Shaun Munro's Reviews (ShaunMunro.co.uk):
Rise: Blood Hunter opens in a way that does not inspire much interest at all. Utilising the classic gimmick of showing scenes later in the film for virtually no reason, we witness some pseudo torture-porn shtick that did nothing but dredge up memories of the pretty passable Hostel: Part 2. As we witness Lucy Liu saving a hooker from certain death, sending her on her way and uttering "find a real job", one really has to laugh.
Following a "6 months ago" title card, we meet Sadie Blake (Liu), a reporter for some semi-trashy magazine. Soon enough, she gets talking to a computer hacker friend of hers, who, following some largely ridiculous and falsified computer jargon, finds a curious address embedded in a web page. Sadie naturally refuses to investigate at first, but that doesn't last long.
The scene then shifts to a rather dilapidated-looking house, where two teenage girls enter and are subsequently beset upon by some monstrous vampires. We have false scares, we have the ever-popular "hide in the closet and have the antagonist look like he's found you, but then turn away at the last second" spiel, and frankly, I was just happy to see one of the girls eaten.
Soon enough, Clyde Rawlins (Chiklis) shows up, the father of one of the girls. Seeing his daughter's friend eaten, he assumes his daughter has met a similar fate. He shows a real emotion, and being infinitely impressed with his performance on the superb FX show The Shield, I was somewhat disheartened when we were promptly taken back to the meat of the apathy-inspiring plot (something which happened to Chiklis far too much in the first hour of this film).
From here, Sadie investigates the address, and is promptly kidnapped, raped, and murdered. Soon enough, she awakens in a morgue, and it appears that she is now a member of the undead, finding it instinctively incumbent to murder and feast upon a member of the living as soon as she's awake. Following a rather gutsy attempt at finishing herself off, Sadie is nursed back to health by an absurdly pigeon-holed mentor-esquire character. Whilst this relationship is essentially just a means of driving the plot and is otherwise throwaway, the mentor does have some interesting morals - "no one is innocent", he proclaims. I'm not sure that I agree.
The transition of Liu's character from a helpless, victimised journalist to an ass-kicking, one-liner quipping heroine was literally blink-and-you'll miss it. It wasn't convincing at all, considering one minute she's very solemn, and moments later, she harpoons a vampire through a window, gets some vital information from him, and gives him another harpoon through the chest for good luck. There's absolutely no progression or character development, and her bravura temperament was too much too soon. So, we return to the opening scene, letting us know for sure that there was absolutely no need for it to be shown twice (it wasn't misrepresented as it was in, say, Mission: Impossible 3), and that it was just a gimmick.
The most interesting scene in Rise comes when Sadie is in need of new blood to feed on, and sees a hitchhiker she could feast on. At this point, there's an intriguing moral dilemma (the only one in the film, unfortunately) - does she kill this innocent man and feast on him, or was her mentor correct, in that there are no innocent people?
Naturally, the morality of this scene is pretty much ruined by the fact that when she initially doesn't pick him up, he yells profanities, then when she does pick him up, he smokes cannabis. I still saw him as an innocent person, and it seemed to me like there was some sort of moralistic value being espoused there that really didn't sit comfortably with me at all. Had this hitchhiker simply been wanting to get from A-to-B and she killed him, without him exhibiting any "negative" traits, then the scene would have been infinitely more effective. It's worth noting that the Sadie character didn't seem to care about his weed, although that could be because she wanted to feast on him, and moreover, it was more the views of writer and director Gutierrez that I was referring to.
Following on from this, we encounter the rather forgettable antagonist's butler, played by Mako of all people. He claims to be unafraid of death, yet this doesn't stop him from surrendering a few important tidbits before popping his clogs. It's not long before Bishop, the only villain left for Sadie to slaughter, becomes aware of her return to the land of the living, and in a phone call utters to her the wonderful cliché - "you're not so different, you and I". Michael Chiklis is finally given the screen time he deserves in the final third of the film, essentially becoming something of an obstacle for Sadie. Whilst they both have the same goal in sight, their methods vary wildly, teetering on different sides of the law. Predictably, an uncomfortable partnership forms, and there's even a hint of sexual tension, but fortunately, it doesn't transpire into anything else.
Sadie and Rawlins head into the final showdown, Sadie allowing Rawlins to follow her on the condition that he carries out one final act once Bishop is dead. A predictable surprise follows, and a not-so-predictable one after that, after which the situation gets very messy for our protagonist. Whilst the showdown ends ultimately as you'd expect, the film doesn't chicken out on its macabre little pact between Sadie and Rawlins, and so the ending happens to be quite satisfying.
Rise is a rudimentary little vampire horror film that will entertain its target audience, but others may find it simply nothing new in frankly already overcrowded canon. A lot of limited releases are simply under-seen masterpieces, whilst others are limited for a reason. Go figure.
