The Thirst: Blood War (2008) Online

Poor battle between Vampires flick.

Paycheck job for the names (Tony Todd, Jason Connery and C Thomas Howell) this is one of those movies you look at and wonder if anyone was taking it seriously or whether anyone was doing it for more than the money. Okay Tony Todd maybe took thing a bit too seriously (he's way too intense) and the cinematographer was very serious about America Olivo's breasts, but other then that this seems to be a joke...except its not, or if it is it never signals that it it is. I thought after the opening attack on the feuding couple that we'd have some laughs after that but it never gets funny, at least not intentionally so.

Only worth seeing if you have to see every vampire movie ever made.

This is the equivalent to Turkey a la King. You know, what your mother used to scrap together from Thanksgiving leftovers using gravy, the parts of the turkey no one wanted to eat and some rice. Well, enough about my childhood.

Anyway, what you have here are some actors who used to be name actors doing throwaway scenes so the directors can put their names on the cover, making you think that this is a better film than it actually is, mixed in with the usual vampire movie clichés.

What you have are some college kids who get mixed up in a fight between factions of vampires, and vampire hunters who have resisted the taste for blood, but are equally immortal. (No, I couldn't figure it out, either.) Lots of scenes with the head chick vampire trying to seduce the hero into the "dark side'.

Oh, yeah, and then there was the sound. It didn't sync up with the action, it seemed to be off by about a half second, so you see people keep talking after their lips have stopped moving. More annoying where the cutaways from the sex scenes. "Hey, you aren't paying me enough to actually take my clothes off, buster. That'll cost you extra!" You can imagine the lead actress saying before she goes back to her day-job as a stripper.

JoeB- watching bad movies so you don't have to.

Action?? Where...?

Comedy?? Well, they make a very very bad movie, worst then D movie, and too late, they saw what a mistake it was. What do they do then? Call it a Comedy!! Hahaha.. loooosers.

Horror?? Come on.. 2 drops of blood on a neck!! F/x is totally worst then zero.

Thriller?? lol!!!

C. Thomas Howell and Tony Todd!! For example.. In this movie!! Don't ask me why or how, it's over my head. I'm tired of all this low budget, low serious 'horror' movies. Why not try to make a good movie for a change...?

I recommend Hatchet and Feast instead...!!

// Cheers

"The Thirst: Blood Wars" is among the worst vampire films of the genre.

**SPOILERS**

Attempting to get through High School, Will Hawkins, (A.J. Draven) and his friends Jayne, (Allison Lange) Rico, (Owiso Odera) and Ashley, (Rini Bell) are constantly in fear of school bully Darren, (Cameron Zeidler) who has a grudge against the two of them. When they form a relationship, he goes even more insane to go after them, but soon after attacking them, he manages to fail, allowing Julien, (Tony Todd) to become aware of the situation. As he struggles to understand what has happened, it soon dawns on him that a coven of vampires are coming after him, believing that he holds the key to helping them fulfill an ancient prophecy that will allow them all unprecedented power, and the group races to stop their devious plans before they can complete them.

The Good News: This one had hardly anything worthwhile about it. One of the few good spots to it is that there's a couple of rather well-done if altogether brief martial arts fights between the vampire sides in here. The one-on-one to start it off is the longest of the bunch and is certainly a bit above-average for this sort of sequence and the lightning-fast moves are definitely enjoyable. The second one, a multi-man fight ruined by the darkened lighting, still comes off as the best of them due to the high-energy nature of it and the use of incorporating the surroundings into it rather well. The last fight, while the weakest of the trio, does have some rather nice moments and a couple good counters to make last longer than expected, though it's not as memorable as the other two. The only other part to this one that works well is the fact that this one has a well-built middle section that makes the slow transformation into the vampire somewhat intriguing, even though the only action during that scene really consists of him acting crazy during a sex scene and how he slowly grows afraid of the light. It's not bad and definitely deserves props. Otherwise, this one just doesn't do much.

