Writers: Thomas Dean Donnelly, Joshua Oppenheimer
Stars: Brandon Routh, Sam Huntington, Anita Briem
Having at one time specialized in the affairs of the undead, retired private investigator Dylan Dog is reluctantly pulled back into service when a client named Elizabeth hires him to look into the murder of her father at the hands of a werewolf. Following what few leads he has Dylan is soon pursuing an ancient relic that could start a war on the streets of Louisiana between the rival vampire, werewolf and zombie clans that inhabit the cities underbelly. Dealing with uncooperative allies from his past and no specific leads to follow Dylan accompanied by his assistant Marcus must search the bowels of the city for an unknown foe while trying to prevent an impending war.
Having read that this movie was based on a series of Italian comic books which I have never read I’m not sure how well the story and characters transitioned to film. It looked like an entertaining movie when I saw the first trailer but still one of those movies which can wait for DVD. There wasn’t much theater time which indicated I was probably right in my assumption to wait for video and after receiving it from Netflix I was right. Although it does have its share of flaws I don’t think the movie deserved every single bad review it received.
Beginning with the script it was a bit of a mess. Instead of focusing on the main plot it kept dropping hints of another story that was apparently a big part of Dylan’s past and the reason he retired from working with the undead. Using two redundant flashbacks and an extremely bare bones explanation from the villain nothing more is told. It was easy enough to draw an assumption but all that succeeded in doing was making Dead of Night feel as though it should have been a sequel to this barely touched upon story. But as this movie ended up failing that will never happen, not a huge loss either way. Another point of fail is the dialogue which when not intentionally goofy took away from the intended impact some scenes were apparently meant to have as well as making certain characters seem bland and unimpressive.
As for the acting, Brandon Routh and Sam Huntington were the ones who dragged this film as far as it could go. Routh who makes his second attempt at playing a comic book character - Dylan Dog, offers a performance that is slightly brooding while somewhat comical and adds a little bit of tough guy attitude without taking it to serious. Sam Huntington plays the role of Marcus the bumbling sidekick who adds the comic relief with some over acting and a lot of yelling which at times became unfunny and annoying. Some comedy has a limited life span and should be allowed to die with dignity. Taking on the role of Vargas the leader of the vampire clan is Taye Diggs. Lacking that menacing personality any good villain should have it made for a boring and unconvincing performance. This can’t all be blamed on Diggs as the dialogue did help in crushing the potential for this role as with all the others. And finally playing Elizabeth the client is Anita Briem. There really isn’t anything noteworthy of this performance as Briem really didn’t seem to do more than take up space in each shot she was in. Her character was supposed to be a key part in the movie and ended up being lackluster and void of any qualities to indicate otherwise.
This whole concept probably would have worked a lot better had it been a made for cable movie. That way both stories could have been made and not just hint at a potential prequel and leave the viewer guessing the back story. If this is something you feel you need to see cable is a good option.
Rating: 1 1/2 Reels
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