well ummm...parts were strange, but overall it was good, i wanna see the next one (: i'm reading the book at the moment...one part i don't get was if the woman who was like cursed or something was also the kids mother, why wasn't she with him on the subway/train thing???
Russian sci-fi/epic fantasy combo Night Watch, based on a series of novels published over there. has a couple of interesting ideas of it's own, but they never fuse together to become interesting in any way.
Characters appear and dissapear from screen, without really letting the audience find out anything usefull about them. The whole rules about the light and dark forces watching each other seem to be a bit muddled, and it also seems that "anyone" can be a "choosen" one for no other reason than to help advance certain plot twists.
It's also a bit hard to take the whole thing serious when the main bad guy is sporting a Duran Duran type of 80's hairstyle, and also happens to be able to removie his own spine and use it as a blade. All this without you know, falling apart into the ground for the lack of support for his body. Even for fantasy stories there are some things that are just too retarded to take seriouslly.
Oh yeah, the light warriors have their main base in....the electric company, original uh? They also move around in this big ghosbuster-type of van, also wearing jumpsuits. I really welcome a film about vampires and the likes that try to go for another tale that it's not the usual "black leather SM/goth" type, but this is going into the goofy and cheesy-but-not-fun opposite side.
In short: this feels like an attempt of mixing different types of meals in a blender. It might be possible to pull it out, but nothing asssures you the result will taste good.
"The Great Other will appear. If he takes the side of Light, Light will triumph. But wise men say he will choose the Darkness, for it is easier for a man to destroy the Light inside himself than to defeat the Darkness all around him." - really now??
Complex and intriguing.A possible entertaining combination,there's too much mythology flinging all over,it sure is stylized and in a twisted way,demonically effective!As a part 1 of a trilogy,I doubt if the rest will be as worthwhile.
One tremendously unforgettable and cool as hell thrill-ride. A stunning and mind-blowing adventure. A stylish, riveting and truly original horror story. The first chapter to a trilogy that will stand the test of time just like The Lord of the Rings. Thrilling, chilling and incrediably exhilerating. Powerful and unforgettable. Provocative and freightning. Delivers great speacial effects, creepy horror and relentless action. An astonishing piece of work. A true triumph. A visionary piece of art thats true to it's material. Director, Timur Bekmambetov has brought a new type of visionary fantasy to screen and blows you away. Brilliant, scary, groundbreaking and breathtaking. A hard-rocking and energetic edge of your seat ride.
Mad!!!
very stylistic movie....
special effects is consider very good for a non-Hollywood movie....
some of the sequence is quite confusing, too much flashback, plot is not movin smooth....
by the way, the idea is quite interesting....
Wow. This is a amazing film from Russia. Set in modern day Moscow this is about the supernatural armies of Light and Dark (good and evil) and the battles they have and will face. This is stylish and gritty and don't let the idea of subtitles be a put of as this does deserve a look at
I liked it.
The special effects were amazing.
There were some parts that were confusing because they seemed to come out of nowhere, and I was like what just happened.
One of the most trendy and stylish movies I have ever seen. After seeing this, Day Watch, and Wanted, Timur Bekmambetov is now one of my favorite directors.
A very good Russian film, the first in a triology about the battle between good and evil. Has some great SFX, if you like vampire films etc you should like this. A little weird at times but a very stylised film.
The movie in itself looks quite good, as well as sounds, but in the end it just doesn't quite make it.
Plot - and there actually is one - is messy. The images and scenes swing from one place to another. Most of the time, I had no idea of what was going on, why, and with what results.
Part of the time, thanks to the hazy structure of the story, the characters just didn't work and their actions were... mostly illogical, meaningless, or confusing. No real character growth either, or then it was completely out of focus beneath the rest of the disasterous swinging of this movie.
The problem, mostly, is that the people and events are not explored. They are merely thrown at the screen one after another, and apparently the audience is supposed to make sense of it. Sometimes it works - most of the time it doesn't.
I expected so much more from this movie, and was left gravely disappointed.
This film was everything the Hollywood film Underworld wishes it could have been... intelligent, well acted, well scripted... and kinda unsettling at points... It got me hooked on the novels.
If you've read the novel, this film is based on the first of the three stories in the Night Watch book...
Indeed, it's one of few such. The visual style is excellent, with a dark sheen reminiscent.
I loved the battle of wills between good and evil. I also enjoyed seeing the way the Others hide under the surface of the 'normal' Moscow.
The New Yorker | Anthony Lane With its somersaulting trucks, drafts of quaffable blood, and skies full of digitized ravens, Bekmambetov's movie has every intention of whacking "The Matrix" at its own game
I couldn't understand this movie. It's a mix of Matrix and some bad horror. Story of light and dark fighting is boring especially in this matrix version...
The visionary clearly wasn't enough here to entertain me. People who haven't read the book didn't understand one bit of what's going on. And people who did - were simply bored.
One of the biggest successes of Russian literature (and now cinema) and one of the few exports that made it to other countries in recent years has quite an interesting take on the eternal battle of good and evil. The look of this fantasy / horror movie is defined by a wild, sometimes odd mix of modern Matrix-esque special effects and every day life of Moscow, which can be positively described as unique, but also causes quite a bunch of WTF moments. Without having read the novel it's still very apparent that the script had to rush a lot into this first movie of three. Apart from those few rather weird, inappropriate and confusing scenes there isn't all that much to complain about this. It's entertaining and adds some new spices into an old genre. It's just not all that impressive either.
My first Russian film! This one seemed to come well recommended. A very modern day vampire style film, capturing a very different angle to others. I did lose the storyline a bit toward the end, but have to say the effects were terrific, not constant throughout the film, but impressive when they appear.
The effects were really awesome, and the story I guess was okay. I have a feeling that ill like this better a second time around though because it was just so different to take in for the first time.
Overall I liked this flick. It's kind of Blade, Underworld, Matrix and Highlander all thrown into a Russian Blender. I was told the books are good, have to check them out. Also, I saw the dubbed version. I will watch the Russian version and may update the review. I watched the Russian version and it is better. Don't even bother watching the dubbed version.
MCT:November 11, 2008
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