30 Days of Night: The Lurking, Endless Fear (SPOILERS!!!)

“I know I'm human. And if you were all these things, then you'd just attack me right now, so some of you are still human. This thing doesn't want to show itself, it wants to hide inside an imitation. It'll fight if it has to, but it's vulnerable out in the open. If it takes us over, then it has no more enemies, nobody left to kill it. And then it's won.”
-- R.J. Macready from The Thing (1982)

“That cold ain't the weather, that's death approaching.”
-- The Stranger from 30 Days of Night

As 30 Days Of Night opens, Ben Foster as the Stranger is walking from a large ship docked in the ice. His walk along the icy Alaskan wasteland is a very impressive shot. His destination is the town of Barrow, Alaska-- the northernmost city in the United States. From the film’s opening, cinematographer, Jo Willems, and art directors Nigel Churcher and Mark Robins have created a beautiful and ominous looking world. Feelings of dread and unease envelop the audience as Foster surveys the town from a distance. His arrival can only mean something very horrible is about to happen. The town of Barrow is about to go dark for thirty days-- no daylight for a whole month. As the film opens, many of the residents are leaving to go south. The beauty of David Slade’s film is that he gets to the action from the beginning. David Slade has given Steven Niles and Ben Templesmith’s graphic novel of the same name a cinematic fury that never lets up. Steven Niles is also one of the film’s screenwriters. David Slade’ previous film was Hard Candy which served as a vivid reminder that maybe meeting people online is not always a good idea. With 30 Days of Night, Slade goes even further. It is very rare to see a horror film that really frightens me these days. The level of fear in the film surpasses most things I have seen in recent years. Only Juan Carlos Fresnadillo’s 28 Weeks Later comes close to matching this film. The rapid fire change from human to zombie in that film was down right terrifying. The furious dehumanization of its characters created a real sense of fear. David Slade does that with great ease in this film. Hope exits the film very quickly.

When Sheriff Eben Oleson, played by a very effective Josh Harnett, and his partner discover a large pile of burnt cell phones, it does not bode well for the town of Barrow. All of the sleigh dogs are found slaughtered. Who would do this? Why? But as the audience, we know what is going on. Someone or something does not want you to leave town or be able to seek help. Isolation is the order of the day. The town’s power plant shuts down. With the arrival of The Stranger in the town, something awful is on the horizon. As the long cold winter takes shape, the eternal darkness sets in and it is not just absence of sunlight for thirty days. Ben Foster’s Stranger is the advance man for a gang of vampires who have chosen Barrow as their next feeding ground. The Stranger is like the Silver Surfer in the Fantastic Four comic books. He served as the advance man to the planet devouring giant, Galactus. After a run in with Sheriff Eben at the town diner, the Stranger is taken to the jail where he is handcuffed to the cell door. From this position, he forecasts impending doom. Eben and his estranged wife, Stella (Melissa George) listen to what the crazy stranger has to say.

2007 is Ben Foster’s year. He stole the show as Charlie Prince in 3:10 To Yuma. His fiercely loyal David Prince was a throwback to a Peckinpah character. He broke out of Russell Corwin’s shadow, the character he played on Six Feet Under, with such thuggish roles in films like Hostage and Alpha Dog. As the Stranger, he comes across as Elisha Cook Jr. on crack. You see, he keeps saying they did not take me away. He has made a deal with the vampires; he will do everything they ask of him and then make him one of them. The Stranger is as pathetic as he naïve. Foster is perfect in the role-- a modern day Renfield who is a miserable pest.

The film could have easily been called The Longest Month. For thirty days, Eben, Melissa, Eben’s brother, Jake (Mark Rendall) and a handful of survivors must figure out ways to endure until sunlight returns. The best thing to do is to hide and figure out how to outlast these super powerful predators. Guerrilla warfare tactics will come into play, but it seems the vampires are always one step ahead of their human prey.

There are some great set pieces and several wonderful uses of foreshadowing early in the film. The vampires are sleek and fast-- jumping from houses and using other humans as bait. They are relentless in their pursuit. Guns and bullets do not work on them-- they only annoy the hell out of them. A trusty, sharp ax is the best way to deal with these creatures-- severing their heads destroys them.

