Stake Land (2010) Jim Mickle

It's post apocalyptic.
It's a vampire tale.
It's a post-apocalyptic vampire tale.
The plot:
The world has been decimated by a plague of vampires. America seems to have been the first to fall, the outbreak starting in the south and sweeping northward. People blockaded themselves into townships, but these proved useless. Now, all that survives of society is an occasional settlement, guarded fiercely, and a cult of religious fanatics known as The Brotherhood, keen that all should follow their God, and prepared to massacre anyone who resists.
We follow Mister, a craggy old vampire hunter, and Martin, a young man without a family who he has taken under his wing as they head north, attempting to find New Eden. Along the way, they'll meet skin headed brethren, blood spewing vampires and Top Gun's Kelly McGillis.
And it's quality stuff, to be honest.
An independent movie, this easily casts off the limitations that Hollywood imposes and offers instead a melancholic, relentlessly bleak little tale.
The special effects, though sparse, are effective enough, and the occasional moment of insane violence unsettling, for sure.
Tonally, this has echoes of Diary of the Dead, thematically, we can see glimpses of Near Dark and last years excellent low budget creature feature Monsters, so it's in damn fine company.
As with all good genre fare, this is allegorical if you care to look for it (the religious are worse than the infected), but this can just as easily be viewed as a straight forward monster movie, though a pretty damned downbeat one.
Not really breaking any new ground - although the vampire 'bombs' the Brotherhood drop were a novelty - this is still a sure-footed, miserabilist horror movie, just like Grandma used to make.
Liked it a lot.

4 out of 5

Let Me In (2010) Dir: Matt Reeves

In this post-Twilight world, it seems any old vampire story will do.
The bloodsucking Undead are currently enjoying a media-driven prominence that would make Lestat blush, frankly, so it was with some trepidation that I blundered, drunken and only partially clothed, into a mid-afternoon screening of Let me In, the US remake of Sweden's very own Let the Right One In - rated an impressive 8.1/10 on IMDB at time or writing, a movie that, shamefully, I am yet to see.
And boy, was it good.
The plot: A teenager, Owen - played with heart-aching poignancy by the chaffed-lipped Kodi Smit-McPhee - is something of a loner. Picked on at school by big, big bullies, no friends to speak of, he spends his evenings spying, Rear Window style on his neighbours, and playing Rubik's cube in the perishing cold outside. It's 1983, by the way, so the cube is not as anachronistic as it first sounds.
One day, a new family move in; a young girl, Abby - Chloe Moretz, Kick Ass' Hit Girl, no less - and her 'father.' Through desperation rather than genuine desire, they strike up a friendship, two outsiders trapped in a sea of loneliness, but it doesn't take Owen too long to realise there is more to Abby than meets the eye.
She's no ordinary girl, oh no, she's only a freakin' bloodsucking creature of the night.
When Abby's 'father' kills himself somewhat dramatically - skin melts, people, skin more than melts - it is down to Abby to source her own blood, and the violence that follows genuinely chills the blood.
Having not seen the source material - yes, I know, get off my back, I shall be flagellating myself rigorously before the night is out - all I can go on is the current version, and mighty impressive it is too.
You see, this movie manages that rarest of feats, coupling horror with genuine pathos, wringing emotion out of pretty much every scene without once leaving you reaching for the nearest carrier bag to offload the contents of your stomach.
Warm, heart-wrenching, tender and vicious, this is a beautiful little movie that I daresay will vanish from the mainstream cinema's quicker than you can say Deathly Hallows, but here's hoping word of mouth gives it a bit of legs as, honestly, it kicks the absolute arse out of most modern horror.

5 out of 5