Like the film that preceded it, “Underworld: Evolution” does not have in mind a general audience capable of making sense of the plot. We’re continuously inundated with characters, back stories, secrets, and turns of events, and yet never once does anyone stop to provide us with some semblance of context. It’s almost like joining a card game without knowing what the rules are or even what the game is. This means that when anything even remotely resembling an explanation is offered, it only raises even more questions. I can imagine these two films being well received by franchise enthusiasts who take the time to study every nuance of the plot, from the lead characters to the family of the lead characters to the friends of the lead characters and their family members. For the rest of us, the film will come off as needlessly confusing.

There is, however, one good way in which “Evolution” is also like the film that preceded it, namely in that it gives us plenty of good things to look at. Granted, it’s almost entirely through a blue-colored filter, which after a while becomes dull and dreary. Most of the modernized urban and elegant locations have been set aside in favor of ancient decay, including castle structures, medieval brick and mortar chambers lit by torches, dank dungeons, and cavernous hidden caves. We spend a little more time outdoors, specifically in snow-covered forests and perilous cliff sides. True to the film’s gothic aesthetic, the snow is augmented by constant flashes of lightning. And while most of the film once again depicts a world of shadow, moonlight, and gray clouds, we do for the first time see sunlight. We also see Scott Speedman shed his street clothes and Kate Beckinsale peel out of her skintight black leather suit, at which point they go at it like the creatures of the night they are.

But before the film gets to them, it first backtracks all the way to the year 1202, at which point we see a still living but not much younger looking Viktor (Bill Nighy), an elder vampire. Now that we know he was a treacherous bastard who killed not only his own daughter but also the family of the vampire Selene (and then lied about it), we know his intentions will be less than honorable. We have already been told that there has been a feud between vampires and lycans (werewolves) for centuries, and it seems the purpose of this scene is to show how it might have started; Viktor orders that another vampire elder, Markus (Tony Curran), forever imprison his brother, who just happens to be an untamed, raging lycan. And so it comes to pass. Needless to say, Markus is not at all happy about it.

We then flash forward to the story proper, which begins immediately after the events of the first film. Markus, who had been hibernating in a stone sarcophagus, is awakened by blood that had conveniently been spilt on the floor. He then adopts a monstrous bat-like appearance and will spend most of the film looking that way. His target is Selene (Beckinsale), who’s now on the run with Michael (Speedman), who was once human but is not a vampire/lycan hybrid. What does Markus want with her? I think part of it has something to do with her blood, since, according to the rules the filmmakers have set, a vampire can drink another vampire’s blood and gain access to his or her memories. Keeping watch over the situation on a high-tech boat is a mysterious older man (Derek Jacobi); for reasons left unexplained for far too much of the film, he sends legions of soldiers to hunt down and destroy Markus.

Selene and Michael, meanwhile, are on a quest to learn the significance of a pendant that was at one time worn by Lucian, the lycan played by Michael Sheen who was shot to death at the end of the first film. This will bring them into the life of an exiled vampire named Tanis (Steven Mackintosh), who, because of a deal he reached with Lucian, has turned his prison into a gothic brothel. This character serves little purpose apart from bombarding the audience with more hopelessly complicated history. You know you’re in trouble when a character takes not one but several ancient books off a shelf and starts thumbing through their yellowed pages. And when you have to look at a graphic pen-and-ink drawing of a medieval battle, all bets are off.

Having sat through a second chapter of this series, I can’t say that I’m any closer to figuring out what has been happening or why. Do the filmmakers not realize that audiences are not mind readers? What makes sense to them will not make sense to us without some degree of clarification. And it never works to gloss over this glaring technicality with scene after scene of stunt work and special effects, especially when they’re both at the mercy of quick edits. For the most part, the action scenes are little more than continuous blurs of blood, fangs, fur, and bullets. The only time I could make out what I was seeing was when Beckinsale would do impossible midair summersaults in slow motion. The final voiceover narration, provided by her character, makes it clear that “Underworld: Evolution” is not the end of the story. I can only hope that any future chapters will in some way attempt to be understandable.

- Chris Pandolfi

 

Click HERE to read the review of Underworld (2003)

Click HERE to read the review of Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)

Click HERE to read the review of Underworld: Awakening (2012)

 

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