Director: Ted Nicolaou
Release date: 2023
Contains spoilers
There is the subspecies fan in me that was (and still is) so excited for this late entry into the series but, if I am honest, it isn’t perfect. That said the original films weren’t perfect either, but they are an institution. It is also the best-looking thing to come out of the Full Moon stable for some time.
So for the uninitiated you can read about the previous films: Subspecies, Subspecies 2: Bloodstone, Subspecies 3: Bloodlust & Subspecies 4: Bloodstorm, as well as the remarkably good spin off Vampire Journals. Technically the films Decadent Evil & Decadent Evil 2 are in the same universe.
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| Circe in labour |
This film is a prequel to the Subspecies films and starts with Circe (Yulia Graut), an immortal sorceress, birthing a child – she is, of course, the character Mummy from the earlier films. The voiceover tells us that the child, fathered by the vampire prince Vladislav (Kevin Spirtas – who was a character, Mel, in Subspecies 2 & 3), was prophesised to be the killer of his father. It looks as though Circe was preparing to kill the baby with a demon slaying dagger, though perhaps having second thoughts, when Templars invade the cave she is in (the child needing to be dismembered and the parts cast into the Black Sea to destroy him).
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| Marius and Radu |
Having staked Circe (which won’t kill her) they take the child and cut his fingers and points from his ears, use holy salves to make his features pass for human and indoctrinate him into the church, training him as a monster slayer. This is all well and good until the adult Radu (Anders Hove), as they name the child, enters his father’s castle with his fellow Templars. In there he fights with Vladislav who realises who he is and vanishes through shadows (vampires can far travel through shadows). Circe confirms his lineage before vanishing too. He and the monk Marius (Petar Arsic) have lost their quarry but have retrieved the bloodstone, which contains the blood of saints.
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| Denice Duff as Helena |
Radu realises there is life in the castle and find a woman, Helena (Denice Duff, who famously played Michelle in films 2-4 and was also in Vampire Resurrection), who begs they spare her child Stefan (Jakov Marjanovic) – Radu’s half-brother. Marius urges Radu to kill them but the knight suggests they are innocent and, having checked Helena’s neck for bites, he takes them with them. Helena tries to seduce the knight, the monk leaves them and then it becomes apparent she cannot go in the sunlight and, whilst not fully turned, she has been bitten in the thigh. Eventually she turns on Radu bites him and feeds him her blood. Vladislav, at that point, retrieves her and the boy.
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| Ash and Ariel |
The film gives us vignettes as it hops forward through time, and there is plenty for the fan. Helena being the image of Michelle ties into the earlier entries well and we see the creation of the vampire Ash (Marko Filipovic), along with his sister Ariel (Stasa Nikolic), Ash appearing in film 4 as a character and being the central antagonist of Vampire Journals. However, whilst there are a lot of moments, there is not a strong central plot. There are aesthetic changes. Clearly Radu is much older looking than he was in the earlier films because it has been twenty-five years since Hove played the character. However, as vampires (in some lore) can age and become younger that’s ok. Like in the other films he has unnaturally long fingers – but these looked a bit rubbery and rubbish.
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| Anders Hove as Radu |
Vladislav’s design has changed – from Angus Scrimm’s longhaired vampire to this Nosferatu inspired design. However, his fate seems somewhat changed (perhaps, vampires are notorious for not staying dead but he was certainly the vampire in charge in the first film and gets stabbed, stabbed stabbity stabbed in this). The photography, especially locational photography, was really nice in this (though cgi crosses on top of real-world castles look a bit bonk). The biggest issues were in pacing and in the fact that this could have done with a strong central story rather than just the vignettes. For the Subspecies fan this is necessary, it might be a bit too fan-centric for the casual viewer. As a fan 6.5 out of 10 seems fair.
The imdb page is here.
On Blu-Ray @ Amazon US
On Blu-Ray @ Amazon UK
4 comments:
Yeah, I thought the film felt disjointed too. It leaves multiple plot threads unfinished, like it's setting up for another prequel. Scratch that, Full Moon definitely left it open for more prequels because that's what they do.
Making Helen the past life of Michelle explains Radu's inexplicable obsession with her, but it makes Michelle's relationship with Stefan retroactively creepy.
The rules for vampirism are inconsistent. Apparently biting turns you, except for all those people the vampires keep around as larders? All other times it requires the master to give their own blood to the fledgling?
In general the continuity is just nonexistent, as is typical for this franchise. Vladislas is depicted as a villain here when his backstory in the other films was that he made a pact with the local villagers for the Bloodstone and disowned Radu because he felt Radu was too cruel and evil. Circe's backstory and relationship is unexplained and the context contradicts her already inconsistent backstory given in the other films: one film says she seduced Vlad because she wanted a special child, another says he seduced her so he could kill her family and take their castle, and here she tries to kill Radu after his birth and then changes her mind when she meets him as an adult?
What is up with this movie?
Hi Propheme,
Good points and yes Full Moon are particularly obsessed with recycling - though that makes this at least original (with only characters and not footage recycled).
The rules are, as you point out, inconsistent and they certainly did retrofit Vladislas as the villain he wasn't. Good point about Stefan
I watched it today and yeah, although there were things I liked, it also frustrated me a little in the same way some of the other movies do, especially part 3. To me there seems to be always so much potential that isn't properly explored, not enough time is taken to focus on the aspects that would be really interesting. I also found some of the supporting players rather weak and I HATED the cheap CGI-Shadow effects. I mean, come on, You did this better 30 years ago!
Anyway, overall it was okay and I certainly didn't expect a masterpiece.
In general the imperfections of the series (except part 2 and Vampire Journals, which belong to my top 10 favourite vampire films) may be part of the reason why I'm so drawn to this series and always return to it. Not everything is told out, it leaves room for the imagination, I don't know, sometimes this works for me better than something that leaves no narrative gaps at all.
@Propheme About Michelle's relationship with Stefan being creepy, well, I think that is okay because at that point she didn't look like his mother yet. And for a complete Oedipus bingo, he would still have had to kill his father, sooo... ;)
cheers NerdyWillowTree, good point around the imperfections being a draw. Sometimes that can be endearing especially when there is so much potential in the vehicle (Vampire Journals particularly strikes me this way)
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