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Review: Blade II - Electric Boogaloo
He finds him, of course. Mind you, Whistler's now a vampire who is in some kind of hastily unexplained "stasis" for the last few years, so that Blade can inoculate him against the vampire virus and make him human again. The science in this movie, by the way, is insultingly bad, and exceptionally inconsistent. It seems to me if you are going to offer some kind of crappy vampire virus you might as well make it somewhat consistent. It's airborne! It's blood borne! It turns out it's script borne, infecting those who it's convienient to infect and missing, strangely, Blade and his pals.
The story (which I urge you to ignore) is that Blade must team up with the "BloodPack" to defeat a new, powerful and virulent strain of vampires known as the "Reaper" strain which poses a threat to the Vampire Nation and to Humanity alike.
I don't want to dwell on the story too much since, well, the producers of Blade II didn't, so why should I? But the stupid names they chose for everything. "Whistler," "Scud" and "Blade" must defeat the "Reapers" with the help of the "Bloodpack" of the "Vampire Nation." This clearly points to their actual audience. Immature 13-year-old boys up late watching bad cable when Cinemax after dark just isn't doing it for them.
And me, I guess, I mean, I did go and watch this tripe. Perhaps the only redeeming features of Blade II are the fight scenes, a number of which were even filmed such that you could see what was going on. The ones you could make out were fantastic, full of groovy moves and excellent gymnastics and flashing leather, steel, vampire flavored flash bangs and flying silver bullets. So that was fun, but watching Blade II makes you realize how well Blade I's fights were filmed. And don't get me into the numerous continuity errors that whap you on the forehead every ten minutes.
As far as Wesley Snipes' performance, it was energetic. I'd place this movie somewhere between Drop Zone and Passenger 57 in the Snipes oeuvre.
So , if you really really really like playing Mortal Kombat-style fighting games, go see Blade II. Also, if you want to see the trailer for the upcoming Friday the 13th movie, Jason X, Jason in Space, go see Blade II. Yes, I'm serious, Jason X. 10! In Space! Starring lots of Canadian sci-fi actors on break from Andromeda ! I weep for action cinema. Thank God I've got Hard Boiled on DVD.
Roger Ebert (don't laugh until you've read his column- the TV show DOESN'T COUNT):k p-news-bl ade22f.html
http://www.sun-times.com/output/ebert1/w
Excerpts:
The movie is an improvement on "Blade" (1998), which was pretty good.
[...]
This news is conveyed by a vampire leader whose brain can be dimly seen through a light blue translucent plastic shell, more evidence of the design influence of the original iMac.
[...]
You can sense the difference between a movie that's a technical exercise ("Resident Evil") and one steamed in the dread cauldrons of the filmmaker's imagination.
"Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
PS I think JasonX looks like Grade A, B movie goodnes.
psxndc
The emacs religion: to be saved, control excess.
Jon Katz didn't write this review.
I didn't think it was THAT bad, geez. Ya it had some problems but this isn't the kind if movie you go and see for a plot, you see it for some good FX and lots-o-vampire-Asswhoopin. That is what the movie had, technology and science be damned. It wasn't made to be on the plot line level of say brotherhood of the wolf, or Braveheart, it was made to be as it was. The next time you go to see a movie, try to have a realistic expectaion of what it will have, and it will have what you are expecting.
Plain and simple...
if you want "No More Hiroshimas" then I say "You First. No More Pearl Harbors."
Blade II reminded me a lot of Resident Evil. Mostly in regard to the "creatures". The plot was decent, I suppose. There was a lot of action, as to be expected. And I thought that Wesley Snipes does a great job of acting. The special effects were definately better than in Blade I. I too saw the trailer of Jason X, it appears that on every deep space exploration mission, some evil being appears... 2 Andromeda women are in the Jason X movie, Lexa Doig, and someone who's name eludes me at the moment.
They were like beavers! The new strain of vampires lived underwater in a damn made from bones. Did the people working on the script have writers block and decide, "Hey lets make them like beavers".
I particularly liked the fact that the vampire virus wasn't just referred to as a virus, but an arbovirus, an actual viral group that includes the agents of yellow fever and dengue. Somebody actually must have cracked open a virology textbook! Then again, arboviruses are transmitted by insects, a fact that wasn't used at all in the movie, so maybe they just liked the name.
Who honestly went to this movie to look for a storyline comparable to Lord of the Rings? Like come on, you went into it expecting WAY too much.
It's based on a comicbook, every comicbook movie sequel has been cheese. Why would you expect any different of Blade II? Did anyone else notice the appearance of Danny John Jules aka "The Cat" from Red Dwarf? He probably just used his same cat teeth from Red Dwarf heh. Anyway, the movie is meant to be entertainment just like the WWF and that's all it is plain & simple. The fight scenes were well done, it had some gore, some corny lines and a chick in leather.
