Rating: 
Summary: Underworld-Uuber edition!! But why now??
Review: This is a special "Director's Edition" of Underworld. There will be over twelve minutes of additional scenes, as well as eleven minutes of footage swapped out for different angles, cuts, effects and the like for 23 minutes total of never before seen footage. Most of the features from the original DVD release will be included as well as a new cast commentary, a 45 minute documentary on the history of werewolves and vampires, a blooper reel and a sketchbook of concept art. A comic book will also be included in the packaging.For super fans of the flick this is a mixed blessing. LOTR fans are gobbling up both the regular and super editions of their favorite trilogy, but was it really neccesary to break this set up? Why not release a two disk, special edition with both versions of the film and all the extras and make that one the definitive edition? I'll probably end up getting this flick just to see the edits and hear the cast commentary. Five stars for the edition and bevy of extras, take one away for the mentality behind a second release.
Rating: 
Summary: A STUDY IN APATHY
Review: UNDERWORLD is visually impressive, with its dark, dark underworld and the lack of real "color" in the film. Blues, greys, blacks, and of course a little blood red(even it is dark) combine to create an atmospheric world of evil. Lots of flashy special effects and imaginative camerawork. The cast does some good work: Kate Beckinsale, Shawn Brolly, Bill Nighy, and Michael Sheen in particular; Scott Speedman walks through his role as a zombie, which is not part of the horror menu here. So what's wrong? The movie has no real likeable characters, as if one should like a vampire or werewolf, and there is such disregard for human or other life that it left me feeling vacant and unaffected. Nice to look at, but empty calories.
Rating: 
Summary: Vampire vs. Lycanthrope sitcom
Review: In an unknown city, vampires and werewolves have been waging a battle that has lasted for thousands of years. The vampires are growing weaker and the werewolves are growing stronger which causes werewolf hunter and vampire, Kate Beckinsale, to suspect that something is brewing when she witnesses the werewolves chase after a human who may have something special about him. So this sitcom plot develops with bloodlines and bad guys turning good guys and good guys turning bad guys and the story just becomes a very tedious episode of Dallas as we learn more about the characters' roots and their connections with surprise twists like - "Bobby, I'm pregnant" or "J.R shot my dad". Underworld simply has no direction whatsoever. It is not until the last few minutes of the movie that all is revealed but by then you don't really care and are more than laughing at how seriously this film takes itself for all its ridiculousness. Underworld looks good most of the time but the Matrix sound effects only bring the film's style down a notch. Neo and Trinity with fangs this is not. As a competitor to films like Dark City and The Crow it doesn't even touch on the plot or gothic look of these movies. The dream sequences in Underworld are directly ripped from the same effect as Frodo seeing the eye when he puts on the ring of power. Now and again blaring plot holes surface that slap you across the face. Vampires have reflections? A lot of the film does not make sense. So how does it work out in terms of popcorn fodder? Well Blade or Blade II is certainly leaps and bounds ahead of this one. Underworld kept my attention for all of it, but still I think I have forgotten most of it by the time I came to write this review. It is simply a no-brainer with elements that you have all seen too many times before. I like the whole vampire meets werewolf scenario but Underworld just misses everything that may have been good about it. If you want to see vampires and werewolves in the same movie then go rent Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) instead. Underworld is simply under-nourishing, under-par and underestimated what audiences expected to see. Only for rainy nights when there is nothing else to do.
Rating:
Summary: Response to A viewer from TN's comments
Review: Despite the movies flaws it is obvious this reviewer did not pay attention to the film. At one point it was mentioned that the coven owns a company that produces plasma and cloned blood. So that's how they can pay for their cell phones.
Rating:
Summary: Vampires and werewolves are not kiddie fare anymore!
