This is not a typical vampire story or I will say it is not even a vampire story at all.
Inside an abandon factory, on top of a commercial use fridge lies a delicate girl. She spreads her arms and legs getting ready to get drained and leave her life behind. On the other hand a nerdy man setting four empty glass bottles on the four corners of the fridge, getting ready to poke needles in the girl’s limbs and empty her blood.
The story never actually reveals the true identity of the protagonist if you insist this is a vampire flick then you have to accept the fact that vampire in this story doesn't have supernatural power as we have learnt from times. He has to lull his suicidal victims to alter their ways and technically drain their blood by using needles and drink it from the bottle.
Simon (Kevin Zegers Damien from Gossip Girl), the protagonist, looks for his pray in a chartroom called "Side by Side" where people will find companies to commit suicide with. He looks into the vulnerabilities of human to minimize his guilt of sucking others blood. There is no denying that in either way he is murderer. What he did is evil, monstrous and unforgivable.
But yet the mood of the movie is not consistently dark and unbearable. While the evil bloodsucker is talking people in giving their blood, he is being annoyed by a psychopath/desperate woman, Laura (Rachael Leigh Cook). How she always appears in Simon’s home and cooks dinner for him without any invitation. The appearance of Laura lightens the heaviness of the movie and brings a contrast with Simon. One appears to be having psychological issue and the other is killing people to survive. Who’s worse?
I love how Iwai Shunji cleverly and carefully let the audience ponder what is really happening. To my acknowledgements, there are so many little details hinting that the protagonist himself is not really a vampire. And it would be much more meaningful if he isn’t one.
To what extent you are willing to sacrifice yourself to improvise your dreams? Would you kill yourself or kill others to live up your dreams? Not only Simon desperately wants to be a vampire, but also Laura, how she fools her into believing she is dating Simon. Even the Japanese student Mina (Aoi Yu) is seeking for attention by killing herself. The bottom line is do you have a bottom line.
It’s amusing how Iwai Shunji Japanese styled sound tracks work so well with a western movie. That's a plus and not to mention for his breathtaking cinematography.
When I walked out the cinema I thought it was just so so, and it's nothing about vampire. But it lingered for days, even when I was watching other movies, scenes popped up in my mind constantly. Till then I realized the movie is hitting me hard with an impact. Good movies should have the power to last in one’s mind and affect them without them noticing. And Vampire does that to me.
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