Night Watch is a taut supernatural thriller; imagine Underworld without all the silly wire-fu excesses. Also, unlike that other franchise, Night Watch is based on Sergei Lukyanenko's bestselling fantasy trilogy, which means there's a more coherent story at work here.
What's Night Watch About?
Living among humans in modern-day Moscow are creatures known as Others: vampires, shape-shifters, seers and magic users. Caught in a ancient battle both sides knew they could not win, the forces of Light and Darkness forged an uneasy truce. Light wizard Gesar (Vladimir Menshov) formed the Night Watch to keep an eye on the evil army, and Dark sorcerer Zabulon (Viktor Verzhbitsky) formed the Day Watch to monitor the forces of Light.
However, a prophecy foretells the birth of an extremely powerful Other, who will restart the War between Light and Dark – and help one side to win – depending on which way he turns.
When junior Night Watch operative Anton Gorodetsky (Konstantin Khabensky) saves a young boy named Yegor (Dmitry Martynov) from being slaughtered by vampires, he unleashes forces he cannot possibly comprehend or control. These include a beautiful nurse (Mariya Poroshina) who appears to be under a strange and powerful curse, and a fledgling vampire (Anna Dubrovskaya) who blames Anton for the death of her lover.
On the plus side, this film moves quickly and the extensive CGI work is convincing. Director Timur Bekmambetov keeps the camera moving and the tension high. The actors fill their roles well – especially Khabensky, who carries the emotional weight of the film on his shoulders – and the grittiness of modern Moscow adds a tough edge to this flick that it wouldn't have if it had been made in the US.
On the downside, vast chunks of plot had to be pulled in order to shoehorn Lukyanenko's book into a 90 minute movie, and the flick suffers for that. It's a shame there isn't a director's cut, as it would have restored a great deal to the flick. Also, people who haven't read the books won't know who many of the characters are, and why they belong in this flick.
Not only that, in order to make this film work, there's one instance of Smart-Character-Acting-Dumb-to-Further-the-Plot: it's only one instance, but it's at such a crucial point in the story that it pulls the viewer out of the story at the worst possible time. Another round of script editing would have been called for.
The Final Analysis
It's easy to see why Night Watch became Russia's first real blockbuster; it's a taut supernatural thriller with some real depth behind it. However, fans of the book will miss the music of Lukyanenko's writing – and many pertinent plot details – while the uninitiated will keep wondering who the hell all these people are and what they're doing.
While some Russian intelligentsia deplored Night Watch for succumbing to Hollywood-style methods, this movie is still very Russian in its themes and vibe. And, unlike most Hollywood product, the good guys ain't always the good guys. Don't expect a pat ending; it's mostly downbeat, but also sets up its sequel, Day Watch. That alone puts this puts this flick miles above Underworld, the only movie it has any real similarities to.
While it's not the greatest thriller ever made, Night Watch moves at a good pace, and gets more right than wrong. For that, it gets a 6/10.
