Underworld: Rise of the Lycan

Underworld: Rise of the Lycans Unless they start with the words “Lord of the Rings” we should avoid, as a general rule, seeing third-movies-in-a-series like the plague. This is no exception. (There is an interesting story behind how I ended up seeing this one, but it isn’t pertinent to our review. Suffice it to say that Garth Reber was the inspiration behind it.)
I freely admit, however, that my son and I sat through it. After about ten minutes, we began doing our own version of Mystery Science Theater 2000, making snide comments (very quietly—the guy with the candy wrapper three chairs over was making a lot more noise) to one another, offering appropriate quotes from Monty Python, and generally doing a “roast-as-you-go” critique.
Obviously, any movie with both vampires and werewolves has a compelling draw, almost like Mélange, the worm-spice from Dune, and it is likely that I will see it. But that doesn’t mean it will be good. Only Zombies can top the allure of Vampires and werewolves. Oh, and cheerleaders. And dragons, obviously. And anything supernatural. And westerns. Plus anything with a starship in it. (Is it any wonder I loved Serenity so much? It’s a western with space ships, and it has Reavers in it, which are a kind of cross between Zombies and Michael Myers. No, the other Michael Myers.)
The reality created for Underworld is one happily devoid of either internal logic or consistency. The original draw, for most of us, was Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight patent leather, but even that is absent in this prequel. It’s interesting how many movies like this come out, do okay at the box office, and then someone starts to feel guilty and decides to put out a prequel or a sequel to explain the whole thing. Like The Matrix. (The next Terminator movie will be doing that as well.) In this one, Rhona Mitra plays Sonja, daughter of the head-cheese vampire, Viktor. She is stubborn, has a mind of her own, and never listens to daddy. And why should she? He’s only been around a few thousand years . . . what can he know? Plus, she has huge, sultry lips. (I suspect a guest appearance on Nip-Tuck). They have a pet, which is a human child that is part Lycan(werewolf for the terminally un-hip) who can alter its form at will—until the tension reaches a critical level and then its only under a full moon. (Up till this point all Lycans are mindless beasts, having been bitten by another of their kind, and they cannot change back. I’ve never heard of that before, but then I’m not a crypto-zoologist. Oh, wait, yes I am.)
So anyway, the writers try to convince us in five-hundred words or less that the vampires have built a complex society based on all-night parties, collecting tribute from surrounding fiefdoms, and walking around all the time in full armor or black lingerie. Hey—it could happen. We aren’t convinced, not for a minute, but we give them the benefit of the doubt. But then they try to convince us that vampires and werewolves are people too, are still human inside and have feelings and stuff like that. C’mon, really? Vampires are the undead, remember. No way are they people anymore. (Zombies on the other hand are the walking-dead. Aren’t you glad you have me around to explain all this?) And if werewolves have any emotions left they are those of a wolf, not a human. It just won’t fly.
The main problem with this movie (and there are enough to require a complete outline—you know, I, A-B-C, II, A-B-C-D, a-b-c-d-e-f-g-h, etc.) is the inconsistency of the use of powers traditionally attributed to these creatures of the night. Sometimes the Lycan are able to change at will, but other times we are clearly led to believe they can only do so with a full moon. Vampires can do all sorts of cool tricks but hardly ever do in this one, preferring instead to let themselves be slaughtered by the wolves while using swords and axes and stuff. In the minds of the writers and director this is necessary however, because if the vampires were using things like preternatural strength, speed, inner-senses, and their well-known hypnotic powers, there would be no contest. And the movie would be fifteen minutes long.
Oh and the, uh . . . plot. A word about the plot. There is none. Not a hint. What there is, is a pathetic and transparent attempt at a plot by people who should really know better.
On the other hand, there is a great deal of gratuitous blood, violence, lobbing off of body-parts, screaming and roaring and general mayhem. And, as if that’s not enough, there is a love scene! Did I mention that Sonja, Viktor’s daughter, and Lucian, the hybrid werewolf, fall in love and have what amounts to an incestuous relationship? Viktor raised them both as his children, more or less. So we have to sit through like, twenty seconds of all this fancy camera work while two naked people pretend to have sex, with all kinds of fade-out shots offering heavy-handed innuendo as to what they might be doing off-camera. Nice. Real nice. A vampire and a werewolf? Not in this universe.
In the end . . . well, who cares? She dies in a fit of sunlight, killed by her father’s edict. Lucien frees the Lycan slaves and destroys the vampire culture, (but don’t worry, they’ll be back) and Viktor tricks everybody into thinking he’s dead. But we know he’s not because he’s in the first movie which takes place in our own time. Then they all get baptized by an itinerant priest and go live together in a monastery.
This was rated R for ridiculous. The best part of the entire experience was that my son paid for it. Thanks, Grah.