Daybreakers
2010 · Directed by Michael Spierig, Peter Spierig
Original language: English
- action
- fantasy
- science fiction
The story
In the year 2019, a plague has transformed almost every human into a vampire. Faced with a dwindling blood supply, the fractured dominant race plots their survival; meanwhile, a researcher works with a covert band of vampires on a way to save humankind.
What it’s like
Cold blue-grey daylight and sickly sodium-amber interiors give Daybreakers its look: a near-future city of glass towers, shuttered offices and rain-slicked streets where the sun is a lethal threat rather than a comfort. The Spierig brothers frame much of it in clean, controlled wides and tight, anxious close-ups, with a steady camera that lingers on corporate lobbies and empty highways, and the gore arrives in bursts of glossy, practical red against all that bleached restraint. The score is a pulsing electronic throb that drops out for stretches of eerie quiet. The vibe is bleak, slick and tense, a dystopian thriller with a dry streak of gallows humour, best suited to a late evening alone or a genre-loving night in. Pacing is brisk and plot-driven, and the tone stays hard-edged, with the emotional weight carried by a weary scientist and a reluctant hero slowly finding a shared purpose amid hunger and betrayal. Violence is frequent and graphic, with bloody feeding and gunfights, though it never lingers on cruelty for its own sake. It suits viewers who enjoy stylised horror-action and a bleak, lived-in future, and it is not a gentle watch.
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