Perfect Creature

Ok, I have had this movie in my stack for a while and kept looking at it thinking, “do I want to watch it today?” So finally giving in to my inner turmoil, I tossed in Perfect Creature. This 2006 New Zealand take on the vampire was a bit different than what I expected. You see, before I throw in a movie I some times check IMDB.com for a little synopsis of what it is I am putting in. Usually what I read totally paints the wrong picture in my head, as was the case with this one. What I read made me think that the setting was in the 60’s and 70’s… this was not the case at all.

The movie is futuristic however apparently in the future we backtrack into the Victorian era. The Vampires were created by a virus caused by some crazy alchemists. When born, they are taken from their mothers into a form of priesthood. On the side they dabble in biogenetics. Unfortunately the experiment goes wrong and one of The Brothers goes mad and turns into the vampire-type that we have read about in literature. The head of The Brothers is helping the police track down and deal with the rogue vampire.

So…. yeah…. the movie itself wasn’t too bad. It felt very draggy and slow paced. Silus (Dougray Scott most recently as Ian in Desperate Housewives) gives off such a soft spoken aura as our good priestly vamp that I was starting to nod off during it. Lilly (Saffron Burrows) our police escort, comes off so wishy washy through out the film, so bland that there were times I got her confused with another character in the movie! Our bad boy, Edgar (Leo Gregory) just didn’t come across very threatening.

The writing and directing by Glenn Standring was ok but a bit stiff. The whole drab world came bursting through it, just a bit too drab and dull. It did have a bit of a comic book feel to it which I liked, but at the same time didn’t draw enough on the fantastical insight that was poking through here and there. It had promise but just didn’t follow through.

2 close ups on dripping water out of 5