Great Film: Blade II
breaking rules
Other than the explanation of where he came from, who he and everyone else
is, at the beginning, this film stands nicely on its own. for those of you
that know the first one, then this opening explanation will be a little
irritating (and a tad confusing, but it becomes clear later). The opening
does smell strongly of franchise potential, being repeated in all the
inevitable sequels still to come. Once past this though, we are lead
through
a massive fight and action scene that sets up the whole movie. and warns
anyone who can't stand Hong Kong action scenes that they are probably
watching the wrong screen.
The movie is essentially a platform for Snipes to have fun with his most
renowned character. And he does so with very entertaining results. The
movie
has reasonably well rounded characters, suspicion piled on top of
everyone,
some amazing set pieces and a good sense of humour. The impact of all the
blood and guts is reduced by the obvious fantasy of the fights (wires and
SFX a lot of the time), but its still pretty powerful.
The lead performances are all very good, although some of the peripheral
characters are a little too hammer horror. Luke Goss demonstrates great
potential, although you would need to see him without the make up, body
doubles, and special effects to really judge. and there is occasionally
that
urge to shout "when will I be famous." and the pure blood female vampire
who
takes a shine to blade is well worth being bitten by.
Overall it feels less like a sequel and more like a stand alone movie.
with
this in mind, I think its in fact better than the original (a rare example
of the exception that proves the rule).
Cast
- Blade played by Wesley Snipes
- Whistler played by Kris Kristofferson
- Reinhardt played by Ron Perlman
- Nyssa played by Leonor Varela
- Scud played by Norman Reedus
- Damaskinos played by Thomas Kretschmann
- Nomak played by Luke Goss
