[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cv568AzZ-i8]

What We Do in the Shadows

Release Date: February 13th, 2015
Cast: Jemaine Clement, Taika Waititi, Jonathan Brugh, Cori Gonzalez-Macuer, Stuart Rutherford, Ben Fransham
Director: Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi
Studio: New Zealand Film Commission, Funny or Die
Distributor: Madman Entertainment
Genre(s): Comedy, Mockumentary

Rating: ★★★★☆
Review Spoilers: Low
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What We Do in the Shadows takes the plight of the modern vampire and puts it out there for everyone to see. It does this hilariously. Brought to us by the great minds behind Flight of the Conchords, this film will definitely leave audiences laughing at the sheer absurdity of its content. With a stunning set of actors and wonderfully fun writing, What We Do in the Shadows is a film to add to the collection.

Taking place in New Zealand, the movie began with an introduction to the characters. It took the form of a documentary as camera crews followed the main characters around in order to show what their lives were like. The documentary focused on four roommates who happened to be vampires. With Viago (Taika Waititi) leading the way, the audience immediately dove into the wonderful world of modern vampires. Viago was the youngest of the group and introduced us to his flatmates: Deacon (Jonathan Brugh), Vladislav (Jemaine Clement), and the oldest of them all, Petyr (Ben Fransham).

Unfortunately, things don’t end up going well for this group of roommates as we’re given a look at their relatively complicated lives.

According to this movie, vampires face a lot of the same hardships normal people do in the modern world. Flatmate issues abounded as various members of the household refused to do their assigned chores. Deacon, for example, had refused to clean the literally bloody dishes for nearly five years now. None of them except Viago would put down newspaper and towels to protect the furniture from the blood of their victims. They went through all of the normal things flatmates typically do.

Yet at the end of the day they still knew how to have fun together. When night approached, they took to the city to have a bit of fun clubbing. Though even that was not without issue, considering vampires have to be invited into buildings and none of the bouncers would comply. Without being able to outright tell what they were (lest they be killed by angry mobs), they were stuck with only frequenting places owned by other vampires.

With their life established, a new layer was added to the complex activities of vampires: new vampires.

The rest of the movie explored a deviation from the status quo. Their existence became a bit more eventful when a young man was turned into a vampire by Petyr. With his new life, the young vampire taught the others how to live a bit differently. He introduced technology and helped them achieve a higher degree of social status. Unfortunately, he also brought with him a number of problems, not including Stu, a human who everyone loved.

Stu was the opposite of a problem.

In the end, What We Do in the Shadows hit the mark it was aiming for. It was funny, well-shot, and kept me entertained for the entire ninety minutes. There was a little bit of uncertainty as to whether or not the premise could fill all that time, but it did. Other than a couple of strangely-placed scenes, the film had a good tempo and carried the audience on an absolutely ridiculous adventure filled with vampire antics and a lot of arterial blood. This film definitely gets my recommendation.