As Eben, Harnett is very good. He was one of the few bright spots in The Black Dahlia, but he seems to shine in this film. For some reason, the audience feels safe with him as the Sheriff. Before the De Palma film, I had not seen him in anything that really grabbed me. The former “It” boy finally does well and lives up to his potential. And like Vacancy earlier this year, the film’s gruesome events serve as a way to save his marriage to Melissa-- although this film is way ahead of the Luke Wilson/Kate Beckinsale motel hell frenzy. What works very well in the film is some of the plot devices. Harnett’s character rises the occasion; he is perfect for this genre.

The film’s greatest asset is that it brings fear and anxiety back to the audience. The vampire is something to be feared; our dreams of them are real. It helps that the vampires are led by Danny Huston. As Marlow, he earns his last name just as he did in The Proposition. Huston’s Marlow and his vampire cronies speak in a foreign dialect. We never doubt Huston’s feral nature. His rawness, when dealing with victims and especially when dealing with Ben Foster, does not surprise us, but it instills fear in us. This is not The Little Vampire. Toward the end, Marlow needs to ensure there are no survivors. The need to make sure that the humans only know them as “bad dreams” must remain intact. We believe he has been doing this for centuries. Huston excels at playing these parts. Marlow could easily be the long lost brother of The Proposition’s Arthur Burns.

I feel 30 Days of Night is a chilling and incredibly well done horror film. Horror films do not always succeed in creating a truly scary atmosphere, but this film does it right away. I was not expecting to be as impressed as I was with this film. Truth be told, I do love the genre, but I have burned out on it over the years. Too many remakes and just too many remakes of Asian horror films have soured me, but this film, along with 28 Weeks Later, is bringing me back into the fold. I roll my eyes more than I care to admit while watching the latest horror films. At least the Saw films still mange to make me turn away during their most disgusting parts.
Slade has created a feeling of isolation and despair that I have not seen since John Carpenter’s The Thing. I could not help thinking of that film which still haunts me. It also reminds me of John Carpenter’s The Fog. The atmosphere is the real star of that film. The mist is a real creepy presence. While I feel Harnett’s Eben is no match for Kurt Russell’s Macready, I still needed to see how he would handle this crisis. While I do like 30 Days of Night, it is not in the same league as those John Carpenter films. Suspense and curiosity make a great team. The unrelenting pulse is key to the film’s appeal-- an adrenaline rush of fear. David Slade has created an environment of fear-- a horror film that can truly scare me is one worth seeing. As in many horror films, particularly vampires stories, surviving through the night means life and salvation.

We Own The Night: Brooklyn Darkness

“What are you doing? Nice college boy. Doesn't wanna get mixed up in the family business. You think this is a battle field where you shoot someone a mile away? No, you get a 45' shoot them up close and bada bing blood all over your nice ivy league suit. You're taking this awfully personal. Tom this is business and this kid's taking this very personal.”
-- Sonny Corleone from The Godfather

James Gray has made only three films in thirteen years. Like John Dahl, he has a mastery and firm understanding of the crime drama. We Own The Night may not be in the same league as Little Odessa or The Yards, but give it time to sink in. I was not blown away by We Own The Night. Seven years ago, I felt the same way about The Yards, but it grew on me over the years. I have a feeling the same will be true with We Own The Night. The first thing that stands out in this film is the cinematography. If I did not know any better, I would have sworn this film was shot by Gordon Willis, the veteran cinematographer of the Godfather films, The Parallax View, All The President’s Men and many other classics. The film’s cinematographer, Joaquin Baca-Asay, creates a vivid world of varying degrees of darkness-- one cannot help but think of certain scenes from The Godfather. The film may take place in the Brooklyn of the late Eighties, but it has a definite Seventies style darkness to it. It is very refreshing. Wojcech Kilar’s haunting and brooding score only heightens the dark moods. His music works very well here as it did in Roman Polanski’s The Ninth Gate and Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula.

