WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS – The Review

WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS is REAL WORLD with bite. Quite literally actually. A colorful (well… mainly shades of palish white) group of vampires that range in style and age struggle to live together all under the same roof. Whose turn it is to do the dishes or why someone didn’t put down newspapers on the floor before biting someone’s neck are taxing conversations that showcase just how “normal” vampires really are in this entertaining mockumentary.

“I go for the look ‘dead but delicious.’” Fans of FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS will love Jemaine Clement’s turn as a stubborn and ultra serious vamp that comes across like a mix of Brad Pitt in INTERVIEW WITH A VAMPIRE with Vlad the Impaler. He’s just one of the highlights in this stellar cast. Everyone involved – even smaller bit parts such as a pair of bumbling police officers – commits to the material and delivers in memorable ways. Taika Waititi is the pseudo-leader of the film as he guides the documentary crew spotlighting the house and its occupants. His prissy and sensitive manner juxtaposes nicely against many of the others in the house including a stoic and silent Nosferatu type.

WHAT WE DO… isn’t just all laughs though. There’s a rather clever sequence early on involving a male victim struggling to escape the house. Utilizing one long camera shot, we feel both the humor and the anxiety as he gets lost in a maze of hallways and doors. Around every corner lurks another one of the roommates in a hilariously creative and occasionally surprising manner. The backpack scare during his attempted escape is absolutely brilliant! Sequences like this recall fellow New Zealander Peter Jackson’s early scary but silly work.

By incorporating ancient drawings and art from over the centuries, directors Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi are able to give us a brief history of each of these characters. Little touches such as this effectively hides the low budget of WHAT WE DO… but also places these fictional characters in a bigger universe. As a fanatic of ancient cultures and fantasy mythology, it’s also quite fun to see these old and sometimes crude looking drawings.

“It’s this big homoerotic dick biting club and I’m stuck here ironing their fucking frills!” Hilarious lines such as this are constant in WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS. You don’t have to be a hardcore horror fan to appreciate this loving nod to things that go bump in the night – yes, even werewolves get in on the action, including one unforgettable scene between the two groups near the waterfront that had me laughing out loud. Thanks in large part to an exceptional cast, WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS proves you can do quite a lot with the vampire shtick without feeling long in the tooth.

Overall rating: 4 out of 5

WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS opens at Landmark’s Tivoli Theatre on Friday, March 6