Review: When I first saw the trailer for this movie, I and a thousand other gamers thought it was based off of the World of Darkness (WOD), published by White Wolf. In short, the World of Darkness is like our world only, uh, darker. And grittier. And full of angst. Vampires and werewolves dominate the WOD. There's changelings, wraiths, and demons too. Normal humans? They're pretty much cattle. Vampires and werewolves don't get along. Vampires are city folk, werewolves are country folk. Vampires like to be clean cut, werewolves like long hair and scruffy beards. Vampires hang out in old mansions drinking blood out of champagne glasses, werewolves beat the crap out of each other for fun in subway tunnels. Get the idea? Not surprisingly, vampires are "winning" the war. Three elders oversee the vampire race (at least, in Europe), and one is awakened every so many centuries to lead. The movie takes place in the interim between vampire elder shifts. Kraven, the intermin vampire leader, is a turncoat who makes a deal with Lucian, the werewolf leader. Collectively, they intend to create an "Abomination" -- a serum that will turn Lucian into a werewolf/vampire hybrid. All other attempts to create such a hybrid have failed, but since vampires and werewolves supposedly share a common ancestor, mixing the two lines shouldn't be impossible... Enter Michael Corvin, who has the gene to transform into a vampire/werewolf hybrid. A Wampire? A Verwolf? A Vampwolf? Nobody knows, but he looks like Nightcrawler when the transformation is through. But I'm skipping ahead. Somewhere in all this messy plot is Selene, a Death-Dealer. Death-Dealers deal death to werewolves (duh). Of all the stupid names, "Death Dealer" has to be the worst. That's right up there with calling your fighter a "Sword Wielder" or your cleric "Healing Guy." Selene (played by Kate Beckinsale) has a few things going for her. For one, she's hot. For another, she wields two automatic pistols. And for a third, she's a vampire. This makes her the goddess of all geek fantasies. Am I oversharing? Ahem. Selene was turned into a vampire by Viktor, one of the three elders. She is loyal to him (like a daughter to a father, the movie's VERY clear that it's not sexual). Only, it turns out Viktor killed her parents before turning her. So for the most part, this movie is about a big build up to a mano-a-mano battle between Viktor the Elder Vampire and Michael the Half-Vampire/Half-Werewolf. Follow so far? There's a few problems with the movie, not the least of which is that the sound was cranked up to eardrum twanging levels. I spoke with my parents, who also saw this movie, and they had the same complaint. This probably has to do with the enormous amounts of gunfire that place throughout the film. Despite the completely unrealistic combat scenes, the movie seems to take great pride in showing characters reload their weapons. This is a little odd, as the automatic pistols themselves are fantastic conventions. Why show this at all? Because on some level, it's as much about Gun Fu as it is about vampires and werewolves. Selene runs around in PVC firing at werewolves. She does that for most of the movie. There's not a whole lot of room for pacing, but a good Gun Fu movie knows that it has to give the audience a break. What better way than to reload a weapon? The reloading -- and the infatuation the director has with filming it -- made me think of Equilibrium, the greatest gun flick of all time. Just as people compared Equlibrium to the Matrix (an unfair comparison), Underworld is a lot like Equilibrium meets Dark City. There's unbelievable shootouts, the main character is a death dealing machine (sort of like Equilibrium's Grammaton Clerics), everybody dresses in black, it's flimed with a gray lense, and the movie is about bucking the rules for love -- of one's family and of one's self. Underworld also takes for granted, probably due to time contraints, that we all know what vampires and werewolves are. Which is funny. While they are definitely recognizable characters, they are not necessarily recognized the same way by the same generation. Take, for example, my mother's interpretation of the movie. She was shocked that 1) vampires could bear children, 2) Selene could see herself in her reflection, 3) vampires displayed no vulnerability to water. And yet, they can leap onto ceilings and cling to them like spiders. I took all of this in stride, because I'm accustomed to the "de-fanging" of Anne Rice's vampires. This is now the fourth generation vampire: Nosferatu -> Dracula -> Lestat -> Selene. What you end up with are pale, superstrong, pretty people with fangs. They don't even drink blood. The vampires figured out how to clone it. Which really makes the vampires the good guys. In comparison, the werewolves are dirty, violent, and come off as more than a little churlish. They're the lower class to the vampire upper class, and indeed, werewolves were the servants of vampires. So everybody wants to be a vampire and nobody really wants to be a werewolf. Just like the evolution of vampires, werewolves have evolved. They no longer need to change during a full moon. Not only that, their organs regenerate. And they can run along walls and ceilings (not sure where that came from). Lon Chaney, Jr., if you could only see your progeny now! The movie drags in parts, but perks up near the end with the titanic battle between Viktor and Michael. Unfortunately, Michael isn't given much to do other than freak out. His character development is almost nil in comparison to say, Selene, who gets to cry and pout and the aforementioned blowing the crap out of werewolves. I liked Underworld, but it's because I'm biased. I also like the idea of the World of Darkness that the creators no doubt abhor -- Gun Fu style, monsters using their superhuman abilities to blow each other up. I mean, who doesn't like that? [...] This movie is violent and a little gory. Vampires and werewolves are not kiddie fare anymore!