We Own The Night is a very straightforward crime drama. This is not a bad thing, but the film does take its time getting into gear. The film is a slow burning firecracker, but when it explodes, it never comes up for air. James Gray understands this genre very well-- the family and its relationship to crime. At its heart, Little Odessa is about a dysfunctional family in Brighton Beach’s Russian immigrant community. The Yards is about family connections and a grand treatise on corruption. In that film, Mark Wahlberg and Joaquin Phoenix play best friends, almost brothers, on opposite sides of the tracks. In We Own The Night, they play brothers on opposite sides of the law. At first the film feels like a retread of The Yards, not only with its two leading actors, but the plot also feels somewhat familiar. In The Yards, Wahlberg’s Leo Handler is an ex-con drawn back into a world of crime by his best friend, Phoenix’s Willie Guiterrez. In the new film, Wahlberg’s Joseph Grusinsky, is the good cop brother who followed in the dedicated father’s footsteps, while Phoenix’s Bobby Green took a different path. The father, Burt Grusinsky, is played by veteran actor, Robert Duvall. Burt is the chief of police and is very proud of Joseph for the path he has taken. Bobby is another story. He went his own way. He is the club manager of El Caribe in Brooklyn during the 1980’s. He has shady associates; his connections with these associates will come into direct conflict with his cop brother and father. The Russian mafia is running drugs out of the club. Joseph and Burt want Bob to spy on the clientele. Bob will have to make a decision on which side of the law he wants to be. By taking his mother’s maiden name, no one in the club world knows he is related to a family of cops. It is an enormous risk to take. He must decide where his loyalties lie-- with his family or the criminal underworld.

We Own The Night belongs to Joaquin Phoenix. He owns the film. Sadly, Wahlberg and Duval are on the sidelines; this film is about Bobby Green. Mark Wahlberg did excellent work in The Departed and Shooter, but he does not have much to do this time. Robert Duvall, like James Caan before him in The Yards, gives his role a level of respectability. When The Yards came out, it was criticized for being a Godfather wannabe. The same could be said for We Own The Night and the depiction of Bobby Green. The visuals aside, Bobby Green reminds me a lot of Al Pacino’s Michael Corleone in The Godfather. Michael went his own way. He enlisted in the Marines right after Pearl Harbor. He did not want anything to do with the family business. After the War, he goes to Dartmouth and he wants nothing to do with family business. When an attempt is made on his Father’s life, everything changes. Things change for Bobby Green as well. He may be the black sheep of the family, but he loves his brother and father. After the notorious Russian drug dealer, Vadim Nezhinski (Alex Veadov) is busted in El Caribe by the police, the Russians try to take out Joseph. He survives the hit. In the first half, it seems that Bobby’s loyalties are to the club lifestyle and all of the things that go with it. He and his girlfriend, Amanda Juarez (Eva Mendes) have everything going for them. Bobby is in the good graces of a kindly Russian, Marat Buzhayev (Moni Moshonov). Marat likes what he is doing for them at the club. In the first half of the film, this is his family. How can Bobby be so naïve about Buzhayev? Before the hit, Bobby and Joseph are at each other throats, but this all changes once the two families cross paths. All bets are off, Bobby must pick a side. As in The Yards, I feel Phoenix carries the film. We Own The Night is Bobby’s story. He is the one who must make the choice and decide where he really belongs. Since To Die For, Joaquin Phoenix has made a name for himself. Most of the time, he brings so much to each part. Inventing The Abbotts, Clay Pigeons, Gladiator, The Yards, Buffalo Soldiers, Ladder 49 and his epic turn as Johnny Cash in Walk The Line show an incredible progression of range and authority. We Own The Night would not work without him. Robert Duvall and Mark Wahlberg are good in the film, but they serve more as plot points than fully realized characters. Phoenix is a powerhouse as Bobby Green. Bobby’ transition is going to be a make or break deal for audiences. It does require a certain suspension of disbelief.

While the film is not perfect, it does boast some great set pieces-- one being an incredible, if brief car chase in the rain. Some critics have suggested this is a homage to the iconic car chase in The French Connection, but I feel that is misleading. It just does not go on as long and it has a different level of intensity. Taking place in the pouring rain adds to the ominous atmosphere that permeates the film. The final shootout is a great sequence which will recall the ending of Little Odessa. Speaking of Little Odessa, it seems that James Gray has an affinity for these troubled souls trying to do the right thing for family. In the end, Phoenix’s Bobby Green and Wahlberg’s Leo Handler are variations on Tim Roth’s Joshua Shapira in Little Odessa. Both characters come very close to the moral complexities of Joshua, but he is in a class by himself. Gray told this story so well on his first time out. Although over time, I am sure We Own The Night, like The Yards will grow on me. Little Odessa is a hard act to follow. Think of it as The Departed lite.