A teenage boy and some mysterious vampire hunter join forces after a vampire kills the boy's entire family. This is after vampires have ravaged pretty much the entire US, and there only few human conclaves around the south. They drive up north in a beat up car, train the boy in fighting techniques to kill vampires, stop at the occasional town that still has humans, regularly fight vampires and a bunch of crazy cultists humans. On the way they pick up a nun, a marine and a pregnant girl. Their destination is Canada, now called New Eden, where presumably there are no vampires.
As a vampire movie, Stake Land isn't all that great. The vampires are pretty ugly and look cheap- like they're wearing some paper mask covered in used car oil. They run around and jump around and often are hard to kill, but don't really seem all that menacing. One exception though is a girl who's just been turned vampire, that scene is pretty good.
As a survivalist road trip movie, Stake Land is better though. We get to see some pretty devastated landscapes and sad towns. Unfortunately we don't get nearly enough southern landscapes, as those immediately change into cold forests. The religious cult angle is also pretty good and the followers seem more dangerous than the vampires. One hilarious and original scene has the cultist dropping live vampires out of a chopper into a town of partying survivors.
The kid speaks mostly in voice overs and the man doesn't have much to say. That's another problem with this movie, there so little dialog, which then has to be replaced with constant music, nice music but very sad and depressing music. The kid is oddly passive and frightful, he really doesn't do a whole lot- a stark departure from the super teens we constantly see in movies these days.
For all its problems, I liked Stake Land a lot. The concept is good, and the crew had the technical skill, but something is missing that would have made this movie even better, and we could have done with less sad music.
As a vampire movie, Stake Land isn't all that great. The vampires are pretty ugly and look cheap- like they're wearing some paper mask covered in used car oil. They run around and jump around and often are hard to kill, but don't really seem all that menacing. One exception though is a girl who's just been turned vampire, that scene is pretty good.
As a survivalist road trip movie, Stake Land is better though. We get to see some pretty devastated landscapes and sad towns. Unfortunately we don't get nearly enough southern landscapes, as those immediately change into cold forests. The religious cult angle is also pretty good and the followers seem more dangerous than the vampires. One hilarious and original scene has the cultist dropping live vampires out of a chopper into a town of partying survivors.
The kid speaks mostly in voice overs and the man doesn't have much to say. That's another problem with this movie, there so little dialog, which then has to be replaced with constant music, nice music but very sad and depressing music. The kid is oddly passive and frightful, he really doesn't do a whole lot- a stark departure from the super teens we constantly see in movies these days.
For all its problems, I liked Stake Land a lot. The concept is good, and the crew had the technical skill, but something is missing that would have made this movie even better, and we could have done with less sad music.