Midnight Mass Year: 2003 Director: Tony Mandile Written by: F. Paul Wilson, Tony Mandile Threat: Vampires Weapon of Choice: Stake Based upon: Novella by F. Paul Wilson IMDb page:

Other movies in this series:
None

Rish's Reviews
I love Horror. I hope it shows. I have a pretty impressive collection of Horror novels (except compared to tyranist's, but hey, you can't win 'em all), but I've never read anything by F. Paul Wilson. He's a respected author, though, so it was with that in mind that I picked up Midnight Mass at the local video store. Also, I think the description said something about the end of the world.
And yes, the end of the world has come. The film begins with several mock news broadcasts, explaining that an epidemic of vampirism has raced across the globe, consuming and/or transforming everyone in its path. Indeed, God help us all. And God help poor pudgy Raven, one of the few survivors, and an athiest to boot. Riding a bicycle from place to place for some reason, she runs afoul of a group of vampires who have taken over the local chapel, defiling it with the help of their undead-priest leader. She escapes, though it seems no one else can. For some reason bothered by their blasphemy, she tracks down an ex-priest buddy of hers and tries to convince him to take back the chapel. Spirituality ensues.
This was a VERY cheap film. I imagine that half the budget was spent on video tapes, red food coloring, and the paper they used to copy the script. So that's a disadvantage. Still, I thought the premise was promising. Too bad the film had to be so ENDLESSLY talky. It felt very much like the radio plays my dad used to bring home in a hopeless attempt to make a connection with me. Just imagine a filmed radio broadcast for a moment. In fact, I started organizing my photos, comics, and severed heads while it played. There were long stretches where the camera just rolled as characters spoke their Lord of the Rings-length speeches. I suppose I can give them high marks for being able to memorize it. There were lots of conversations about religion versus science, and vampires versus humanity, about what life was like before THEY came. Lots of conversations about a lot of things, come to think of it. The dialogue probably wasn't so bad, but there's just so damn much of it!
The vampires range from normal-looking guys with fangs to dudes with zombie masks on. They have sick animal sounds dubbed in when vampires attack . . . not successfully, however. The spiritual aspect of the film was somewhat hard to swallow, especially when Raven "sees the light," so to speak. Part of it felt like it had been produced with a grant from the Vatican, and was about as subtle as an eye gouge from Moe Howard.
On the positive side, there was a nice moment when a little girl vampire kills one of the most sympathetic characters. Cool. A major subplot that I thought was interesting was about the Vichy, who were subservient humans (goth douchebags, actually), who brought victims to their vampire masters in the hope of becoming vampires themselves. They were, in many ways, much more loathesome than the undead they so envied. Tyranist used to hang out with people who painted their fingernails black, dressed in the same colour, wore black eye shadow, etc. I sometimes wonder how we could be friends.
It wasn't awful, but far from good. I have to assume that anything that didn't completely suck was taken from the novella, but I can't be sure without reading it. It's surprising to me, a hundred years after Dracula, just how many vampire stories can be told and still be interesting. Not that Midnight Mass was interesting. Was the idea a bad one? No, not at all. Was it poorly written? No, not really. It's just too cheap, too inexpertly done, too slow, and too dull to be effective.
Wow. I've spent a lot of time on this movie . . . more than it deserves. I guess I just saw some potential here that was never even close to achieved, and that requires a bit more talk than worthless crap like The Killer Eye or Jugular Wine.
I'd Recommend It To: Ho boy. Do I have to recommend this one?

Total Skulls: 9

Sequel
Sequel setup
Rips off earlier film
Horror film showing on TV/in theater in movie
Future celebrity appears
Former celebrity appears
Bad title
Bad premise
Bad acting
Bad dialogue
Bad execution
MTV Editing
OTS
Girl unnecessarily gets naked
Wanton sex
Death associated with sex
Unfulfilled promise of nudity
Characters forget about threat
Secluded location
Power is cut
Phone lines are cut
Someone investigates a strange noise
Someone runs up stairs instead of going out front door
Camera is the killer
Victims cower in front of a window/door
Victim locks self in with killer
Victim running from killer inexplicably falls
Toilet stall scene
Shower/bath scene
Car stalls or won't start
Cat jumps out
Fake scare
Laughable scare
Stupid discovery of corpse
Dream sequence
Hallucination/Vision
No one believes only witness
Crazy, drunk, old man knows the truth
Warning goes unheeded
Music detracts from scene
Death in first five minutes
x years before/later
Flashback sequence
Dark and stormy night
Killer doesn't stay dead
Killer wears a mask
Killer is in closet
Killer is in car with victim
Villain is more sympathetic than heroes
Unscary villain/monster
Beheading
Blood fountain
Blood spatters - camera, wall, etc.
Poor death effect
Excessive gore
No one dies at all
Virgin survives
Geek/Nerd survives
Little kid lamely survives
Dog/Pet miraculously survives
Unresolved subplots
"It was all a dream" ending
Unbelievably happy ending
Unbelievably crappy ending
What the hell?