Ray Pride

(Nochnoy Dozor, 2004) Convoluted, grimy, gruesome, Gothic, Slavic, giddy humbug, Timur Bekmambetov's "Night Watch" has been a massive hit on its Russian home ground, with a sequel in the works and a third, shot-in-English installment rumored. Moscow's a marvelous backdrop for Bekmambetov's relentless camera hijinks--post-Jeunet, post-Fincher, mid-Wachowski and post-"Lord of the Rings"--and the otherworldliness of its vampires of day and night evoke a Russian culture both medieval and postmodern, derivative of every visual culture keen on big-budget eyeball kicks, along with an occasional dollop of Eisensteinian battle. The plot is seldom decipherable, but boils down to a battle for the soul of a boy born in 1992 at the fall of the Soviet Empire. The American subtitles are also post-Tony Scott, drawing from the playfulness of his "Man of Fire" verbiage with the kind of play--letters jumping, jittering, turning red, melting away in inky, smoky spirals--seldom seen since silent picture intertitles. "Just what we need," a character says knowingly, "Another asshole with visions of the future." With Konstantin Khabensky, Vladimir Menshov, Valeri Zolotukhin, Mariya Poroshina, Galina Tyunina, Yuri Kutsenko, Dmitry Martynov, Aleksei Cahdov, Zhanna Friske, Ilya Lagutenko and Viktor Verzhbitsky. 115m.

"Night Watch" opens Friday.

(2006-02-21)

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