Out of Frame: Bloody Last Vampire

Saya, a human-vampire hybrid played by South Korean actress Gianna (née Jeon Ji-hyun), has chosen to work for a shadowy group called the Council, who supply her with bottles of blood and information on her nemesis, Onigen, the mother of all vampires. Getting a tip that vampires connected with Onigen are hiding on the Yokota U.S. Airbase, Saya dons a fetching blue sailor suit to impersonate a Japanese student. For some reason, she falls into the company of another student, Alice (American actress Allison Miller, who currently has a major role in the interesting, if obscure, television series Kings), whose screaming and general uselessness plague the rest of the film. We make our way through some tedious back story about how Saya was raised by a wise servant named Kato (Yasuaki Kurata) until, after a seemingly endless number of vampires — who can also mutate into other demonic forms — have been slaughtered, Saya confronts Onigen.

The ridiculous plot, hardly an impediment for a good action film, means that the fight sequences would have to carry the film, which they do not. The stylish and beautifully physical Saya created by Gianna is, by far, the best part of the film. Unfortunately, the extensive CGI additions to those sequences, the cost of which must have been prohibitive, are cartoonish (countless spurts of brown, dust-like "blood") and herky-jerky (some caused by a mixture of real-time and slow-motion action, others just clumsy and fake). Like so many blockbusters, one often has the sense of too many cooks spoiling the pot, too. Sure, the films that Chris Nahon and the other creators obviously like are great — Bladerunner (the grimy, rainy locations), Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (the tree and rooftop sequences), Kill Bill (the snow-tinged confrontation with Onigen) — but simply rehashing them into a sort of patchwork tribute does not make a good movie. Apart from the first (and least explicit) vampire attack, the film has no good scares and far too many cringes.

Blood: The Last Vampire opens today at the E Street Cinema. View the trailer.