I wasn't sure I could still enjoy mockumentaries, as the last one I did was A Mighty Wind in 2003. Sacha Baron Cohen struck me as largely tasteless, and shows like The Office and Parks and Recreation turned me off in no time -- something about the combination of social awkwardness and shaky cameras, I guess. Was it them, or had I changed? Regardless, a focus on vampires promised something different.
Netflix describes the theme as three vampire housemates, but for most of the movie, four or five share the house. These five are all men who somehow wound up in Wellington, New Zealand. Don't ask me why they agreed to be filmed when they otherwise try to keep their vampirism a secret. By agreement, the cameramen carry crosses just in case, but vampires aren't the only supernatural danger to turn up....
Far more important than their nations of origin are their centuries of origin. Viago, age 379, sort of an unofficial leader for both the house and the documentary, is foppish enough that moderns could mistake him for gay, but he's long held a candle for a mortal woman -- the clearest sign that vampire hearts need not be cold, except literally. Deacon, 183, is the "young" guy at first, trying for a punk chic but often seen knitting. Vladislav, 862, used to be quite the evil powerhouse, but a defeat that remains vague for a while brought him down to the others' level; he still espouses some medieval ideals. Petyr, circa 8,000, sports a Nosferatu look and usually keeps to his basement crypt, acting too animalistic for language; even his housemates can barely deal with him, but they appreciate him if only for "making" some of them. (Like in Interview with the Vampire, you have to drink vampire blood to become one.) The one he makes in the course of the film is 20-something Nick, who annoys the others a bit by being slow to come to grips with the ups and downs of vampirism.
They're not the only characters of interest. Nick's friend Stu, despite normality, wins the others' approval by being a chill guy who helps catch them up with computer stuff. (They're not as out of the loop as the Sanderson sisters, but they do have a little trouble passing for ordinary without hypnosis.) Jackie is a servant under Deacon, hoping he'll assimilate her one of these days; her arc smells too much of emotional abuse to amuse me, but she does have an arguably happy ending. Of the other supernaturals, the rival werewolf pack tickles me most, especially during trash-talk sessions, wherein the alpha must remind them they're not "swearwolves."
Yeah, that's one reason for the R rating. Is it also violent? Now and then, but this low budget provides nothing more graphic than an accidental main artery puncture, and none of it's really supposed to scare you. Sexual? We don't see Vlad's escapades in detail, and the documentarians blur out the occasional nudity. Two vampires stuck looking like preteen girls prey on pedophiles, but we don't learn much about that.
I learned from a tour that New Zealand has an edgy sense of humor. That's pretty much inevitable in a movie like this. Fortunately, despite a twisted variation on a prank from The Lost Boys, it's no more disturbing than average for a vampire flick. Nor does the mockumentary format bother me when the subjects are wicked enough to deserve embarrassment and superpowered enough to make it dissonant.
Part of the fun comes in parody of modern societal interactions. Nick "comes out" to Stu in an unmistakably familiar fashion. Viago looks much younger than his love interest, but he'd be the one "robbing the cradle." And Deacon fails to see the point of doing the dishes or keeping the carpets clean when their guests generally don't come out alive.
Early on, I thought WWDitS would lose its energy well before the 84 minutes had ended. Instead, it's never boring, even at predictable moments. It covers just about everything about these characters' lives we'd care to know, without overdoing any of it. Yes, I can still get a kick out of some examples of the genre after all.
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