Two Cents is a Cinapse original column akin to a book club for films. The Cinapse team curates the series and contribute their “two cents” using a maximum of 200-400 words. Guest contributors and comments are encouraged, as are suggestions for future picks. Join us as we share our two cents on films we love, films we are curious about, and films we believe merit some discussion. Would you like to be a guest contributor or programmer for an upcoming Two Cents entry? Simply watch along with us and/or send your pitches or 200-400 word reviews to cinapse.twocents@gmail.com.
In most of the United States, we’ve been experiencing a record cold streak. Frigid temperatures and vast snowy landscapes are fuel for some truly delightful terrors. This month, we are embracing the cold and watching 4 thrilling films set in the not-so-wondrous Winter. From an underdiscussed found footage gem to a seemingly forgotten vampire gorefest to a thoughtful study on cold weather chills to one of the best King adaptations ever put to celluloid. Beat the cold by warming up with a nice cup of cocoa and a horrifying film that’ll get your blood pumping!
The Pick: 30 Days of Night (2007)
This week, we head to the edges of society, in the frozen tundra of northern Alaska, for a tale of insatiable hunger, unspeakable bloodshed, and the depths of cruelty a pack of near feral vampires can get up to when given 30 nights of pure freedom; we’re talking about 30 Days of Night!
Released in 2007, and based on a graphic novel of the same name, 30 Days of Night rides both the extreme violence wave that came in the wake of the War on Terror, as well as the growing comic book genre, taking much of its cues from other graphic novel adaptions like 300 and Sin City. While the horror archetype of vampire was already starting to slip towards a more YA audience, through the fun-and-sexy Underworld series and the quickly growing phenomenon of the Twilight (which got its first film in 2008), 30 Days of Night went in the exact opposite direction; the vampires here are grotesque, ferociously violent, and deeply, deeply cruel. There is skin tight leather or sparkling here; only frozen blood in the snow, and the screams & cries of loved ones barely rising above the whipping winds.
The Team
Ed Travis
Everything about 30 Days Of Night screams Ed Travis catnip.
And yet, while I enjoy the film well enough, this revisit confirms a weirdly specific issue I have that keeps me from loving it unreservedly… and it’s right there in the title.
The set up is AWESOME: Of COURSE vampires would want to attack and feast upon a small isolated community in an arctic environment where the sun won’t rise for 30 days. And of COURSE if Josh Hartnett happens to be the sheriff of that town, he’s going to throw down with those vampires.
But then comes this seeming nitpick that kills this thing for me: The passage of time. Time is obviously a factor in all of our lives and bleeds right on into cinema. Most movies don’t attempt to unfold in “real time”, and how do you depict the passage of 30 days in your vampire movie? Well, in director David Slade’s hands… it turns out you don’t depict it very well. Yes, that’s right, I struggle to love 30 Days of Night because it portrays the passage of time in an unsatisfactory way.
Unfortunately that matters quite a bit. Played smart, the audience would feel the tension of surviving, waiting, watching, learning, etc. Instead the titular 30 Days seem to pass by randomly and the audience doesn’t always feel privy to important developments that have transpired over this lengthy period of time surviving a vampire siege.
There’s cool shit left and right here, like the animalistic design of the vampires, their weird language, and… Danny Huston! Hartnett is also innocent, with his character having somewhat of a redemptive arc that might be the best part of the storytelling on display in the film. But there’s just something off with the structure, the editing, the pacing. A 30 day standoff should slow build, the tension should ratchet, the audience should learn a little bit more about the protagonists and the villains as they skirmish over the course of this battle. Instead it feels disjointed and uneven. But dammit, it still does feel pretty cool. I just find myself focused on the shortcomings more than I want to be as this otherwise gnarly supernatural siege unfolds.
Justin Harlan
I’ve only seen this one once before. The first time we saw it was soon after it dropped on DVD (on the good ole Netflix physical disc program) and me wife hated it. So, I’d never rewatched it until now. My memory of the film was foggy, but I remembered it being dark and bloody. And… it was indeed both dark and bloody.
Honestly, I couldn’t give this one the undivided attention I feel it deserves, so my third watch of this film is likely much sooner – certainly not another 18-19 years as was the case this time.
With that in mind, I did enjoy this one a good bit. The intensity, fast paced action, and buckets of blood are all pretty appealing to my sensibilities. The darkness and the cold are characters in and or themselves, which plays greatly into the Winter horror theme for this month, as well. While I have limited commentary beyond this – for now – I genuinely appreciate this selection and am happy to have it back on my radar for subsequent viewings!
