Fangs for the memories

Being a 'bit' of a horror movie fan I do enjoy a good vampire movie. Sadly they're few and far between. The latest vamp flick to hit Australian cinemas, 30 Days of Night is a case in point. It's got a lot going for it, but it's still not good.

While there's a modicum of suspense, some beautiful cinematography, and some credible acting going on, its dire script really lets things down. Nor does it help that the vampires, for some unexplained reason, speak a guttural tongue that A) requires subtitles, and B) majorly reduces the ability of the actors playing the leeches to deliver their lines with anything resembling gravitas.

The plot's a cute one though: Barrow, Alaska, is the northernmost town in the USA, and each year experiences 30 days of darkness in mid-winter during which the sun never rises. It's a perfect opportunity for a pack of vampires - led by Danny Huston, pictured - to descend and feed, though they're still careful enough to cover their tracks; they also try to ensure not to turn everyone they feed on into new revenents.

(Exactly why they want to kill everyone in town without turning them into vampires is never explained - I mean, if this was a recruiting mission it would make sense; it's what they do every winter - descend on a town, feed, and increase their numbers. But nope, that's not what these bloodsuckers want. Maybe they just want to kill for the fun of it? But what do they do the rest of the year - sleep beneath the permafrost or something? These, and other questions, remain unanswered...at least in the screenplay. Something tells me the original comics the film is based on would somehow flesh out some of these details...)

Back to the plot. Our hero is Eben, the local sherrif (played an increasingly sombre, scruffy and consistently wooden Josh Hartnett) and his estranged wife Stella (Australian actor Melissa George), who band together and lead the slowly-dwindling handful of survivors as the dark days drag on. And that's about it as far as the plot goes - though the film does touch on a few moral issues from time to time, such as the question of retaining your humanity in the face of such over-whelming horror - it's a pretty light touch though, with director David Slade knowing his core audience of teenage boys doesn't want philosophy or moral conundrums; they want thrills, action and violence.

There's lots of opportunities for decapitation, mutilation, screaming, eye-strainingly-rapid jump-cuts, and furious blood-letting (although thankfully while gruesome the film is not overly graphic - torture-porn this ain't): including a great set-piece shot from above showing the degree of carnage and chaos in the town as the vampires attack en masse.

There could have been opportunities for character development and interpersonal drama beyond the superficial; but there ain't. Instead we're lumbered with expository dialogue - especially between Hartnett and George's characters - and not much else to save the film apart from the extremely active action sequences. I hoped this would be a vivid, frenetic roller-coaster ride, but instead of getting my heart-rate going, I was actually a little bored, 'cos on the genre front, it's basically an action thriller, not a tightly-wound horror movie.

So yeah, the film of 30 Days of Night is a little sucky. I might hunt down the original graphic novel instead.

Speaking of which - how good is the new Buffy the Vampire Slayer comic written by Joss Whedon? If you've been having Buffy withdrawal since the tv series wrapped up at the end of Season Seven, you'll definitely want to pick up the first six issues, which have just been reprinted in a handy collection: Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Long Way Home.

The comic is pitched as Season Eight, and pretty much picks up where the tv show ended. All the potential Slayers in the world are now actively fighting the forces of darkness, with a one-eyed Xander helping coordinate the Slayer teams from their magic-and-technology equipted HQ. Whedon's dialogue is just as sharp as ever; all the regular characters are back, including a couple of old villains you know and love; and there's some new villains on the horizon - and like The Initiative, these guys wear uniforms...

I'll definitely be keeping tabs on this series as it unfolds!