The Bad News: frankly, this one just had way too many problems to really make it worthwhile. One of the biggest problems is the fact that there's just way too many things to keep track of during the course of the film. Firstly starting out as a story about the group of friends being tormented by a bully that may or may not have supernatural explanations for his powers is all well and good, if incredibly dull, then it turns into a group of vampire hunters tracking down the group, then into the focus of the group to transform the one member of the high-school group and finally it manages to merge those with another few subplots about the two friends' growing friendship with another's desire to join the vampire coven and finally getting all of these together. Most of these are purely uninteresting due to boredom running rampant through just about all of them, it has way too much time devoted to them as well, and in the end, it causes the effect of the just not featuring enough action to make up for the plot and give a reason why it's forcing us to sit through all this stuff, and in the end it's just too confusing to really matter much. The dullness is also another factor caused by another big flaw in this one, where the film just doesn't utilize its action scenes with enough stuff to make them exciting, as they're all too short to really let the viewer get into them and not enough time is used on them. The attack in the woods before the hunters find them is a prime example, as from the start of the scene when the vampires find their victim to when the hunters have arrived and vanquished them from the spot, the whole scene is almost two minutes, and it really could've done so much more to really make this one more interesting and exciting. The lack of excitement also comes into play with the film's last big flaw, the fact that the violence and gore is mostly hidden away due to how dark and really hard it is to really see anything in here with any kind of clarity. This one really could've let us see what was going on quite easily, but due to other forces, this one just doesn't and it's hard to really care about this one due to all the problems with it. The fact that other minor flaws, including the fact that the vampires are clearly shown to be extremely loose with their own rules for dealing with them or that the hierarchy of their establishment aren't a factor yet are still viable flaws shows just how terrible this one is.

The Final Verdict: An almost-complete failure as a vampire film, without a whole lot of good points that aren't that great to start and way too many flaws. Really hard to know who would enjoy this one as fans of the creative side will be put off, and with their being so many flaws this one just doesn't stand out.

Rated R: Graphic Language, Violence, Nudity, an attempted Rape and a Sex Scene

This film cost about ninepence, which is abundantly clear from what you see on screen. Make no mistake - you're not going to get production values.

But you are going to get something which, from time to time, delivers a surprise and at least tries to be a bit different. The acting isn't great and the effects aren't very special, but it makes more of an effort than other films which do things strictly according to formula.

It suffers from starting off as a comedy and finishing seriously - an internal inconsistency which it never really recovers from.

But it's not fair to criticise it solely for being cheap tat - it can't help that, and it does at least try to be a bit more than that.

The Thirst: Blood War is set in modern day America where college teenagers Will (A.J. Draven) & Jayne (Allison Lange) decide they want to take their friendship to the next level & start dating, however local jock, bully & tough guy Darren (Cameron Zeidler) isn't happy about the nerdish hippie Will dating the hot Jayne & starts to make trouble. Late one night by a pond Darren attacks Jayne & Will comes to her rescue & in a struggle Will stabs & kills Darren who is in fact the son of a centuries old Monk sorcerer who calls himself a sentry & who are sworn to fight & kill Vampires. Now the head of the Vampire clan Julien (Tony Todd) has competition from his right hand man Cladius (Jason Connery) but the only way Claudius can snatch power from Julien is to kill a sentry & if he can't do that kill someone who did kill a sentry which is Will. Will & his friends are plunged into the ancient war between Vampires & sentry's...