Frank Calvillo
It’s no wonder that Sam Raimi attached his name to 30 Days of Night. The project has so much to it that appeals to the horror master’s sensibilities in terms of practical effects and a killer crop of menacing creatures. It’s hard to find a horror film that feels more 2007 that this one. 30 Days of Night features Josh Hartnett in the era where he was still aiming for leading man status, plus a collection of welcome faces, including a game Melissa George, Danny Huston at his most obviously terrifying, and Ben Foster during his peak unhinged period.
Having never read the graphic novel on which this is based, I can only judge 30 Days of Night as a pure movie experience, which this more than delivers. The creature design is perfectly frightful, creating a special breed of vampire that comes across as otherworldly and appropriately menacing, yet still feels as if they can actually exist among us. Also helping tremendously is the frozen, desolate landscape in which all the events play out. Shrouded in darkness and covered in snow, the physical world of 30 Days of Night does give off a feeling that this is truly the end of times. This is a world that feels as if no one else exists in it and no one is coming to save you. In that special pre-Twilight era, 30 Days of Night proved a real gem in the vampire genre thanks to its effective setup and the filmmakers’ ability to take things to their fullest. The effects, creature makeup, and that gut-wrenching ending, makes this one of the more worthwhile examples of the genre.
Spencer Brickey
30 Days of Night is a film I’ve felt the need to champion for nearly 20 years now. While it put up a pretty strong box office, it’s one of those titles that seems to have disappeared from people’s memory. Is it because it fell so neatly into the “300 rip-off” genre that people were quick to pack away and forget about? (when’s the last time you heard anyone mention The Spirit?). Or is it because it came out one year before Twilight completely rewrote the book on Vampire lore and gave exclusive rights to the YA crowd? Either way, I’m pulling out my blood stained soapbox to make an impassioned plea to go and watch this!
30 Days of Night is just an excellent out-and-out horror film. It lays out the setting (the edge of civilization in the barrens of Alaska), the situation (the town gets dropped into 30 days of complete darkness) and the antagonists (a pack of terrifying vampires have shown up to throw a party) neatly and economically. Clockwork filmmaking on display as we shift into vampire violence early, and often. Director David Slade knows why we’re here, and he shifts into “vampire carnage mode” quickly and efficiently.
The vampires of 30 Days of Night are truly frightening; tall dark figures with black eyes and mouths full of razor sharp teeth. They look like they’ve been pulled from a nightmare, or from some genetic memory that represents “fear”. They wear clothes and communicate, but any sort of humanity they possess seems to exist to either facilitate better communal carnage, or to mock those they slaughter.
And, boy oh boy, do they slaughter. The violence here is mean. For those who forgot what movies were like in the wake of the Towers falling and at the peak of the War on Terror, horror was a nasty, mean spirited business. 30 Days of Night is no different; the vampires revel in their bloodshed, playing with their victims, cackling in delight at the sight of steaming entrails. There is one sequence, where we watch the head vampire move his way through a home, killing its occupants while playing an old record, that feels like it was pulled from an old Italian sleaze film like House At The Edge of The Park.
But, all those horrifying vampires and vicious bloodshed goes down a little bit easier with how good this film looks. While it might have seemed a bit gimmicking in 2007, especially off the back of 300, 30 Days of Night style of big, grandiose digital vistas in the first act add a sense of scale and awe to the land that our soon to be victims have called home; it is wide, it is majestic, but it is empty. These wide shots of mountains and valleys quickly become tight, claustrophobic shots of people huddled in homes, in basements, in cupboards, the cool-tinted warmth of the descending sun on snow replaced by harsh fluorescents and grittier grains. The painterly world of the day gives way to the stark, violent desolation of the night.
30 Days of Night is a lean, mean little slice of bleak horror. It’s a great premise turned into a blood soaked nightmare. There are plenty of good-to-great horror films that have fallen between the cracks from the 2000’s; hell, even others from 2007 (one day I will make others see what I see about Dead Silence!). 30 Days of Night is very much one worth your time, especially if you’re already freezing your butt off, and could use a little reminder that “it could always be worse”.
All month, we’ll be trying to heat ourselves up by watching some freezing cold terrors! Join in by sending your thoughts on any of the films above to cinapse.twocents@gmail.com or your favorite Cinapse staffer by early in the week listed above. Hope to see you all month long and try to stay warm!
