James Cameron says of it, "Digital imaging has entered a new era. The world will come to consider this work as the standard of top quality in digital animation." Andy Wachowski gushes, "It was beautiful. It was as if the art of Francis Bacon had come to life." What film are these quote wh0r3s talking about? Why, it's Blood: The Last Vampire, a nice, though very brief, diversion for the kiddies. (On a side note, that James Cameron seems to have spent all of his time sitting around watching anime after making that Titanic movie as you can find him commenting on everything from the Mamoru Oshii-written Jin-Roh to Rin Taro's Metropolis. Nerd!)

At a running time of only 45 minutes, there's not too much you can say about Blood's story without spoiling it. First, we have the Wednesday Addams-esque heroine, Saya (voice of actress Youki Kudoh, from such live-action efforts as Scott Hicks' Snow Falling On Cedars and Jim Jarmusch's Mystery Train). She looks mean, she wears a little sailor suit, and she carries a sword. Who is she really? Why is she working for those shifty guys in the suits? We never find out. Then we have the chiropterans. They look mean, they disguise themselves as humans, and they feast on our blood. Who are they really? Where did they come from? What's their relationship to Saya? We never find that out either.

But, needless to say, when you put a few of these chiropterans things and a hunting Saya into the same film together, a little bit of gore and entertainment will ensue. The thing here is that, when you get right down to it, the plot is about as original as wacky morning radio show DJs. The real reason to see it is for the gee-whiz digital animation and the brilliantly stylish direction. The crisp look of everything onscreen simply enhances the experience, particularly in the opening sequence and the ballroom scenes.

Most of Blood takes place on an American airbase in Japan during the Vietnam War (and on Halloween night, for maximum mood). The filmmakers use this backdrop to exploit something we see all too rarely in movies. The characters aren't all dubbed into English nor do they speak in English with foreign accents (as you often see foreign characters doing in films even if there's no reason for them to be speaking English) nor do they even all speak Japanese with English subtitles. Instead, characters who should speak Japanese do and characters who should speak English do and the bilingual characters even speak both with English subtitling where necessary. Imagine that. A film that portrays people speaking languages the way they would in real life. This probably won't be true of Manga Entertainment's VHS release of Blood, which is listed as a "Dub" even though the majority of the dialogue in the original Japanese version is in English to begin with.

The film version of Blood: The Last Vampire is just one part of a unified multimedia storyline. More of it was released in the form of a Playstation 2 video game of the same name (a continuation that takes place in present day Japan), three novels (Night Of The Beasts by Mamoru Oshii and Blood Calling For Darkness & Shang-hai Aibyou by Junichi Fujisaku), and a manga (Blood the Last Vampire 2000). None of these have been translated and released in North America so us poor folks are left with what feels like the pilot episode for an animated tv series, though a lavishly animated one. Questions are raised but almost none of them are answered by the end. This isn't uncommon in anime as often short anime direct-to-video series are based on tiny parts of a much larger manga work (Dragon Half, Bastard!!, Shinesman) but I'm sure it's annoying for uninitiated viewers. Some helpful info about Blood's greater plot not revealed in the movie itself can be found at the film's official website at http://www.bloodthemovie.com

One gets the frustrating feeling that director Hiroyuki Kitakubo could've easily turned in a masterpiece of anime given a full 90 minutes to play with more of this material. But even as is, Blood: The Last Vampire is a good exercise in style. The digital look, which in recent works of animation from Japan has often left me cold, works here and the action scenes look great. But I guess those who want a more complete experience will probably have to wait for Yoshiaki "Ninja Scroll" Kawajiri's soon-to-be-released Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust.


Recommended:
Yes

Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 9 - 12