Blade 120mins 18 Dir Stephen Norrington WHAT does it say about a movie when the first thought on leaving is what a good video game it would make?

Blade is one of those high-octane action thrillers in which if people aren't shooting at other people, they are screeching their car tyres on the way to shooting each other. How satisfying it would be to waggle your joystick, drive that car and shoot those guns yourself.

Wesley Snipes is the eponymous super-hero who is half man and half vampire. He was rescued from a life of blood-sucking by hippy gadget-maker Whistler (Kris Kristofferson), who had his entire family eaten by vampires. The pair are two of a ragged band of vigilantes, avowed to ridding the world of the blood-sucking scum.

We join the party as vampire Deacon Frost (Stephen Dorff) is hatching his evil plan to take over the world, ha ha haaa. Can Whistler, Blade and Karen (N'Bushe Wright), a recently rescued blood expert, stop them?

You know, don't you? You know, even before you've munched on your first bit of popcorn, seen the Barclays Bank ad or even decided, after taking your seat in the middle of the row, to go to the toilet, what will happen. Blade will appear to be winning until ten minutes before the end of the film when it will all go horribly wrong. Deacon will look like he has won and the world is his, then there will be a sudden desperate push from the downtrodden hero, and a final, apocalyptic battle between the hero and villain that will end with the villain being hoisted by his own metaphorical petard.

I've not ruined anything by telling you that. In between there is a lot of highly stylised fightin' and drivin'. I never thought a film would be influenced by the movie Mortal Kombat, but here it is.

Blade is just over the top enough to convince you that it is tongue in cheek. Snipes displays no emotion as he creaks through in his raunchy black leather gear. He is highly camp as the avenging anti-hero.

Dorff too seems to enjoy playing a thoroughly evil character.

Although there are no belly-laughs there is something slightly enjoyable about this. I am sure there are many who will love it. All, probably, too young to get in to see it. Tone down the swearing and the violence and you get Batman. This is not groundbreaking stuff.

It throws up some tricky questions too. Why are all superheroes enigmatic loners who live in secret hideaways with trusty sidekicks? Why do they all have one terrible weakness (Blade's being the fact that he must take a serum and is really called Eric)? Why do the evil henchmen always attack the hero on their own -- each waiting until his colleague has been beaten up before attacking?

Surely if they all attacked together their combined force would be far greater than the person with whom they are battling. There is power in a union, boys.

Jeremy Austin

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.