REVIEW: ‘Blade: Trinity’ (2004)

BLADE: TRINITY is the best two-hour commercial for an iPod ever. As a movie however, it’s a bloated, over-produced, obnoxious, and pointless waste of good viewing time that could be spent watching something better, like GOLDEN GIRLS re-runs for instance. Surely those lovable elderly ladies could do just as well against the undead as Wesley Snipes, Ryan Reynolds and Jessica Biel. All it takes are some cool poses, leather and a thunderous mix of rock and roll, hip hop and dance beats rattling the theater seats. Of course, you’d be missing out on seeing Biel in a moment of deep contemplation in the shower and Reynolds baring his well-sculpted torso during an interrogation that turns into comedy night.

In his first attempt to direct his own script, BLADE series writer David S. Goyer has lost touch with the franchise he helped to make into the first real success as a Marvel comics adaptation. The original BLADE was a surprise hit that turned a little-known comic book character into one of the best adult-oriented action heroes in years. It certainly gave Snipes’ floundering career a boost. The sequel upped the ante in every aspect and despite some cartoony CGI effects; it worked thanks to quirky supporting characters and a more ambitious plot. For a long time, the rumor was that Blade 3 would be an I AM LEGEND scenario where vampires take over the world as Blade valiantly fights on in a losing, but epic battle. That’s what should have been. The only thing that exists of that premise in TRINITY is a scene where the good guys discuss changing combat tactics to fight the growing vampire threat.

This time, martial arts and fancy gadgets aren’t enough. Once Blade hooks up with a “sleeper cell” of vampire hunters known as the Night Stalkers, he’s told that an airborne biological weapon has been designed that will instantly kill vampires. All it needs to be perfected is a sample of DNA from the father of all vampires, Dracula himself. Coincidently, Draco has just been brought back to life by fellow vampires led by a vampy Parker Posey. The stage is set for a climatic battle as Blade and two Night Stalkers take on Posey and her posse of undead.

After BLADE 2, the only logical thing to do would have been to have an all-out war between vampire and human with Blade in the middle. Instead, Goyer actually downsizes. Posey and her crew are the least threatening villains from the franchise. As for Dracula, he’s little more than a snakeskin boot-wearing stud with shape-shifting ability. His “natural” guise is as a Predator-like creature that looks silly. He ends up being just one of Posey’s goons who duels with Blade at the end in battle armor.

Nothing really matters. Story and characters are clearly secondary. The whole film really is framed and edited like a commercial engineered to hold the attention of 14-year olds. Having repeated and pointless product placement for iPods only reinforces this feeling. You have the hot bods, an endless stream of overbearing music that drowns everything out and near-endless imbedded promo shots of our heroes walking in slow motion while trying to look as cool as possible.

Fight scenes turn into chopped up montages and the overall effect is a deadening of the senses. By the end, I didn’t know anyone in the movie besides Blade and I didn’t have any interest in what they were doing. Most of the acting is bad, but Reynolds does brighten up the film a little with his continual joking.

There is some decent fight choreography here and there, but no real involved match apart from a generic sword fight at the end. Snipes dishes out a lot of kicks and both of his costars join in. Biel has her first big action role and while she looks good physically and can go through some of the motions, she ultimately looks like a parody. At least Reynolds isn’t taking himself too seriously onscreen, but when Biel actually starts kung fu sparring in exaggerated fashion with a vampire her action star image becomes a joke.

It may not be quite as bad as BALLISTIC: ECKS VS. SEVER, but BLADE: TRINITY has fallen into the territory where filmmakers keep spewing more fancy visual and auditory crap at the audience simply because they can or to make up for fundamental inadequacies and not because it makes a better movie. Anyone who liked garbage like VAN HELSING (2004) or UNDERWORLD is likely to enjoy this film, but I find all of these comic book vampire movies to be in need of receiving a good old stake to the heart to put them out of their soulless misery.