Rise: Blood Hunter opens in a way that does not inspire much interest at all. Utilising the classic gimmick of showing scenes later in the film for virtually no reason, we witness some pseudo torture-porn shtick that did nothing but dredge up memories of the pretty passable Hostel: Part 2. As we witness Lucy Liu saving a hooker from certain death, sending her on her way and uttering "find a real job", one really has to laugh.
Following a "6 months ago" title card, we meet Sadie Blake (Liu), a reporter for some semi-trashy magazine. Soon enough, she gets talking to a computer hacker friend of hers, who, following some largely ridiculous and falsified computer jargon, finds a curious address embedded in a web page. Sadie naturally refuses to investigate at first, but that doesn't last long.
The scene then shifts to a rather dilapidated-looking house, where two teenage girls enter and are subsequently beset upon by some monstrous vampires. We have false scares, we have the ever-popular "hide in the closet and have the antagonist look like he's found you, but then turn away at the last second" spiel, and frankly, I was just happy to see one of the girls eaten.
Soon enough, Clyde Rawlins (Chiklis) shows up, the father of one of the girls. Seeing his daughter's friend eaten, he assumes his daughter has met a similar fate. He shows a real emotion, and being infinitely impressed with his performance on the superb FX show The Shield, I was somewhat disheartened when we were promptly taken back to the meat of the apathy-inspiring plot (something which happened to Chiklis far too much in the first hour of this film).
From here, Sadie investigates the address, and is promptly kidnapped, raped, and murdered. Soon enough, she awakens in a morgue, and it appears that she is now a member of the undead, finding it instinctively incumbent to murder and feast upon a member of the living as soon as she's awake. Following a rather gutsy attempt at finishing herself off, Sadie is nursed back to health by an absurdly pigeon-holed mentor-esquire character. Whilst this relationship is essentially just a means of driving the plot and is otherwise throwaway, the mentor does have some interesting morals - "no one is innocent", he proclaims. I'm not sure that I agree.
The transition of Liu's character from a helpless, victimised journalist to an ass-kicking, one-liner quipping heroine was literally blink-and-you'll miss it. It wasn't convincing at all, considering one minute she's very solemn, and moments later, she harpoons a vampire through a window, gets some vital information from him, and gives him another harpoon through the chest for good luck. There's absolutely no progression or character development, and her bravura temperament was too much too soon. So, we return to the opening scene, letting us know for sure that there was absolutely no need for it to be shown twice (it wasn't misrepresented as it was in, say, Mission: Impossible 3), and that it was just a gimmick.
The most interesting scene in Rise comes when Sadie is in need of new blood to feed on, and sees a hitchhiker she could feast on. At this point, there's an intriguing moral dilemma (the only one in the film, unfortunately) - does she kill this innocent man and feast on him, or was her mentor correct, in that there are no innocent people?
Naturally, the morality of this scene is pretty much ruined by the fact that when she initially doesn't pick him up, he yells profanities, then when she does pick him up, he smokes cannabis. I still saw him as an innocent person, and it seemed to me like there was some sort of moralistic value being espoused there that really didn't sit comfortably with me at all. Had this hitchhiker simply been wanting to get from A-to-B and she killed him, without him exhibiting any "negative" traits, then the scene would have been infinitely more effective. It's worth noting that the Sadie character didn't seem to care about his weed, although that could be because she wanted to feast on him, and moreover, it was more the views of writer and director Gutierrez that I was referring to.
Following on from this, we encounter the rather forgettable antagonist's butler, played by Mako of all people. He claims to be unafraid of death, yet this doesn't stop him from surrendering a few important tidbits before popping his clogs. It's not long before Bishop, the only villain left for Sadie to slaughter, becomes aware of her return to the land of the living, and in a phone call utters to her the wonderful cliché - "you're not so different, you and I". Michael Chiklis is finally given the screen time he deserves in the final third of the film, essentially becoming something of an obstacle for Sadie. Whilst they both have the same goal in sight, their methods vary wildly, teetering on different sides of the law. Predictably, an uncomfortable partnership forms, and there's even a hint of sexual tension, but fortunately, it doesn't transpire into anything else.
Sadie and Rawlins head into the final showdown, Sadie allowing Rawlins to follow her on the condition that he carries out one final act once Bishop is dead. A predictable surprise follows, and a not-so-predictable one after that, after which the situation gets very messy for our protagonist. Whilst the showdown ends ultimately as you'd expect, the film doesn't chicken out on its macabre little pact between Sadie and Rawlins, and so the ending happens to be quite satisfying.
Rise is a rudimentary little vampire horror film that will entertain its target audience, but others may find it simply nothing new in frankly already overcrowded canon. A lot of limited releases are simply under-seen masterpieces, whilst others are limited for a reason. Go figure.