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Perched on a ledge high above a dark, rain soaked city, a woman and her companion watch and wait. For Selene (Kate Beckinsale), this night is one like many others, where she will seek out Lycans (werewolves) and eliminate them in accordance with a century's-old blood feud between the two mythical races.

With the Lycans thought to be on the verge of extinction, the vampires are preparing to form a new coven by merging with a powerful overseas clan. Towards this end, members of both houses plan to awaken one of their two great leaders to guide the vampires into a new era of prosperity. Selene is troubled by these plans, as she believes that the Lycans are massing in greater numbers under the leadership of their leader Lucian (Michael Sheen), whom the vampires believe died centuries ago.

Further complicating matters is Selene's concern that the present leader of the vampires, Kraven (Shane Brolly), may not be willing to release the power he now holds and that the Lycans' interest in a mortal named Michael (Scott Speedman) may indeed be the key to a larger threat to her people.

Selene is forced to defy Kraven and leave the safety of the vampire mansion to locate Michael before the Lycan hordes are able to and use him for their sinister plans. While the action in Underworld is powerful, it never seems to have the intensity that it should, as the sense of urgency and tension seems to be missing. The cast is good, but it does not display much emotional depth, and this flaw hinders the efforts of the audience to form a connection with the characters and care for their fates.

That being said, Underworld does a fantastic job with breathing new life into the vampire genre. Director Len Wiseman bathes the viewers in images of eerie translucence that combine various color hues to create a look that enhances the action by surrounding it in an otherworldly ambience.

Writers Kevin Grevioux and Danny McBride are to be commended for breathing new life into the genres as he gives us a tale that entertains yet expands upon the traditional lore of the creatures and if for nothing else, that alone makes Underworld pure entertainment and a must-see film for fans of the genre.

Gareth Von Kallenbach   September 23, 2003

Underworld opens with a voice-over by the talented and beautiful Kate Beckinsale (Pearl Harbor, Serendipity) in which her character, Selene, explains how vampires and Lycans (those are werewolves for those who aren’t aware) have been raging a secret, centuries-old battle which the vampires have been winning since the lycan leader, Lucian (Michael Sheen, long-time real-life boyfriend of Beckinsale),  was apparently killed. Selene and a group of fellow vampires are in charge of hunting down and dispatching of the remaining scattered werewolves.

And then a very public shootout in a subway station occurs which left me wondering how the vampires and lycans have managed to remain so secret all these years. But back to the story…

Apparently things haven’t been exactly as they would appear. The Lycans were well-prepared to face Selene and her fellow hunters and seem to be after an unwitting young human, Michael, played with intensity by Scott Speedman who shows for no good reason an utter lack of surprise to discover that vampires and werewolves exist and are interested in him. Now, what exactly do the Lycans want with this mortal? It’s a question Selene wants answered but her “boss,” the vampire leader, Kraven (Shane Brolly) doesn’t want her to pursue.

I’d like to take a moment here to note that Shane Brolly’s performance here is singularly the worst performance I have seen on screen all year. It’s almost painful to watch. Granted, screenwriter Danny McBride didn’t give him or any other character in this film much to work with, but Brolly comes across as a very untalented actor trying very hard to be menacing.

Of course, Selene disobeys orders and asks all the wrong questions trying to figure out just what’s going on. In the process she awakens one of the vampire elders, Viktor (Bill Nighy), discovers that Lucian is still, in fact, very much alive, and falls in love with Michael in much less time than it took me to write this sentence.

Plenty of plot twists and action sequences ensue as plenty of time is wasted watching them; the movie has a running length of just over two hours. Although there are attempts made at character development, such as Selene’s tale of how she became a vampire, it is all lost in the convoluted storyline and, at best, silly dialog. First-time director Len Wiseman does a good job with the visuals, but this film is ultimately a creature that is all talk and no bite.

Some praise has been given to the film’s “creative” fighting scenes between the vampires and Lycans, which make use of “light” bullets and “silver” bullets instead of claws and fangs. Indeed, many of the classic conventions of vampire and werewolf movies are tweaked or thrown out altogether. There is no mention of religion, no crosses or cloves of garlic, and no holy water used to battle. Unfortunately for Sony Pictures and film distributors Screen Gems and Lakeshore Entertainment, it may turn out that many of the innoventions here aren’t so creative as borrowed. Both novelist Nancy A. Collins and White Wolf Publishing, the publishers of the role-playing game Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse video game, are suing the makers of Underworld for copyright infringement. Apparently the suit lists over 60 similarities between the role-playing games and the movie.

Although Underworld ultimately is a bomb, Beckinsale plans to return to the monster-movie world next summer, starring opposite Hugh Jackman in the famous vampire slayer entitled Van Helsing.

Darryl A. Armstrong 10/19/03