Movie Review - Byzantium

Byzantium **½ ( R) In the mid-1990s, writer/director Neil Jordan seemed poised for ranking with the industry’s best and brightest after The Crying Game, Michael Collins and Interview with the Vampire. Since then, his output from behind the camera and/or with the pen has been less in both quantity and quality. In this film, he again explores romantic drama from an unusual perspective. The result is interesting, but hardly a return to the form of his early critical and commercial successes.

The premise is a mother-daughter tandem of present-day vampires who can withstand sunlight, hiding for 200 years from both humans and the brotherhood of bloodsuckers that wouldn’t have allowed them to join their ranks. They’re constantly on the move, with the mom (Gemma Arterton) supporting them by stripping and turning tricks. The daughter (Saoirse Ronan), having been raised in a convent orphanage before being turned at age 16, feels compelled to tell the truth of their existence to all, being saddled with an existence-threatening conscience. Her voice-over supplements the live action that gradually fills in their backstories.

That would seem to set up a sexy, gory suspense tale. But this one plays out as more of a noirish melodrama. The mom scrambles for safe havens with little remorse over casualties along the way. The daughter tries to feed only on those who are already terminal and willing to go, while hoping for love to blossom with a likely classmate in her latest school. While far less sappy than the Twilight films, their dour ordeal lacks the romance or action of most vampire opuses. They don’t have the extra powers of their cinematic peers. They even draw blood for feeding with a taloned thumbnail, rather than fangs.

With sufficiently dialed-down expectations on such genre basics, viewers might find the moody presentation an intriguing change of pace. The process of converting humans into vampires is a unique, visually notable variation on the norm. (7/12/13)