BLADE TRINITY, or How I Killed This Franchise. That’s my title for it. Wesley Snipes got royally ticked off about how his role got diminished in this film to make room for the younger stars. He has every right to be ticked about this colossal disaster.
However, everyone else has the right to be ticked at Snipes for not even dialing in a performance, but faxing in something from the Ashton Krutcher School of Acting. The premise was so promising. The vampires want to get Blade off their backs so they start a PR campaign to get the cops to believe he's a psycho. Led by Danica Talos (Parker Posey, BEST IN SHOW), the vampires discover the hibernating Dracula, know called Drake (Dominic Purcell, EQUILIBRIUM), in of all places Iraq. They want to use his pure DNA to make them day-walkers like Blade.
So after some stuff happens (who really cares), Blade winds up with a group of vampire killers named the Night Stalkers, which include former vampire Hannibal King (Ryan Reynolds, VAN WILDER), blind scientist Sommerfield (Natasha Lyonne, SLUMS OF BEVERLY HILLS) and Abigail Whistler (Jessica Biel, TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE remake), who is the “born out of wedlock” daughter of Blade’s right hand man Whistler (Kris Kristofferson, ALICE DOESN’T LIVE HERE ANYMORE). And yes, Abigail actually describes herself as being born out of wedlock.
Any real character issues that this film could have dealt with were replaced by boring action, descriptions of stupid weapons and an inane plot, which also includes the Night Walkers needing to infect Dracula with a virus that will kill all vampires instantly. The dialogue is awful. As I said before, Snipes shows his distain for the material by not even trying. Presented with crud to say, Kristofferson and Posey give cringe-inducing performances along with John Michael Higgins (A MIGHTY WIND) as psychiatrist Dr. Edgar Vreede and wrester-turned-actor Triple H as vampire muscle man Jarko Grimwood.
Director David S. Goyer makes his directing debut with this film and must have been heavily medicated on some illicit drug while doing it. He wrote solid screenplays for BLADE and BLADE II as well as the awesome DARK CITY, but churns out this crap for his first directing job? His timing and pacing are awful and the film has the weakest, sixth-grade attempt at humor that I’ve probably ever seen on screen. Just uttering four-letter words does not a punchline make. Even the fight scenes are boring. I am now very worried about the quality of BATMAN BEGINS and GHOST RIDER for Goyer has written the screenplays. But I have no hope for his version of the Flash, starring his BLADE TRINITY co-star Reynolds. Please prove me wrong. His first effort is the worst film I’ve seen in years.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
