Day Watch [movies]

Why does the Movie Moscow always look like an urban jungle in decay? Maybe it’s actually like that? Perhaps our Russian readers can confirm or deny. Bleak though its Moscow is, Day Watch is anything but, and ranks as probably the most intelligently designed and executed supernatural flick of the decade.

Deviating wilding from Sergei Lukyanenko’s novel, director Timur Bekmambetov’s plot choices strongly favor the movie for once in the book-movie comparison. If anything, the film risks having far too much going on. Bekmambetov stages: a love story between master (Anton) and student (Sveta), complete with a Shakespeare-esque body-swap, mirrors that story with the historical affair between Gessar and Olga, complicates matters with a father-son dispute stemming from the sins of the father (see Night Watch, the previous movie), mirrors that relationship with the vampire father-son duo on the “evil” side of the aisle, and stages the whole set of interactions on the cosmic chess board of the battle between Light/Gessar and Dark/Zavulon with Anton caught in the middle. Wrestling with fate, loyalty, desire, sacrifice, and any number of human needs, the success of the supernatural elements of this fantasy world is that they emphasize and are driven by the humanity of the characters. Incredible powers, but understandable impulses, needs, and failings.

Plot’s nice and all, but a supernatural film isn’t just about what happens — when you go to create a fantasy world whether it’s hobbits or underground monsters (yeah, Tremors, you remain awesome), selling the effects themselves is just as important as delivering a reason for them. Your unreality better look and feel real enough no matter how unreal what’s happening might be. Here, the effects have a realism that shouldn’t exist for what is being shown. A car driving sideways across a building, the buzzing flies of the gloom, Zavulon flattening a bus, exploding yo-yo’s of doom — it’s just nuts the sheer number of incredible effects brought to bear without making the effects themselves the focus of what’s going on. There’s no effect without a grounding reason in the story, no character’s emotional need that doesn’t translate into a stunning supernatural effect. Nothing is gratuitous.

And the details are just great. Loose ferris wheel amid an apocalypse? Definitely. Excellent heart-pounding Russian techno for fight scenes, car chases, and birthday parties alike? Check. Medieval sword fight in a hotel ballroom? Totally. Even the subtitles are interestingly done for the American audience, lingering for emphasis, changing color, and even jumping to the beat of a drum in one scene.