The Forsaken (Widescreen)

Before we get to the actually plot of this film what we have as the chief selling point are a pair of young studs from the WB network at the top of the credits, namely Kerr Smith from "Dawson's Creek" and Brendan Fehr from "Roswell." Smith is Sean, who edits trailers in Hollywood and is now driving somebody else's Mercedes convertible across the country to attend his sister's wedding. Fehr is Nick, who seems to be just some slacker bumming a ride but is in reality much, much more. We just do not figure out what until they encounter Megan (Izabella Miko), who is acting weird at a bus stop. Not only is she the blonde from the beginning of the film, but it turns out that she has been bitten by a vampire. Nick knows this because a year ago he was bitten by the same vampire, but he has a magic drug cocktail that has stopped him from making the change. Now the guys have to save Megan from the same fate of living death.

Anne Rice, P. N. Elrod, Laurell K. Hamilton and Joss Whedon have all dealt in different ways with making the vampire mythos work in more modern terms. J.S. Cardone, writer and director of "The Forsaken," tries to do the same thing but the result is something of a mess. The vampires in this movie are basically something akin to the Manson Gang, which is easy enough to grasp, but it is the new and improve rules on how you avoid turning into a vampire that really requires copious note taking, although that becomes rather pointless once we discover that one of the ways to stem the transformation is to pour buckets of ice on a half naked woman in a bathtub. The goal is ultimately to kill Kit (Jonathan Schaech), the leader of the vampire pack, because that will break the cycle (sort of convenient, huh?). But before that can happen there is plenty of blood-letting and you know that beautiful Mercedes is going to take a pounding.

At least "The Forsaken" takes itself seriously, although there are times where that works to the disadvantage of the film. Kerr is passable enough in the role of the basically good guy to whom all sorts of weird things are suddenly happening, but Fehr just does not have the presence to make his role and the rest of the movie works (every time I look I him I keep thinking he should be playing the young Fox Muldar on an "X-Files" flashback). The film is bloody and gory for those who like such things, although none of it is particularly memorable. The problem is that I perked up at the idea of some new twists on the idea of the vampire, but that just called attention to the most problematic elements of the film. The really depressing part is that this is the best film I have seen this week.