"The Forsaken" follows a young film editor who takes a cross-country trip from Los Angeles to Florida for his sister's wedding. Along the way, he picks up a hitchhiker on his way to Texas for unknown reasons—but he gets more than he bargained for when the two come across a disoriented woman at a truckstop. Turns out the hitchhiker is a vampire hunter, the girl is infected, and there's a cult of desert vamps seeking them out.
I saw this film years ago back in 2001 when it was released, and recently revisited it almost fifteen years later. Often ranked among film buffs as one of the worst post-millennial vampire movies ever, "The Forsaken" is a hodgepodge of traditional vampire elements with revisionist intentions that don't quite work. The film's greatest idiosyncrasy is that the vampires here are fangless—instead, they were more of a cult of blood drinkers who carry a virus that "turns" those who come into contact with it. The fact that the vampires in the film are not really "vampires" in the traditional sense seemed to have elicited extreme reactions from genre fans. I'm not what I'd consider a hardcore vampire film lover, so I was able to accept this on its own merits, as unusual as it is.
While the script is a bit clunky and the character relationships seem arbitrary and at times underdeveloped (this is most apparent in the film's denouement), it does evoke a dusty, creepy desert atmosphere. As beautiful as the desert is, let's be honest: deserts are creepy. They are no man's land—desolate, expansive, and dangerous—and that is something this film gets right. The vast landscapes, long two-lane highways, and dingy desert truckstops are captured fantastically. It largely cribs this atmosphere in co-opting the tradition of road movies, and many have compared it to "The Hitcher," although I think it aesthetically looks more like John Carpenter's "Vampires" (also set in the desert), from which it borrows liberally.
The film is nicely shot, with direction from J.S. Cardone, who began his career with the bizarro '80s slasher film "The Slayer," and would go on to script and direct the atrocious remakes of "Prom Night" and "The Stepfather" after "The Forsaken." For all intents and purposes, the direction here is decent, and there are some great images and scenes interspersed throughout. Kerr Smith and Brendan Fehr ground the film as the two male leads, while Izabella Miko is fantastically weird as the mute, traumatized victim of the vampire gang. Jonathan Schaech seems miscast here in my opinion—the role of the vampire leader seems to call for someone who is legitimately intimidating on screen, and he's just not—he's ridiculously sexy in this, but he isn't scary. China Oruche plays his mad sidekick nicely, and Carrie Snodgress probably turns in the most notable performance as a gun-toting desert redneck.
Overall, "The Forsaken" is probably not as bad as you've heard it is. It's an entertaining and atmospheric road flick that is legitimately fun. The truth is that it's an average revision of traditional vampire territory, and the amount of flack it's gotten over the years is largely due to the disgruntled vampire fans who want their vampires served a certain way. All in all, it's a decent, bloody desert romp from the early 2000s. 6/10.
I saw this film years ago back in 2001 when it was released, and recently revisited it almost fifteen years later. Often ranked among film buffs as one of the worst post-millennial vampire movies ever, "The Forsaken" is a hodgepodge of traditional vampire elements with revisionist intentions that don't quite work. The film's greatest idiosyncrasy is that the vampires here are fangless—instead, they were more of a cult of blood drinkers who carry a virus that "turns" those who come into contact with it. The fact that the vampires in the film are not really "vampires" in the traditional sense seemed to have elicited extreme reactions from genre fans. I'm not what I'd consider a hardcore vampire film lover, so I was able to accept this on its own merits, as unusual as it is.
While the script is a bit clunky and the character relationships seem arbitrary and at times underdeveloped (this is most apparent in the film's denouement), it does evoke a dusty, creepy desert atmosphere. As beautiful as the desert is, let's be honest: deserts are creepy. They are no man's land—desolate, expansive, and dangerous—and that is something this film gets right. The vast landscapes, long two-lane highways, and dingy desert truckstops are captured fantastically. It largely cribs this atmosphere in co-opting the tradition of road movies, and many have compared it to "The Hitcher," although I think it aesthetically looks more like John Carpenter's "Vampires" (also set in the desert), from which it borrows liberally.
The film is nicely shot, with direction from J.S. Cardone, who began his career with the bizarro '80s slasher film "The Slayer," and would go on to script and direct the atrocious remakes of "Prom Night" and "The Stepfather" after "The Forsaken." For all intents and purposes, the direction here is decent, and there are some great images and scenes interspersed throughout. Kerr Smith and Brendan Fehr ground the film as the two male leads, while Izabella Miko is fantastically weird as the mute, traumatized victim of the vampire gang. Jonathan Schaech seems miscast here in my opinion—the role of the vampire leader seems to call for someone who is legitimately intimidating on screen, and he's just not—he's ridiculously sexy in this, but he isn't scary. China Oruche plays his mad sidekick nicely, and Carrie Snodgress probably turns in the most notable performance as a gun-toting desert redneck.
Overall, "The Forsaken" is probably not as bad as you've heard it is. It's an entertaining and atmospheric road flick that is legitimately fun. The truth is that it's an average revision of traditional vampire territory, and the amount of flack it's gotten over the years is largely due to the disgruntled vampire fans who want their vampires served a certain way. All in all, it's a decent, bloody desert romp from the early 2000s. 6/10.