It was entertaining, all in all an okay show to see. =)
I liked it.
:(
Decent use of surround sound in what was not even a THX theater (rare!).
I thought that the story was pretty good too, nothing revolutionary, but it got the point done (reason to go around beating the sh*t out of things.)
Not as many things were killed in Blade II as in the original Blade, but it defintly made me keep on saying to myself "Man they hired one hell of a fight scene choragrapher."
Did some scenes of the fights (specificaly the parts up in the air) seems almost like they used clay animation or something? No I am serious, it almost looks like free form computer deformation based animation effects of some sort. In other words, very 'clay' like. During one scene the characters even took on a distiguishable NON-REAL apperance. I am VERY surprised that that scene made it past QA in its current form.
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It's big. It's brawny. It's darker, it's scarier, it's downright vicious compared to the kicked dog that is now the original "Blade."
Sure the names are simple and the action is over-energetic. This is a living comic book folks, and anybody who's ever read a comic book will easily see the connection. We have the "cool" shots of him putting on his sunglasses, the "slow-mo-coming-out-of-the-water-with-big-guns" shot, etc. The framing is specific and easy to follow. The story for "Blade 2," like any well-plotted comic book, is driven by action. Unlike other superhero films (*cough*TombRaider*cough*) that rely on "stopping points" to explain plot, "Blade 2" just throws it all at you and expects you to keep up. The new Reapers are easily the most frightening thing I've seen on the big screen in the past few years, I don't know about you.
The plot of course is that Blade helps the vampires destroy the vampire-eaters. But, and this is going to sound a bit strange, it still manages to convey the importance of loyalty, tells a love story, and captures betrayal in a non-cringing and original way. This is especially important for a film such as this, where such melodrama is encouraged, but normally goes too far to remain serious. And now that we've moved past the "origin story" film, scribe David Goyas finally breathes life into a character who desperately needs it.
And you have to give a hand to director Guillermo Del Toro. Look at a few of his past few films: The first brilliant 1/2 hour of "Mimic" and the exceptional ghost story "The Devil's Backbone". Del Toro takes a gritty sense of realism and blends it with a stylish take that the original "Blade" was painfully missing. The editing is the true defintion of "The Fast and the Furious," with jump-jump cuts and brutal slow-down that was tried in "Moulin Rouge" but is brought to perfection here.
Let's face it folks, it's a popcorn film. It's meant to be seen with friends so they, just like yourself, can spout Blade's one-liners for the next few weeks and groan in unison at the most gruesome spots.
Del Toro's amazing direction and Goyer's much-better-than-the-first-Blade script make this a solid hit. See it loud and proud on the big screen in a dark room with strangers. This one's a true crowd pleaser.
Evan (blog); I write for here and here.
How BII is enigmatic of the post Enron collapse when viewed thru the vampire genre of hollywood. Enron execs feeding on the blood of staffers while extolling the new world that they and they alone will create....
Not as violent as the MPAA raping American citizens with laws they passed using your dollars.
I saw the trailer for that. It looked pretty stupid, but I bet it'll make a lot of money anyway. I hear they're releasing it along with a new trailer for Episode 2! I'm saving up my popcorn money starting today!
The enemies of Democracy are
I still don't agree with Katz' reviews, even when he uses a pseudonym.
Funny, I thought Snipes studied Capoiera (Brazilian street fighting a la Eddy Gordo in Tekken)
I believe you are correct. However the moves he is coreographed using are from various styles in all his movies. I have seen him use Kenpo techniques and Tae Kwon Do as well.
The thing is, in a movie an actor rarely sticks to one individual style (unless you are someone like Segal).
Snipes was not exclusively using the Cheung Wing Chun style (there was much in there that was not from that style, like the WWF moves...) but this is the first place I have seen so much of it. The fight scene after he gets out of the pool of blood has the most Wing Chun (the bear hug defense/takedown) and he uses some Biu Gee eye jabs in a very apparent Wing Chun form in this scene, as well as various basic Wing Chun techniques (applicable to all Wing Chun styles, not just Cheungs) and probably common to many other styles as well.
(And if you want to get picky the way the "Ninjas" used the swords, and Blade used his sword is more of a Chinese Wushu style more applicable to a "Dan Dao" Chinese sword. And not a katana (Japanese) style weapon. Those who practice Kendo or Iado probably cringe at those scenes.)
Still, none of this matters. It looked cool, and there were some real techniques in there that I noticed. Things that really work in the real world. Sure, most of the stuff was the "flowery" stuff. But every now and then there was a "gritty" no-nonsense technique that is simple and effective. The combination of all that really made me enjoy the film overall.
Bottom line, if you are a martial artist, you will probably enjoy the fight scenes. (Just remember that you are supposed to laugh at the really silly stuff.)
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!