January has got to be one of the most schizophrenic months of the year for movies. On one hand, smaller films like Revolutionary Road and Slumdog Millionaire are finally freed from their limited engagements, and get wider releases. On the other, we also get forgettable generic stuff like Underworld: Rise of the Lycans. The movie serves as a prequel to 2003's Underworld, and it's sequel, 2006's Underworld: Evolution. It's funny. I remember watching those movies, but I remember very little about what happened within them. All I remember is that neither one of them filled me with a burning desire to learn how it all began.

The movie chronicles the beginnings of the war between the vampires and the Lycans, beasts that look like werewolves, but mainly behave like targets in an action video game as they spring up in front of the camera to be decapitated or stabbed by the vampires. The vampires keep some of the Lycans as slaves in their gloomy fortress. The lead Lycan in the story is Lucian (Michael Sheen). He's different from the others, because he can take the form of a human, and change into wolf form at will. He is still a slave, but is treated slightly better than his brothers by the cold ruler of the vampires, Viktor (Bill Nighy). We learn early on that Lucian is involved in a secret and forbidden love affair with Viktor's daughter, Sonja (Rhona Mitra). Sonja is a rebellious girl, who does not wish to live the life her father has planned for her. We never really learn how or why their love came to be, and we only learn of their affair when they both sneak off to have some hot vampire/Lycan sex one night. Those of you interested in what would happen if a vampire and a werewolf made love, you'll be disappointed. We just get a lot of panting, and some close ups of the actors' bare bodies.

These early moments seemed to be leaning to a sort of gothic Romeo and Juliet story, and it at least had my attention. I wouldn't have bothered getting my hopes up if I knew the movie had no intention of following this idea or their relationship. Lucian is tortured and locked up when he disobeys Viktor's orders and uses his Lycan powers to save Sonja. While in his cell, Lucian rallies his fellow Lycans to fight back and escape from the castle. Of course, Viktor eventually finds out about his daughter's affair, and puts her life in danger. This supposedly sparks an eternal war between the two races, but I found it hard to care about anything, because the movie doesn't care. Director Patrick Tatopoulos (a special effects artist who worked on the previous films) seems to view this as one big technical demo. The problem is it's not a very impressive one. The effects work for the Lycans is surprisingly chintzy, with the creatures looking about as convincing as the monsters you find in a low budget video game. The movie has an overly dark and murky look to it in the vain hope to cover up the half-hearted effects work. This makes the movie not only ugly to look at, but the blue-colored tint that's been added to a lot of scenes makes it look like someone poured toilet bowl cleaner all over the film.

The actors tackle this material with what can only be described as scene-chewing precision. After appearing in films like The Queen and Frost/Nixon, Michael Sheen cashes a paycheck here. To be fair, he is unrecognizable under all his mangy hair, and he was in the other Underworld movies. His part requires him to look wild eyed and scream half of his lines, which he does with gusto. As the head vampire, Bill Nighy plays his role as if he was doing some Bizarro World version of Shakespeare. Actually, a lot of his dialogue sounds like it was written by a 13-year-old trying to emulate Shakespeare's writing style. At least he actually gets to act like a vampire from time to time. The weird thing about Rise of the Lycans is that it keeps on telling us they're vampires, but aside from Nighy biting someone and drinking blood (or maybe it was wine) from a cup, they don't do anything that clue us in to that fact. Many are hidden behind suits of armor in the first place, except for the Vampire Council, who dress like medieval wannabe goths.

I know I haven't said anything about Rhona Mitra as the female lead, and that's only because there's little to say about her performance. Actually, now that I think about it, there's not much to say about the movie itself. If the other two movies worked with you, so will this. I found this just as forgettable as the other entries, and I'm sure it will enter the hazy part of my mind where my memories of the other two currently lie. That's not such a bad thing. It means the space in my mind it currently occupies will be filled by a better movie.

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