First off, I love a good vampire movie. While I’m not an aficionado, a blood-sucking plot always gets my attention whether it be a more modern tale like Underworld or a classic like From Dusk Til Dawn. BloodRayne, however, left me actually quite bored. Forget the fact that the movie was loosely based on the game’s concept. But if you strip away the videogame veneer, the movie still really sucked, and not in a good, vampiric way. The movie tells of the Brimstone Society, a group whose goal is to unseat Kagan, the vampire leader who is so powerful he even has an army of humans serving him. In the meantime, Kagan, played by Ben Kingsley (The House of Sand and Fog, Gandhi) is forever searching for his long-lost daughter, a dhampir –- part human and part vampire. Unfortunately for Kagen, his daughter is Rayne and she wants nothing more than to kill him and every other vampire she encounters. She’s slightly bitter after watching Kagen rape and murder her mother in front of her own eyes.
Among the cast’s stars are Michael Madsen (Kill Bill, Sin City) who laughably plays Brimstone Society leader Vladimir and Michelle Rodriguez (Lost, Resident Evil), as Katarin, who actually turns in a really good performance. Yes, I know she is playing what she always plays, a bad-ass chick, but it is a good performance. Billy Zane (Titanic, The Phantom) made me laugh during his short screen time, with his intensity and wry humor as Katarin’s father. Oh and don’t get me started on Meatloaf as a vampire leader surrounded by naked vampire chicks (that were supposedly played by actual Romanian prostitutes because they were cheaper than actresses). Yikes is all I can say.
This film isn’t shy about the hack ‘n slash gore or nudity. Well, for starters, if Kristanna Loken stars in a movie, you know you are guaranteed at least one nude scene by her and it is in here. As for the violence, I certainly don’t mind gore if it adds to the movie, but in this case, it was supremely laughable. People hacked in half for the hell of it, vampiric blood lust and rage, it is all here. But that’s not the worst of it. At the end of the movie there's a wrap-up of all of the strange scenes, most of which probably ended up on the cutting room floor, but were placed back in at the last minute as a montage (indicated to be Rayne’s musings) of various fight scenes and moments throughout the movie. The thing is, I don’t remember these particular instances happening in the movie. They seemed like longer, gorier and stupider versions of what we had already seen. Some were completely laughable. Ok, most were. Sadly enough, this was a new, "alternate" ending. I don't know what the original ending was, but they probably should have stuck with it because it can't have been worse than this.
Special features include things like "Dinner with Uwe", where Uwe Bolle and two interviewers sit at a little table and drink wine and eat food while discussing the movie. Odd for sure. There’s also a commentary and some making of featurettes, but also included is the complete BloodRayne 2 videogame for the PC, which is a nice perk.
That being said, this is a bad movie. It doesn’t have much of anything in the way of redeeming qualities, aside from the included videogame. Even if you are a videogame movie collector purist, this is not one that you necessarily need in your collection. However, if you had planned to get the game anyway, then it might be a good deal for you. As for the movie, rent if you must, but don’t come crying to me when you have watched it and want that 99 minutes of your life back.
