221 What We Do In The Shadows

A fitting coda for our Matt and Mark's Vampire Weekends movie review marathon, we review the New Zealand mockumentary What We do in the Shadows. A film that's gimmick could've easily sabotaged it, the high concept of a Real World for vampires is handled deftly with a genuine love for it's characters. Well edited and tight, all the gags and bits flow seamlessly. This movie is funny and worth more than one viewing, dare I say an "instant cult classic."

Download: 221 What We Do In The Shadows    

Bonus Episode #3

A surprise bonus episode this week (Matt was overcome by a swarm of feverish screaming children, and didn't' get to watching the movie). After a minority of us voted to make America Great Again, Matt and Mark thought we'd take some time and hash over the aftermath of the 2016 election. If you're sick of politics, low-rent punditry, and snobbish West Coast libtard commentary, skip this one. However, Mark does insert a quick review of Gibson's Hacksaw Ridge, which may make us worthy of redemption.

Download: Bonus Episode #3

220 Byzantium

This is the end of Matt and Mark's Vampire Weekends movie review marathon! And to go out, we review Neil Jordan's sophomore vampire film, Byzantium (not to be confused with Matt's dismally selling novel Nova Byzantium). Beautifully wrought with a carefully crafted atmosphere, Jordan takes the vampire tale in a different baroque direction, filled with Illuminati-esque intrigue and nascent melancholy romance. Where Twilight is bubble gum and Tiger Beat, Byzantium is The Cure mixed with midnight readings of Edgar Allen Poe. Hope you enjoyed our set of blood-sucking cinema critique!

Download: 220 Byzantium

219 Near Dark

With skin more volatile than kerosine mixed with flash paper, the vampires of Katheryn Bigelow's Near Dark redline their existence into the daylight hours (often). Vampire Weekends continues with our penultimate offering this week on The Cult of Matt and Mark. A Western-genre modern-horror mashup, Near Dark is stylistically polished with gritty murderous characters that eventually gets what's coming to them, and deliciously so. However, for a horror film, it really fails to terrify.

Download: 219 Near Dark

218 Fright Night

And Vampire Weekends movie review marathon just keeps on rolling on The Cult of Matt and Mark with Fright Night, a solid mid-80's vampire offering. While the main character of Charlie Brewster merely provides an avatar for the viewer, the power of the film resides in its supporting characters. While Evil Ed and the two-bit Van Helsing Peter Vincent add color, it's Chris Sarandon as the seductive vampire lord Jerry Dandrige that adds an awesome brush stroke of menace. In so doing, it could be argued that Sarandon's performance could go down as one of the greatest cinematic vampires of all time.

Download: 218 Fright Night

217 Shadow of the Vampire

And Vampire Weekends keeps rolling with The Cult of Matt and Mark's vampire film movie review marathon. This week we review the 2000 indie film Shadow of the Vampire, starring powerhouse actors Malkovich and Defoe. While Matt developed a nascent pining for an "is it real?" theme, Mark re-aligns the compass and delves into the power of film and the historical schism it created when action itself could be cast in stone for later generations. A meta film, Shadow of the Vampire asks the hypothetical question: Was Nosferatu documenting the end of the vampire legend or its beginning?

Download:  217 Shadow of the Vampire

216 Blade 2

This week Matt and Mark continue our Vampire Weekends movie marathon with Guillermo del Toro's sequel Blade 2. Despite being a fun Matrix-style neo chop-socky action film, it also deals with the idea of "vampire normalcy" in pop culture. Having familiarized ourselves with vampiric menace for decades now, Blade 2 must invent a more sinister "Reaper" variety to inspire the menace, a beast so sinister it feeds on vampires as well as humans. Because with your garden-variety vampires no more sinister than club kids, you gotta take it up a notch.

Download: 216 Blade 2