Known under the title Blood Wars on DVD in the US this was co-produced & directed by Tom Shell & I had a quick look through the IMDb user comments section & a couple of external reviews & I can't really find anyone who says anything good about The Thirst: Blood War which isn't too surprising since it's awful on every conceivable level. First off the title is a lie, there's very little blood in it & as far as I could tell no war either. The first thirty odd minutes of this focuses almost entirely on Will, Jayne & Darren & feels more like a teen soap opera than a horror film & when the horror elements do eventually kick in they are pretty lame with Will trying to be turned into a Vampire & a bit of bickering between Julien & Claudius to see who is harder but they both come across as wimps anyway & really don't put up much of a fight at a very weak climax. There's these Monks as well who total three & are able to shoot blue 'stuff' out of their fingers for no apparent reason, we are never really sure if there are more or not or where they came from or the story behind them & we are never really sure if Julien is head Vampire in the world or just his clan & there are other clans out there & apart from sit in a room he doesn't seem to do anything else & he has no plans or ideas & we don't really know if a Vampire bite turns you into a Vampire or kills you since at the start a bite will turn you into a Vampire but at the end it kills you so it's hard to care about anything as it doesn't make much sense, there's no threat or grand plan or anything to keep you watching really & I do not count three Monks & about half a dozen Vampires as a war, maybe I'm being too tough here but I just don't. To make matters worse the character's are one dimensional stereotypes, the dialogue is awful & at 100 odd minutes it's far too long & feels more 100 odd hours while watching it.

There are no special effects in The Thirst: Blood War at all, none. All we get is a bit of blood on someones hands, some fake blood on some fake fangs & some fake blood pored onto someones neck. There's nothing in The Thirst: Blood Wars I couldn't stage myself with some fake blood & a camcorder, nothing. There's no nudity either. The film looks as cheap & low budget as they come with a very point & shoot look to it, the fight scenes are brief & contain no real excitement & the whole thing is just a tedious, dull mess of a film that feels like a cross between a teen angst film & a cheap Vampire flick but without the merits of either.

The IMDb reckons The Thirst: Blood War had a $1,000,000 budget which I find hard to believe unless it went on Todd & Connery & if it did indeed have a million dollar budget than the film get even worse in my eyes as the production values are awful with most scenes shot outside on a random path or in front of a tree or something. How on Earth did the makers convince fine talent like genre favourite Tony Todd (who is dressed in an awful costume complete with cape) & the son of Sean Connery no less Jason to appear in this? I wonder if Jason has shown this to his dad & what the one time James Bond star thinks of it?

The Thirst: Blood War is terrible, I haven't given a film a lowly one star rating in a while but this throughly deserves it. One to avoid, even Vampire fans might find it hard sitting through this.

Wow, where do start with this pile of shiz..

1. Who the hell plays on a PS1 in 2008?!

2. Tony Todd has officially extinguished all the goodwill he mustered by playing the Candyman and Captain Sisco's dad. He isn't so much slumming it here as eating fish bones from the dumpster.

3. This well oiled six-pack hunk in the lead might be able to fill out a white T-shirt, but an actor he ain't. Evertime he opens his mouth, you want to curl up in embarrassment. Oh. dear.

4. Who writes this dialogue anyway? Someone call child labour on these producers: I think they're illegally employing a bunch of kindergärtners to do their screenplay for them.

5. Where's the 'sexy seductress' promised in the plot synopsis? You don't mean the ugly old tart wrapped in cling-film, with more botox than Jane Fonda do you? Whoops.

6. The fight scenes are ssoooo pathetic, they should play an instrumental of Kung Fu Fighting in the background, and pretend it's supposed to be a comedy.

7. There is a highly camp black best friend who calls everyone dawgs and has a secret funky handshake with Mr Muscle. He might as well have STEREOTYPE tattooed on his head. But get this.. HE DOESN'T DIE. AMAZING.

8. Tru Blood, Twilight, Vampire Chronicles.. ENOUGH ALREADY. Especially when the end result is as dismal as it is here.

9. The Thirst: Blood War? That title.. SUCKS (Pun intended ho ho)

10.Seriously guys.. what's the deal with the PS1?!

The director is called Tom Shell, which is quite apt as you'll feel like a shell of a person after submitting yourself to this drivel. It also concludes with the threat of a sequel, to which I can only respond with the Wilheim Scream our hunk unleashes just before the end.

It's probably started filming even now, after all it shouldn't take Mr Shell too long to muster up the 7 new pence and half a packet of wine necessary to complete production. And that would still be more than they spent on the original.. 2/10