Rating: 
Summary: UNDERWHELMED
Review: If I can think of one movie that I HATE, it is "Underworld". I was so excited to see the battle of the vampires & werewolves, and laughed through this whole movie. I HATED HATED HATED this movie. The costumes were apparently borrowed from the Warner Bros vault when "The Matrix" was through with them. I didn't know vampires suddenly have reflections in mirrors (one female is looking in a mirror deciding which dress to wear and has a reflection!). Who is paying for the online account and cellphones that the vamps use???? Do they send the bill to the LAIR BELOW THE STREETS!!!????? What's up with that???? Dark, dreary, depressing, horrible acting, horrible script, clothes from a better movie, sets from "League of Extraordinary Gentleman". Skip it. Send it back to the Underworld and get it out of ours.
Rating:
Summary: Been There, Done That
Review: If you've seen "The Matrix" and "Blade" movies, then you've already seen this. There isn't an original moment in this overly visual movie, just stolen ideas from recent hits. Most of it plays like a bad episode of "Buffy, the Vampire Slayer". I dig vampire movies and I dig werewolf movies, but they need to be character driven, not special effects driven. Maybe the old Universal horror flicks were corny, but at least you got to know the characters and the stories were fun. I'm not even going to go into the acting because there isn't any, just special effects.
To be fair, the idea of vampires and werewolves in the same movie is something I don't remember seeing since "House of Dracula" back in the 1940's, but the filmmakers don't do anything particularly fresh with this concept. This movie is so generic it hurts and it bores. Overall, a decent rental if you are an incurable vampire fanatic.
Rating:
Summary: Lot's of rain and not much else
Review: Underworld is the story of an age old war that's going on between vampires and werewolves. It stars Kate Beckinsale (who also starred in the awful Pearl Harbor) as Selene, a vampire that hunts werewolves. Things get complicated for Selene when she falls for a mortal(the really dull Scott Speadman) who helps her in the begining of the movie, when she starts to fall in love him. To make matters more complicated, he is also the chosen one by the werewolves(I hate when that happens)so they want him too. Selene's fellow vampires aren't too happy either. All they seem to do is sit around the vampire mansion brooding in there goth velvet gowns, while Selene is kicking werewolf(rear-end). I was amazed that Bauhaus wasn't being played over and over at the vampire mansion.
Another thing you'll notice is the considerable amount of rain the city where this film is set in, is getting. They must have terrific drainage, is all I kept thinking. The movie does have some fun fight scenes, I only wish they would have developed the romance part of the story a little better.
I would only recommend Underworld if you're desperate for a vampire film, otherwise skip this one and watch the original From Dusk Till Dawn for a bloody goodtime.
Rating:
Summary: a sad day for vampires
Review: This movie was so bad i think it gave me cancer. I had high hopes but I was just let down. The vampires were too weak they had no powers at all its more like a bunch of english people fighting werewolves. Special effects is all this movie had. I guess there was so much of that they didnt have time for a plot or character development it only has one star because of the back story. I didnt rent or buy it i borrowed it from a friend but i think im gonna charge him for wasting my time. This makes a Jhon Grisham book sound good.
Rating:
Summary: from an extra's point of view
Review: Having the fortune of participating in the first day of filming as an extra, I eagerly anticipated Underworld's release. This vampire vs. werewolf film was shot almost entirely in Budapest, Hungary. I believe they chose Budapest for its old city feel and for the numerous underground locations. As with many other fans of this genre, I was excited by the prospect of the vampire vs. werewolf storyline. While I thought the plot was pretty good, I felt that it was a little too complicated and difficult to follow at times. However in the end the pieces came together quite nicely. The acting was pretty good as were the special effects. It was interesting to see Kate Beckinsale as an action hero...She did quite well!
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