 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: Stake Land • Year: 2010 • Country: USA • Director: Jim Mickle • Main cast: Connor Paolo, Nick Damici, Danielle Harris, Kelly McGillis • Runtime: 98 minutes • Production company: Glass Eye Pix, Belladonna Productions, Off Hollywood Pictures • TRAILER |
Stake Land is one of those movies where the action starts in a world already changed by a phenomenal disaster. No matter how, what happened, whose fault it was. The global situation is anew, the world has been devastated by zombified vampires and you have to put your shit together and deal with it. As simple as that.
So then is when this story starts. Martin is a teenager countryside boy who sees how his parents are being slaughtered by thirsty vampires, and his luck would had been the same if it wasn’t for the appearance of this character only called “Mister” who saves his scary ass from a fatal fate just to take him as his pupil. Then, Martin and the Mister start a road trip heading north following the hope of finding a place free of the devil creatures. But, as expected, their trip won’t be a path of roses, and they will get involved in lots of gory adventures, finding new friends and also facing enemies even worse than the vampires they run away from.
Here the vampires are not the elegant creatures we are used to see in many other movies. Here they are not sophisticated or dazzle you with their rhetoric and their fancy clothes. Here the bloodsuckers are closer to rotten zombies, but with fangs and a terrible allergy to the sun. Because this is a nasty movie, with images that give you the scent of putrid blood and bloody dust. No romantic vampires here, take note of that.
And this crudity is probably the most attractive aspect of Stake Land. Technically this movie is excellent. The make up, special effects, editing, photography, costumes… everything takes you deep into the scenario where these atrocious events happen. Many people I’ve talked to think this movie is a little masterpiece in the genre because of that. But sadly I can’t count myself in that group. I found the narrative very slow and contemplative, and the over dramatic music neither helped for the good purpose. Things happen in a kind of natural order, like if it was a real long trip and you find all kinds of people from the road and from little towns. But still, it’s the adventure of a rude mean badass man, a little scared boy and their road trip. It feels like the audience wasn’t invited to be part of this trip.
Probably that was the main intention of the movie, to show the crude, lonely and cold trip of 2 main opposed characters and all the people they found on the way surrounded by the dangers of all the creatures living in a vampire world. But sorry, I never really connected with them, they lost me on their way. Is till encourage everyone to watch Stake Land and prove me wrong. As I said before, I know many people who liked this movie a lot. But it didn’t really work for me.
RATE: 5/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1464580
