You can accuse me of being a dreamer if you want. I just naturally assumed walking into a movie titled
Blood and Chocolate that the film itself couldn't be as stupid as its title. Wishful thinking on my part, I suppose. I mean, with a title like that, I kept on envisioning the movie was to be about a disgruntled employee at the Hershey chocolate factory who goes on a shooting spree. The movie, however, is about werewolves. Not just any werewolves, but werewolves who like to jump around a lot like frickin' acrobats, stand around in bars, look moody and depressed a lot, and karate fight. There's very little chocolate to be found in this movie, and thanks to the film's PG-13 rating, even less blood. On the whole, the film disappoints, not even wanting to live up to its title. Theater goers should demand a refund after seeing this, and the filmmakers should issue an apology.
Our heroine is Vivian (Agnes Bruckner), a lonely young werewolf girl who has been living in Romania ever since her family (also werewolves) were killed by humans in the U.S. There are apparently a lot of werewolves running around, and they like to hang out in bars, picking up women, and gather in a forest where there are a lot of torches, and their leader, Gabriel (Olivier Martinez) rants and raves about how humans are inferior to their kind. One day, Vivian happens to meet a human named Aiden (Hugh Dancy). He's a comic book artist who just happens to be doing a story about...you guessed it...werewolves. The two spark a shy, secret romance because Vivian doesn't want her werewolf brothers and adoptive family to know she's fallen in love with a human. Of course, they eventually do find out, and they are not happy. Aiden eventually finds out about Vivian's secret as well, and doesn't seem nearly as concerned as I think he should be considering he found out his girlfriend can turn into a four-legged carnivorous animal at will. (Maybe I'm out of the loop, but I would think most men would consider that a turn off in a relationship.) With the werewolves hot on their trail, Vivian and Aiden fight for survival and their love as they try to escape from Romania alive.
Head screenwriter Ehren Kruger certainly is no stranger to films with horror themes, having penned such films as
The Ring,
The Skeleton Key, and
Scream 3. Perhaps that's why it's so strange that despite its horror undertones,
Blood and Chocolate is completely tame and lacking the very slightest of thrills and excitement. Instead, Kruger and co-writer Christopher Landon have delivered some sort of bizarre werewolf love triangle melodrama. We're supposed to be enthralled by Vivian and her quest to create her own destiny with Aiden, instead of the pre-determined destiny that her werewolf peers have created for her. This is all but impossible, mainly due to the fact that the movie never clues us in on the ways of the werewolf society or their ways. They keep on talking about how the head wolf Gabriel might possibly take Vivian as a wife, or how the werewolves have big plans to change the world. Neither of these plot points are remotely touched upon, and if they are, they're done so vaguely that the audience is left to fill in the blanks. Same goes for the relationship between Vivian and Aiden, which pretty much builds during a two minute music montage as they goof around the city and lie in the grass, looking dreamily at each other. Because we never truly get to know these characters, we never understand why their love for each other is so deep that they are willing to risk their lives for one another. Characters who are barely developed come and go as the screenplay sees fit (such as Vivian's Aunt), and nobody manages to make even the slightest bit of an impression. This is one of those movies where I remember most of the characters having names, but I'll be damned if I can remember what they were, and I don't think I'll be crying over not being able to remember anything about this movie.
The storyline is loopy enough in itself, but German filmmaker Katja von Garnier (making her US film debut) decides to make it harder to follow with some slapdash editing. Scenes start rather abruptly, and end even more so. Everything has been filmed with the subtlety of a rock music video, with lots of stunt doubles running up walls and leaping through the air as if they were ballet dancers who learned how to defy the laws of gravity. And many of the scenes set at night are so murky and dimly lit that it gives the film a rather drab quality to most of its sequences. That really is too bad, because the day time shots and the exterior scenes filmed in Romania are actually quite beautiful, and are probably the film's sole highlight. Since there was very little going on with the plot or the characters, I often found myself admiring the backgrounds, and wishing I could see those places in person. When the movie's not allowing us to admire the setting, there's very little else to admire. From the lame dialogue to the underwhelming performances, this movie seems to be on some kind of strange quest to suck out any sort of entertainment the premise might have provided had competent people been behind it.
Speaking of the performances, who were the ones that told Agnes Bruckner and Hugh Dancy that they had good romantic chemistry together? The two never come across as being interesting as a couple. Part of this comes from the screenplay that refuses to clue us in on the attraction they share, and part of it comes from the fact that they are just not believable as a couple. There is no passion when they kiss or embrace, and most of the time, they seem to actually be wishing as if they were with someone else. We never buy their love for a second, and the movie fails largely because of that, since it is supposed to be what drives the main plot. Not that everyone else is much better. The werewolves, except for Gabriel, all look like rejects from a boy band, and come across as being about as menacing as one too. They simply glare menacingly at Vivian and Aiden, or they jump around as if they had kangaroos in their blood instead of wolf. There are a lot of side characters who pop up now and then, but don't really play any part of the story. There's a woman who runs the chocolate shop where Vivian works (hence the chocolate part of the title, I'm assuming), but I don't think she even had any real dialogue. Late in the film, a crazed pharmacist shows up, bulges his eyes practically out of his own sockets to show just how crazy he is, and then disappears shortly afterward. The movie keeps on tossing these throwaway characters at us one after another that we stop even trying to keep track of who's who.
Blood and Chocolate is based on a novel by Annette Curtis Klause, and apparently has a loyal fanbase. Checking the film's message board on the IMDB, a lot of the fans are upset with some major changes that the movie made. I will most likely never learn what these changes are, as I have no desire to enlighten myself on the literary adventures of Vivian and Aiden. Rather, I will choose to take the word of the fans and mark this off as a failed adaptation, and that there is a story worth telling in the shambles that is this movie. Movies about werewolves and monsters used to be fun, but now they're trying to mimic bad teen soap operas with this film. Where's Lon Chaney, Jr. when you need him?
