"El Conde" has a dynamite premise, one of the best of any movie released this year. It imagines Auguste Pinochet, one-time dictator of Chile, is alive and well as a vampire, still feasting on the blood of innocents. By extension, it suggests that fascism itself is a kind of monster that will never die.
But this is a one-joke film that goes nowhere once it's made its point, which it makes early on. It's a ravishing looking movie, filmed in beautiful and eerie black and white by Academy Award nominated cinematographer Edward Lachmann, and it's got atmospheric, gothic production design that makes a Chilean hideaway look like something out of "Dracula." But the style isn't enough to make up for the lack of coherent narrative to hold the thing together. It's also got many gross out moments that were way too gross for me. I can only see so many scenes of people slurping down blood smoothies before I'm completely turned off by the movie.
Grade: C.
But this is a one-joke film that goes nowhere once it's made its point, which it makes early on. It's a ravishing looking movie, filmed in beautiful and eerie black and white by Academy Award nominated cinematographer Edward Lachmann, and it's got atmospheric, gothic production design that makes a Chilean hideaway look like something out of "Dracula." But the style isn't enough to make up for the lack of coherent narrative to hold the thing together. It's also got many gross out moments that were way too gross for me. I can only see so many scenes of people slurping down blood smoothies before I'm completely turned off by the movie.
Grade: C.