Released: 01/06/06

Viewed: 5:20pm 01/11/06

Starring: Ben Kingsley, Kristanna Loken, Michelle Rodriguez, Michael Madsen, Billy Zane, Meat Loaf, Matthew Davis

Directed by: Uwe Boll

Official Site of the movie

Would anyone be surprised if I said that this was the best, most original vampire movie made in the past 25 years? If I said that Kristanna Loken is a rising star, and that Ben Kingsley made a wise choice in taking the part? Well, I would be surprised. None of that is true. Every negative thing you've heard on line, or from your drunken friend who accidentally stumbled into the wrong theater, THAT'S true.

About 50% of the way through this movie about vampire hunters, I found myself wishing I was a vampire, just so they would put me out of my misery. BloodRayne is another in a long line of crappy movies based on video games, brought to us by Uwe Boll. He's also responsible for House of the Dead and last years disaster Alone in the Dark. Each movie is worse than the next, often killing off, in just one weekend, the fan base the games worked so hard to build up. Boll makes Paul Anderson look like the God of game to movie adaptation.

But how bad could it be? Look at the cast. There's some actual talent up there. The real question I was asking myself going in was, how was Boll able to get all these people to read this script and agree to show up? Easy - free money. Paychecks for doing next to nothing will get anyone to show up.

Ben Kinsley: He worked three days at the most. Every scene he has takes place in the same room. All the action his character was involved with was obviously pieced together using stunt men and stand-ins, even for the easiest of moves.

Meat Loaf: 1 day and no more, and he gets to sit around a room filled with naked chicks. I would've done his part for free.

Billy Zane: There's no way his two scenes took more than an afternoon to film. I'm willing to bet more time was spent primping his wig, than he was actually on set.

Michelle Rodriguez: She's an enigma. Her career fluctuates between success and failure. Fast and The Furious, Resident Evil SWAT. Up down up down. This is clearly a down, but the timing was right because LOST was on later that night and I don't care how much she sucked in this, LOST sort of redeems all.

Unfortunately, even with all this talent, they couldn't put a decent scene together. Everyone is phoning it in giving overly dramatic speeches or just reciting the dialogue with no inspiration at all. Loken looked great in the costume, until she started talking. I'm willing to be all of Michael Madsen's scenes were shot just after naptime.

That's really what destroyed the movie for me. I mean with Vampire's and blood, you can put together a cool little story. Then you could get together the most talent people in the world, but if they're not into it, why should we be?

So there are actually some redeeming qualities. This movie is bloody like no ones business, but in a very tame way. It's all "slash-spray" it's not graphic or gory, but it's definitely a hard R in terms of violence. If they could have matched this up with more than 2 decent fight scenes ? that would have been something to talk about.

Another plus is that the movie feels like a video game. She has to collect these pieces to help defeat the boss at the end. That was actually kind of cool. I mean if this guy makes a crappy Ledged of Zelda game, they better make Link find the red ring and the silver arrows. I liked that aspect of things, but that, and all of this, was too little too late.

It's boring, poorly paced, poorly acted, and poorly conceived. When spraying blood is the best quality your film has to offer, the words "Direct to video" are in your future. But what do I know? Uwe Boll has a handful of projects lined up, all video game adaptations, all with seriously talented actors. I'll see them, and they'll suck, and he'll make another. That's the circle of life.

2.5 out of 10 That's a point for the blood, and a point for the boobs. Half a point for the most comically awkward and unnecessarily long love scene I've scene in ages. That "this is so bad it's funny" aspect is probably the best part of the movie. We were laughing pretty hard, pretty consistently, but we weren't supposed to be.

BloodRayne found new ways of making a vampire movie suck hard, and suck frequently. Avoid at all costs. .

DVD worthy?: There's no chance in hell. I might rent it and get a bunch of people together to make fun of it, but there's no way I'll own this.

If you liked this movie check out: Blade

I kept being reminded of Blade. I'm not sure why. There are some major differences, but the vampire hunting, the vampires attempting to take over the world, and the fact that she was a mixed breed kept bringing me back to it.

Blade's not a period piece but in terms of vampire hunting movies, it beats this one (and most other's) to a pulp. Buying Blade with your movie going cash would have been a better investment of money and time.

Trailer Hitch: Brick

Since leaving the TV show he grew up on 3rd Rock From the Sun, Joseph Gordon-Levitt has been very careful with his roles. It probably could have been pretty easy for him to jump into the teen movie circuit. He even had 10 Things I Hate About You to ease the transition. Instead he's opted for smaller roles in more serious (and sometimes disturbing) films.

His latest, Brick, looks like a fantastic gritty look at crime in schools. When his girlfriend goes missing he digs deep into the world to try and find her. And judging by the trailer he gets his ass handed to him over and over again. Looks like fun.

Voting today will get you my favorite incentive image in a while. The Rock in his role mentioned in the strip. I really enjoy the incentive images. I feel like it adds a whole other dimension to the strip.

I've added two new strips to the Ipod preview site at Clickwheel.

One is the BloodRayne strip above, the other is a fresh strip that hasn't updated yet for Last Holiday. That review will go up tomorrow.

I'm surprised by Holiday and two of the other new releases (Glory Road and Hoodwinked). They were able to claim the top 3 spots and finally knock Narnia down a peg or two. We need some fresh meat. Bring on Underworld.

As my last item of the day I wanted to give a shout out to a new web comic called Plot Holes by Jon Scrivens. It's brand new, and has only a few strips up (so you have no excuses for not reading them all). Jon's got a sense of humor that's appealing, and I love the way the art matches it. Give it a read, and I won't kick you.

Thanks for reading guys. More tomorrow.