1 comments
You can accuse me of being a dreamer if you want. I just naturally assumed walking into a movie titled Blood and Chocolate that the film itself couldn't be as stupid as its title. Wishful thinking on my part, I suppose. I mean, with a title like that, I kept on envisioning the movie was to be about a disgruntled employee at the Hershey chocolate factory who goes on a shooting spree. The movie, however, is about werewolves. Not just any werewolves, but werewolves who like to jump around a lot like frickin' acrobats, stand around in bars, look moody and depressed a lot, and karate fight. There's very little chocolate to be found in this movie, and thanks to the film's PG-13 rating, even less blood. On the whole, the film disappoints, not even wanting to live up to its title. Theater goers should demand a refund after seeing this, and the filmmakers should issue an apology.
Our heroine is Vivian (Agnes Bruckner), a lonely young werewolf girl who has been living in Romania ever since her family (also werewolves) were killed by humans in the U.S. There are apparently a lot of werewolves running around, and they like to hang out in bars, picking up women, and gather in a forest where there are a lot of torches, and their leader, Gabriel (Olivier Martinez) rants and raves about how humans are inferior to their kind. One day, Vivian happens to meet a human named Aiden (Hugh Dancy). He's a comic book artist who just happens to be doing a story about...you guessed it...werewolves. The two spark a shy, secret romance because Vivian doesn't want her werewolf brothers and adoptive family to know she's fallen in love with a human. Of course, they eventually do find out, and they are not happy. Aiden eventually finds out about Vivian's secret as well, and doesn't seem nearly as concerned as I think he should be considering he found out his girlfriend can turn into a four-legged carnivorous animal at will. (Maybe I'm out of the loop, but I would think most men would consider that a turn off in a relationship.) With the werewolves hot on their trail, Vivian and Aiden fight for survival and their love as they try to escape from Romania alive.
Head screenwriter Ehren Kruger certainly is no stranger to films with horror themes, having penned such films as The Ring, The Skeleton Key, and Scream 3. Perhaps that's why it's so strange that despite its horror undertones, Blood and Chocolate is completely tame and lacking the very slightest of thrills and excitement. Instead, Kruger and co-writer Christopher Landon have delivered some sort of bizarre werewolf love triangle melodrama. We're supposed to be enthralled by Vivian and her quest to create her own destiny with Aiden, instead of the pre-determined destiny that her werewolf peers have created for her. This is all but impossible, mainly due to the fact that the movie never clues us in on the ways of the werewolf society or their ways. They keep on talking about how the head wolf Gabriel might possibly take Vivian as a wife, or how the werewolves have big plans to change the world. Neither of these plot points are remotely touched upon, and if they are, they're done so vaguely that the audience is left to fill in the blanks. Same goes for the relationship between Vivian and Aiden, which pretty much builds during a two minute music montage as they goof around the city and lie in the grass, looking dreamily at each other. Because we never truly get to know these characters, we never understand why their love for each other is so deep that they are willing to risk their lives for one another. Characters who are barely developed come and go as the screenplay sees fit (such as Vivian's Aunt), and nobody manages to make even the slightest bit of an impression. This is one of those movies where I remember most of the characters having names, but I'll be damned if I can remember what they were, and I don't think I'll be crying over not being able to remember anything about this movie.
The storyline is loopy enough in itself, but German filmmaker Katja von Garnier (making her US film debut) decides to make it harder to follow with some slapdash editing. Scenes start rather abruptly, and end even more so. Everything has been filmed with the subtlety of a rock music video, with lots of stunt doubles running up walls and leaping through the air as if they were ballet dancers who learned how to defy the laws of gravity. And many of the scenes set at night are so murky and dimly lit that it gives the film a rather drab quality to most of its sequences. That really is too bad, because the day time shots and the exterior scenes filmed in Romania are actually quite beautiful, and are probably the film's sole highlight. Since there was very little going on with the plot or the characters, I often found myself admiring the backgrounds, and wishing I could see those places in person. When the movie's not allowing us to admire the setting, there's very little else to admire. From the lame dialogue to the underwhelming performances, this movie seems to be on some kind of strange quest to suck out any sort of entertainment the premise might have provided had competent people been behind it.
Speaking of the performances, who were the ones that told Agnes Bruckner and Hugh Dancy that they had good romantic chemistry together? The two never come across as being interesting as a couple. Part of this comes from the screenplay that refuses to clue us in on the attraction they share, and part of it comes from the fact that they are just not believable as a couple. There is no passion when they kiss or embrace, and most of the time, they seem to actually be wishing as if they were with someone else. We never buy their love for a second, and the movie fails largely because of that, since it is supposed to be what drives the main plot. Not that everyone else is much better. The werewolves, except for Gabriel, all look like rejects from a boy band, and come across as being about as menacing as one too. They simply glare menacingly at Vivian and Aiden, or they jump around as if they had kangaroos in their blood instead of wolf. There are a lot of side characters who pop up now and then, but don't really play any part of the story. There's a woman who runs the chocolate shop where Vivian works (hence the chocolate part of the title, I'm assuming), but I don't think she even had any real dialogue. Late in the film, a crazed pharmacist shows up, bulges his eyes practically out of his own sockets to show just how crazy he is, and then disappears shortly afterward. The movie keeps on tossing these throwaway characters at us one after another that we stop even trying to keep track of who's who.
1 Comments:
The movie is so far off from the book, it's not even funny. Simply put, they ravaged the entire plot direction of the book. Vivian and Aiden were not meant to be together, that wasn't the point of the story, and it should have been left in print or given to a different director.
By
Dae, at 10:30 PM
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