Rayne (Natasia Malthe) is a Dhampir: part vampire, part human and all bad ass. She is also a day-walker, which means she doesn't succumb to the perils of daylight, as vampires do. She joins up with a resistance group fighting the Nazis, led by Nathaniel (Brendan Fletcher), when they attack a series of trains headed for Auschwitz, thinking that the trains contain weapons when really, they are loaded with Jews headed for slaughter. It is here that Rayne faces down Commandant Ekart Brand (Michael Pare) and spears him through the heart, but not before getting shot in the process and having her blood splatter into his mouth. The Commandant then begins his transformation into a Dhampir, under the care of Dr. Mengele (Clint Howard), who has been studying vampires in an attempt to make Hitler immortal and now, he just got one step closer.
When Rayne visits a local brothel for a massage and ends up brutally beating a Nazi serviceman who was roughing up one of the ladies, a prostitute hoping for favors from the Nazis rats Rayne out to the Commandant. Soon, the Nazis are upon her and after a brutal battle, Rayne escapes, but not before leaving some of her blood, which Dr. Mengele greedily scoops up, hoping to use for his precious Fuhrer.
Soon, Dr. Mengele is turning Nazi soldiers into vampires to raise an unstoppable army. Armed with a sample of her blood and a tracker vampire to find her, the Nazis are hot on Rayne's tail and aim to destroy the Resistance once and for all, before making their way to Berlin to immortalize their wicked leader. It will take all of the Resistance's resolve and Rayne's deadly skills with the blade for the motley group to defeat the bloodsucking Nazis once and for all.
If the movie sounds cheesy, well, it is. It is a Uwe Boll film, after all. I don't know why people keep giving him money to fund his films, but they do. While BloodRayne: The Third Reich is certainly not the worst Uwe Boll film I've ever seen, it's not very good either. Worst of all is Clint Howard as Dr. Mengele. He is so annoying I kept hoping Rayne would kill him so I didn't have to hear his rendition of Mengele that sounded more like a version of Igor. His performance really took a lot away from the film, at least to me, but Malthe, Fletcher and Pare were convincing enough. Some of the battle scenes seemed a little ridiculous and one, in particular, doesn't even make sense; there's a scene where Rayne is randomly attacked on the street by a pair of vampires. We don't know why or who they work for, but she makes short work of them. There's also a random lesbian sex scene in the brothel which was unnecessary and clearly there to add to the over-the-top violence and sex Boll's films are known for.
Special features are slim and include a couple of trailers, a making-of and a featurette with the writer of the film. I found the featurette with the writer to be boring, but I actually really enjoyed the insight provided by the making-of. If you've ever wanted to get inside Uwe Boll's head and understand a little bit more why he does what he does, this featurette is for you. I'll give the man this - he's passionate and completely unapologetic about what he does. His commentary on getting his female actresses to get naked on film is priceless, even mentioning a previous actress by name saying she goes almost naked to every party and can't take her top off in his film. It's amusing stuff.
I didn't really notice anything special about the film being on Blu-ray. Some of the blood looked fake and it just wasn't an especially pretty film, so nothing really popped on high def. Blu-ray isn't necessarily a must for this one, if you do see it.
That being said, if you are a major BloodRayne fan and have always longed for a film showing Rayne's true roots, this is it. It's not good, but it tries to stay close to the source material.
