Blade (1998)

Easily my favorite superhero film of the modern era. Nolans Bat films are objectively better films, but I don't find myself rewatching them like I do Blade.

I love that Snipes plays Blade as a straight-up Blaxploitation character. But I think claiming that THE MATRIX owes its existence to BLADE is a stretch, given that they're only separated by about eight months.

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Originally Posted by Bartleby_Scriven 

There's fun subversion, as well, of race roles and a quiet subtext about masculinity and blackness on display. Deacon Frost is a character with an ill-defined backstory, but it's obvious that he has little man's complex. First he wants to be a Pure Blood, then Blade, then he wants to be La Magra. He wants to be BIG. He's a little white guy, and on several occassions admits to wanting to be a strong black man, all the while accusing Blade of being an "Uncle Tom". It's fascinating, a scenario in which the metaphor encompasses vampires as oppressed minorities seeking revolution and Blade as a sellout of his own people.

I never quite got that reading off of it. From what I recall Deacon didn't feel inadequate, it was quite the opposite. He felt that him and his ways were better and vampires were becoming too compliant to people he felt he was better than. I don't recall him ever wanting to be pureblood, he never thought that mattered. I don't actually recall him wishing he wanted to be a big black guy unless your saying thats what wanting to be a "daywalker" meant. The Uncle Tom reference is interesting though. Vampires are in fact a minority that HAS to feed. And unlike real minorities they truly are faster, stronger and pose a real threat to society. One of the things racists worry about is this threat of no more pure races in the future. However in this case it would actually happen and it wouldn't take hundreds of years and there would be no choice in the matter. In a weird backwards way that im sure the filmmakers didn't intend you could read something very racist into this. Or even if you look at it from the black side, a small group of white people show up but a lone black warrior steps in and defends the people. When they realize they can't defeat them they decide to breed them out of existence.

However I tend to just look at it as an action movie :)

I can't imagine someone not being totally jazzed by the films opening quarter hour. To be honest, if they're out there, I wouldn't want to meet them anyway.

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Originally Posted by Andrew Merriweather 

I love that Snipes plays Blade as a straight-up Blaxploitation character. But I think claiming that THE MATRIX owes its existence to BLADE is a stretch, given that they're only separated by about eight months.

Also the fact that The Matrix was written years before they even thought of this one. Only reason Blade beat it to theaters was that Warners wanted to give the Wachowskis a couple of trial runs (Assassins, Bound) before giving them $60 million.

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Originally Posted by The Rain Dog 

I can't imagine someone not being totally jazzed by the films opening quarter hour. To be honest, if they're out there, I wouldn't want to meet them anyway.

Yup. Whether the rest of the movie lives up to it is up for debate (personally, I love it beginning to end) but that opening is a masterclass in shooting and editing action.

The film only stumbles with the ending Deacon Frost fight. And even then, there's that amazing, silent, "What the FUCK?"

Still such the goddamn shame the industry broke Stephen Norrington.

Well, we'll always have Death Machine.

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Originally Posted by Justin Clark 

The film only stumbles with the ending Deacon Frost fight. And even then, there's that amazing, silent, "What the FUCK?"

 

Still such the goddamn shame the industry broke Stephen Norrington.

Yeah but if you check the DVD it was even worse. The original ending has La Magra coming back and absorbing Deacon altogether eliminating him form the rest of the film. It becomes this big blood tornado thing. If I recall correctly  Blade beats it by throwing that head blow upy stuff into it(or maybe the serum). The audience reacted negatively to it because who the hell wants to lose Deacon Frost that way? Although the only hang up is that that ending made slightly more sense because the idea was that the blood tornado would spread out over the entire city and then world I guess. When FrOst gets takes it into himself im not sure how exactly he was going to infect the world when all it seemed to do was make him super strong and unkillable. Also I always thought La Magra was his own thing. Like he was a god brought to earth why would he worry about fighting Blade first? Although this is a film that claims they need 12 vampires for the ritual and then kills one and wants to make everyone vampires but has no food SO I guess this sin't it's biggest problem.

Keeping Frost (super)human when fighting Blade was the right choice. It just came too late in production to do it justice.

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Originally Posted by Justin Clark 

The film only stumbles with the ending Deacon Frost fight. And even then, there's that amazing, silent, "What the FUCK?"

 

 

Most out-of-left-field homage ever.

Had Deacon turned into a blood tornado, we wouldn't have gotten: "Some motherfuckers are always trying to ice-skate uphill". That would have been unacceptable. I haven't watched it in a very long time, and to be honest, beyond the fantastic opening sequence, I'd probably have less patience for it today, but in terms of Snipe's career as an action star, the man has never been better. An imbalanced but wonderfully appealing confluence of material, filmmaker, and star.

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Originally Posted by Andrew Merriweather 


Most out-of-left-field homage ever.

 

Oh god... when I found out what that moment was a reference to (I saw Blade first), I just about died.  So great.

Also, "Muthafucka, you outta yo damned mind?!"  Snipes was born to play Blade.  I love the physicality of his performance.  He may not be as fast, graceful, or as skilled as other martial arts performers, but his movements have such power and aggression in them.  They feel heavy.  It makes the action sequences so satisfying.

Let's not forget the great contribution from Kristofferson who is just so gloriously grizzled.  He and Snipes were great together.  

Confession time: I don't care that much for Blade II but I adore the fuck out of the original.  On my deathbed, hopefully 50 years from now, it might even worm it's way into my All Time Top 10.  Where Blade II is over the top and comes off as West Side Story meets Aliens meets Blacula the original is almost minimalist by comparison with it's nameless city controlled by a rotten underbelly (which always struck me as heavily influenced by Asia) populated by a blood sucking Eurotrash mafia. Snipes is brilliant and Dorrf and Logue are awesome in roles that could have easily fallen flat as one note villains.  And kris Kristofferson was born two do things in this life: be awesome and play Whistler.

Shit, I'll say something even more controversial: The opening sequence of Blade is better than anything in Blade 2. I'll duck before the slings and scorn tipped arrows come my way.  Shame that Norrington lost his mind after the LXG debacle because between this and Death Machine he showed a lot of promise.

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Originally Posted by Bancroft Agee 

Shit, I'll say something even more controversial: The opening sequence of Blade is better than anything in Blade 2. I'll duck before the slings and score tipped arrows come my way.  Shame that Norrington lost his mind after the LXG debacle because between this and Death Machine he showed a lot of promise.

Having seen Blade 2 recently for the first time since it's release, I'll back that assertion 100%
 

I'll third that.  The original has the best opening hook of any super hero movie.  I liked Blade II, but it can't hold a candle to the first one action-wise.  Del Toro's action scenes always play kinda weightless to me.