Blood and Chocolate (2007)

Blood and Chocolate
Directed by: Katja von Garnier
Written by: Ehren Kreuger, Christopher Landon, Annette Curtis Klause
Featuring: Agnes Bruckner, Hugh Dancy, Oliver Martinez, Katja Riemann
2007
www.mydarkestsecrets.com


PG-13, with little or no gore (and forget about sex), Blood and Chocolate is based (loosely) on the young adult novel of the same name by author Annette Curtis Klause amd shows it. It's 'from the people who made Underworld' in the same way that my red cotton jammys with the feet are made by the same company that owns Victoria's Secret. It starts off well with an entire family of werewolves being killed in the middle of the night by angry hicks in Colorado, but very quickly the scene changes to Romania, where young Vivian works in a chocolate store, looks really hot, and spends most of her time 'hiding from herself' or whatever...

True Love is always nauseating, always.

Shape-shifting loup-garou (werewolf) Vivian lives with her aunt Astrid, since both her parents were murdered brutally when she was a child in Colorado, and now that she's 19 she's eligible to be mated to the great Gabriel (Oliver Martinez, better known as the really hot guy from that movie Unfaithful who seduces Diane Lane). As the leader of the werewolf clan in Romania, apparently, Gabriel can choose a new wife every 7 years. With that lame threat looming closely over her head, Vivian goes ahead and falls in love with a young artist from the '˜States (Hugh Dancy) who happens to be traveling in Romania to draw wolves for his new graphic novel. But not before spending at least 20 minutes trying to convince him that 'it could never work' and 'you need to leave now' and 'you wouldn't understand'. Aidan is everything your stereotypical teenage artist heartthrob would be like; sensitive, sweet, and stupidly obsessed with Vivian. They enjoy a sweet montage of dancing in the rain, lying in a meadow, and laughing about nothing, and everything! After this agonizing pastiche, and sub plots involving Astrid being in love with Gabriel, Vivian's cousin Rafe and his 'gang of hoodlum friends' wreaking teenage werewolf havoc, and a sleazy 'werewolf friendly' nightclub, we finally get to the main problem; the werewolf ritual. Every so often, the werewolves participate in an organized hunt for a human to 'keep the balance' of 'nature' or something, and Aidan has been chosen for the ritual so that he will be out of Vivian's life and the old ways will not be compromised.

"I am Gabrrriel. My eyes glow with passion and, how you say? Sexiness."

I wish it were only as simple as this 'Romeo and Juliet' story, but its not. You have to keep in mind that there's also some kind of 'serum' with a name right out of Resident Evil that can cure werewolves who have been sickened by contact with silver. It's at your corner pharmacy in Bucharest, apparently. Vivian, being from America, has an American accent. Her cousin Rafe speaks with a British accent. Aunt Astrid has a German accent. Gabriel speaks like a Spaniard. Why? They're all in Romania, and I assume that they're supposed to be speaking Romanian, at least the majority of the time. The street signs are in English, too. Nice attention to detail, Art Directors Vraciu Eduard Daniel, Mihnea Vieru and Vlad Vieru (at least they employed locals). There's simply no excuse for having your characters speak with different accents if they're supposed to be from the same place. They also did this in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves starring Kevin Costner, where it was equally embarrassing, but at least there was some blood in the film. Oh! Don't forget the Prophecy. There's always a prophecy. A woman will come and change the future of the werewolf clan; could it be Vivian?

"Just fill up the fucking bag with anti-silver serum and no one gets hurt"

The werewolf transformations themselves are not going to please horror fans. Instead of a gruesome, or even uncomfortable process, Vivian and her fellow werewolves are engulfed in a warm glow of computer graphic light and within its bounds they subtly transform into complete wolves. It's very reminiscent of one of those New Age posters with the crystals and the Dreamcatcher in the corner and the wolf howling on the cliff in the distance. Maybe a dolphin swimming in a sea of cosmic harmony. You know.

It's the "new" werewolf; beautiful and glowy

And where's the chocolate in all this? Vivian does work in a chocolate shop. But that's the only real tangible reference to it in the entire film. The title, while true to the book, is not only misleading but also rather dumb. Chocolate might represent humanity, while Blood represents Vivian's ties to her werewolf clan. Or, maybe blood and chocolate look the same in the dark -? It's not explained. Doesn't matter, because either way it's a horrible title for a film. Even if it is the original title of the novel, changing the title for the film would have been a marketing move bordering on genius for this particular project.

The characters are all very predictable and one-dimensional. There's no violence, gore, or excessive blood. There's no sex. The dialogue is banal. The werewolf transformations are disappointing. The major themes are ones we've seen many times; youth forging their own paths and going against the conventions of their elders; forbidden love that overcomes all; and facing your fears. And, all done with about as much scare and fantasy as a Harry Potter film. (Which, by the way, with a higher budget, is much more fun than Blood and Chocolate). While this is a story based on a teen novel, it's not marketed as such. It's presented as an adult horror film, which it is most certainly not. And while these recurring 'life lessons' are enjoyable to a younger reader, or viewer, they just don't appeal to adults who want to see juicer, more intriguing, and more mature storylines and characters.

Rafe hates having to make fucking hard choices. Dammit.

The same chocolate-metaphor-with-supernatural-overtones feel can be gotten from reading Sunshine by Robin McKinley, except its not dumbed-down for a younger audience. I just hope no one tries to adapt it for the screen. Enjoy with tongue-in-cheek.