Review of Byzantium (2013) by Allan C — 26 Oct 2015

Neil Jordan return to the vampire tale with this elegantly understated story that boils down to a rather simple coming of age story. Saoirse Ronan and Gemma Arterton pair a pair of vampires living and hustling their way through modern day London.

Arterton preying on the underbelly of society posing as a stripped and prostitute. Ronan preying on the elderly and offering those a peaceful end who are ready to move on. To reveal much more would spoil the elegant way the story and characters unfold and are slowly revealed.

Jordan directs the film with style, but as usual takes the time to develop well rounded characters. This film si somewhat hard to categorize, because it is certainly a vampire story, but this is not exactly a film that would appeal to gore-hounds or your stereotypical horny teenage horror fan.

This film is really too intelligent and character driven to appeal to that demographic. However, this film is also likely too bloody and genre focused to appeal to Jordan's usual art-house crowd. But Jordan has done this before with his sexualized adult version of Little Red Riding Hood with "A Company of Wolves.

" I'd place his other vampire story, "Interview with the Vampire," as more solidly fitting into the horror genre, although it was more character focused than most. So if you're interested in an intelligent character driven vampire tale that's essentially a chamber piece, but with some quite bloody scenes, you should check this film out.