Underworld: Blood Wars (2016)


The Underworld series has gone the usual horror movie route of semi-famous director to guy who helped out on the films to guys hoping to make their big Hollywood break and, with Blood Wars, to general unknown that usually works on television shows.  By now I should be screaming my head off about a decent series stomped into the ground through too many sequels and neglect, with the intent to wring out every last cent from its good name, and wondering who this stuff is still being made for.  But, then, I keep expecting the next Underworld movie to be the one that puts the nail in the coffin, and I keep getting a surprise.

While the humans are now quite aware that Vampires and Lycans exist, it seems that most are satisfied that they are pretty much wiped out or at least not a threat any longer.  Antigen, the big company behind the Cleansing, turned out to be overrun by Lycans.  While Selene (Kate Beckinsale) is able to rescue Eve, Michael mysteriously disappears from the facility.  

Blood Wars, following the pattern of many of the Underworld films, starts not too long after the events of Underworld: Awakening.  Selene is on the run once again from both clans, but they want her alive this time.  It turns out the Lycans have regrouped under a leader named Marius (Tobias Menzies), who has been able to organize them in a way no one has since Lucius.  On the other end the current Vampire Council has convened at the Eastern stronghold, a supposedly impenetrable fortress, and are concerned that Marius is preparing an attack.  While David (Theo James) is back again by Selene's side, her daughter has hidden herself away without giving knowledge of her whereabouts to her mother.  That's a good thing because the Lycans want her for her blood, while Semira (Lara Pulver), a member of the council, wants Selene for the same.  As the Lycan threat grows Selene and David must do what they can to protect the last of their kind. 

Like the other movies in the series we are given an entirely new piece story and the world that it takes place in.  We are introduced to a separate remote Vampire coven led by Vidar (Peter Andersson) in the northern part of Europe, many of whom have discovered powers the other covens haven't.  We also find out more about who David is, and as always we are waist-deep in Vampire politics.  It does try to pack a lot into a short running time, and if there is any major complaint it's that this is a movie that needed be longer.  

Anna Foerster's directing isn't anything spectacular; in fact, she has a bad habit of cutting from one shot to another too quickly, which annoys me in action films.  There is nothing to distinguish her style, which is probably what Len Wiseman wanted so that it didn't change the feel of the series too much.  If anything it is closer in style to the first three films, and less sleekly modern than Awakening.  

Charles Dance is back as Thomas, giving a longer performance as well as adding quite a bit to the story we already know.  Tobias Menzies is imposing as Marius, but the character itself is dull.  Lara Pulver's Semira is much more interesting a villain.  Unfortunately, we again have too short a running time, and without the time to properly develop Marius it seems like adding Semira just creates too many diversions.    

Len Wiseman is planning on producing one more of these films to wrap everything up, even though a number of questions from the last film are answered here.  It will be interesting to see how things turn out in the end, and if there is going to be more lore crammed in as we get to the ultimate finale it may be wise to start letting the movies stretch out a bit more.  Previously they only had as much story to tell as what we saw, but it is starting to feel like the series wants to end as a bit more than a silly action film. 

Underworld: Blood Wars (2016)
Time: 91 minutes
Starring: Kate Beckinsale, Theo James, Tobias Menzies, Lara Pulver, Charles Dance
Director: Anna Foerster

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Lawnmower Man (1992)

Image
Virtual reality has been one of the most hyped, and one of the most disappointing, promises of technology.  While it promotes immersion into a cybernetic world what it really provides are video games with 20-year-old graphics and the occasional bruise when one accidentally hits a closet door.  In the case of The Lawnmower Man  what it is promising is that something with graphics just a little bit better than Dire Straits's "Money for Nothing" video will somehow change the world and alter humanity. It was laughable then and it is laughable now.  The only person not laughing was Stephen King, who demanded that his name be removed from all future advertising for the movie because he never wrote this.  The story, of which a short film was made in the 1980s, involves a man unwittingly hiring a Greek god to mow his lawn and, after said god creates a spectacle, paying for the landscaping with his life.  It's only a few pages and, in my opinion, it is one of King's...
Read more

Things (1989)

Image
Most of the time when I hear a movie is the worst ever I know that is hyperbole. There are few candidates and I would even say the famous book chronicling the worst movies ever made got it wrong.  Plan 9 from Outer Space is laughably incompetent, but enjoyable.  The worst kind of films are the ones where no joy can be found in the watching experience, for reasons ranging from unlikeable characters to just sheer boredom.  A truly horrible movie is something like  Things.   This is a 1989 direct-to-video horror film from Canada, filmed on 8mm and dubbed once it was completed and the makers realized most of the sound was unusable.  Director Andrew Jordan and writer Barry J. Gillis managed to grab porn star Amber Lynn for an hour to shoot her as a news reporter just so they could put her face on the video box.  Most of the music was done by Gillis, and some of it by a local band called Familiar Strangers.  It was filmed in large part in Andrew Norman'...
Read more

The Omen (1976)

Image
A movie does not have to be high art to strike a chord with the public.  The Omen was an attempt by writer David Seltzer to make some money and get a nice trip to the UK.  It just so happened that because of The Exorcist the public was hungry for more movies involving demons and such, and adding a veneer of Catholicism didn't hurt either.  The Vatican's secrets are most likely of more interest to scholars than anyone else, but a religion doesn't hang on over the centuries without creating a bit of mystery.  In this case, Seltzer settled on the Revelation of St. John, the low-fantasy portion of the Bible and, instead of an hilariously named (albeit historically correct) demon named Pazuzu, with The Omen we get the son of Satan himself.  When Robert Thorne (Gregory Peck) is informed that his child has died he visits a priest at the hospital in Rome where his wife is coalescing.  He is given an offer too good to be true: a foundling, whose mother died in...
Read more