On the surface, Stake Land is a vampire apocalypse film. The story is very similar to Zombieland, but the tone is 180 degrees different. The world has gone to hell and there’s nothing slick or cool about trying to survive. Fighting back is the only option if you want to live, and the film doesn’t flinch from showing quite a few opted out of life because they simply don’t have it in them. I was completely absorbed by its sadness. With a thorough attention to detail, here is a doomsday future that felt very possible. I’ve seen zombie/vampire children before but here is the first time where killing one felt like a violation, an abomination of decency. How often in a film like this does a human make a comment like, “It’s running out of food so they’re skinnier but meaner,” and not brace you for some cool fight but make you pity the vampires?
Performances are natural, characters are fully fleshed out. There’s even a nice violin and piano score that reminds me of Serenity. It occasionally lapses into B-movie monster killing and the violence would’ve been more effective had it been less bloody. It reminds me of Pontypool, with an intriguing, fresh horror idea, a strong secondary theme (in Ponty it was language, here it’s religion) and a wonderful southern-fried lead performance by a grizzled character actor.
This one, named Mister, is played by Nick Damici, who got a 2nd great lead role in 2014’s Late Phases. Mister takes us on a journey through a vampire post-apocalyptic southern wasteland, giving us some helpful tips for surviving not only the vampires, but hordes of religious fanatics who believe this plague is God’s will. Smartly, there’s a positive religious character named Sister (Kelly McGillis) so this not a religious satire but more of a metaphor for America aiding in its own decline. (Nothing unusual about that.)
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