My willingness to watch predictably horrible horror films has struck again. I am ashamed…
Lucy Liu has a problem. The most obvious of which is that she agreed to star in this film. Okay, let me start over… Lucy Liu’s character, Sadie Blake, has a problem. For starters, she is an investigative journalist, and curiosity comes with the territory. Unfortunately for her, this curiosity has broken her “better judgment” part of the brain, allowing her to stumble upon something she was not supposed to see. So now she must die. However, instead of taking the route most do after this step in their life, she wakes up in a morgue drawer, naked, alone (well, those are to be expected), thirsty for blood, and with a bone to pick.
The problem with this “bone to pick” is that this revenge story is completely laughable. For one thing, where is my training montage? After Sadie is turned into a vampire a mysterious man takes her home with him so that he can teach her to overcome her curse and become a BA assassin. But apparently all he really needs to do was give her a jug of blood, a crossbow, and a pair of scissors because the only thing keeping her from these necessary skills is her long hair. And with that, she is ready to set out on her quest.
And oh what a short quest it is. In order to find the man she blames for her undead state of life she must first shoot her way through a few lesser evildoers. One by one they fall with little to no fight, allowing her to progress to whom she is really after maybe ten minutes after first setting out.
Now let’s talk about this “big bad.” Am I really to suppose to be that scared of a Josh Hartnett look alike? I don’t think so. Speaking of Josh Hartnett, I want to know how so many recognizable actors agreed to be in this film. If you take the time to pry your eyes away from the boobs that are more often than not exposed throughout the film, you may start making the connections too. For their sakes, I will pretend that I didn’t see them. But I will not extend this courtesy to Nick Lachey. When I saw him appear on the screen I knew that the tiny shred of hope I was holding out had just been spat on, and it quickly took its leave, distraught and dejected.
Finally, the one and only thing this film could have done right was to bow out gracefully, but Rise wasn’t even good enough for that. Instead, it ends with a brief moment after the credits begin to roll that completely nullifies everything that Lucy Liu’s character stands for.
For those of you who love moves but don’t always make the best decisions in which films to give the benefit of the doubt to (like myself), I have this to say: DO NOT WATCH THIS FILM!!! You will just end up feeling bitter, cheated, and ashamed.
Final Grade: D-
PS – Looking back, there is at least one thing I can compliment. Though the script proves to be awful in pretty much every aspect, there is one line that I thought was a great argument and defense for a vampire’s lifestyle: “Good and evil are just imaginary friends.” There, compliment given.
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