Most know Brandon Routh as Clark Kent and Superman from Bryan Singer's "Superman Returns". Sam Huntington played Jimmy Olson in that movie and had a couple of great comedic moments bouncing his performance off of Routh's straight man act. The two are paired up again in what I would describe as "Comedic Supernatural Noir".
"Dylan Dog: Dead Of Night" is about a former supernatural investigator (Routh) who has been out of the game for a few years but is pulled back in as those in his life are suddenly harmed by the supernatural world of werewolves, vampires and zombies. It's a modern story but has a dash of 1930's noir in that Dylan bridges scenes with darkly intoned, past-tense narration.
The performances by Routh and Huntington make the movie very watchable, despite the dialogue feeling dry and uncreative. The two leading men work great together, and while Huntington gets most of the laughs, I was pleasantly surprised by some previously unseen flavors in Routh's acting. Even so, Routh doesn't seem like the best fit for this role, despite the fact that he did a fine job. Some of the best moments in the movie were Sam Huntington's scenes dealing with a particular bit of misfortune he's experiencing that I won't spoil. I think an entire movie could have been built around his character's plot. Great stuff.
The visual effects and makeup leave something to be desired. The monsters all look pretty "rubbery" and the digital morphing effects look a lot like digital morphing effects. They would have done well to follow cues from "Underworld"(another relatively small vampire/werewolf movie) and use shadows to conceal flaws in both visual effects and makeup. As it is, they showed me too much and I found myself being distracted by technical flaws.
The movie has some great new takes on the myths of vampires, werewolves and zombies. Some of them are comedic and others are just original ideas that I found welcome. But I didn't find the movie scary, despite a number of attack/action scenes, which would have helped the sometimes sluggish pace.
I don't remember anything that could contribute to worthwhile, real-world discussion after the movie. It's just pure escapist entertainment for hardcore fans of the genre, who will enjoy checking this one out. If you're not starving for vampires, werewolves and zombies, you can easily afford to wait for this on video or tv.
Rated PG-13 for sequences of creature violence and action, language including some sexual references, and some drug material.
Quality: 8.0/10
Relevance: 5.0/10
Listen to this review this weekend at- spiritblade.net/podcast
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