Night Watch (Nochnoi Dozor)
Directed by: Timur Bekmambetov
Written by:Timur Bekmambetov, Laeta Kalogridis (screenplay), Sergei Lukyanenko (novel)
Starring: Konstantin Khabensky, Vladimir Menshov, Valeri Zolotukhin, Mariya Poroshina

I can probably count the number of Russian films I have seen on both hands. In fact, I embarrassingly had to log on to the internet and search for titles as just two came to my immediate recollection.

The fact that I had not viewed many from this vast Eastern country probably led to my lack of excitement over Timur Bekmambetov’s flick, Nochnoy dozor (or Night Watch to those that don’t have a Russian to English translation book at the ready). I had seen the trailer and was mildly intrigued, but I didn’t hang on to any notion of the film satisfying my Saturday night void.

The first 15 minutes didn’t help either. Not since Gaspar Noé ’s Irreversible have I spent the opening sequences in a dizzying frenzy trying to figure out what the hell I was watching.

But then things started to get interesting. Vampires, shape shifters and a battle of good versus evil began to become more evident. The characters, lead by Konstantin Khabensky as Anton, are thrown at us quicker than Clint Eastwood’s draw hand back in the spaghetti western day and the special effects are edited with split second visuals that would put Michael Bay films to shame.

The story is actually a trilogy with parts two and three expected out over the next two years and involves a battle between the night and light watchers who have been battling for years waiting for the birth of the chosen one that will pick a side thus declaring a winner (have enough religious overtones for you?). So while we wait for the decision that will ultimately come in the later parts of the second or third chapter, Anton hunts down vampires, saves the world from something called a funnel and befriends a child that may just be the lucky person that gets to inny-minny-miney-moe a side.

While watching Night Watch I couldn’t help but think of how The Matrix must have translated and looked to people of other languages. Even in English, The Matrix was difficult to figure out and Night Watch did many things to remind me of the Wachowski Brothers’ trilogy. It has a complex plot, too many characters with too many quirks to keep track of and enough special effects to keep those sensory buttons in the old noggin firing every few minutes. But maybe the biggest comparison between the two films are the religious suggestions in the films, specifically being the fact that ‘The One’ will be sent to save or condemn us all.

I will not go as far as commenting that Night Watch is a great film, but it is very good. You won’t be bored and I bet that you watch it again just to try and figure the whole thing out. Besides, isn’t that what had us going back and a second and third time to see Matrix: Revolutions for? — Greg Roberts

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Recommended If You Like: The Matrix, The Matrix Revolutions, From Dusk Till Dawn