Quite frankly, anyone BUT Bookeem Woodbine would have been fine in this role, but his portrayal as Steve Grant left me more than a bit cold. His character is a one-dimensional, whining, cardboard-cutout wannabe gangsta, and he honestly just does not cut it as Grant, which was a serious detriment to this film, as Grant's was a key role. (And what was WITH those short, tiny ties?! Was he wearing a kid's tie?)

Additionally, Adrian Paul as Aaron Gray here was reminiscent of a young, uptight Gomez Addams look-alike. There was nothing wrong with his performance, but his costumer should definitely have gone in another direction with his wardrobe. The pencil-drawn-looking mustache did not help, and neither did the liberal abuse of hair goo. All these elements contributed a certain air of detachment between the audience and his character, which seriously brought down the film. His character was one of those principle characters which needed to enjoy a connection with the audience in order for this film to work.

However, Ling Bai's performance was very compelling, provocative and professional here. You may remember her as Miss East from Wild, Wild West.

Other than that, this was a rather entertaining venture into the future of the vampyric race, in spite of the vastly missed potential. There are certain rules one must follow when in production of a vampire film. Some argue that these rules were created by Universal Studios when they filmed the old 30's, 40's and 50's black and white horrors. Others say these rules come from the legends themselves. Whichever the case, this movie does not seem to be aware of the "vampire rules."

The effects were less than they could have been, but were otherwise passable. The flash-backs, however, were just annoying, and the visuals lacked in creativity.

The musical score was strong and contributed a nice suspense to the production, and moved between action and suspense quite well, even if it was overly techno at times.

There are some good elements, but they seem totally unconnected and even accidental. There is little flow and less continuity. Yet the good elements are enough to keep you watching to the end, which is satisfying. Unfortunately, it's also satisfying that it IS the end.

It rates a 4.2/10 from...

the Fiend :.

The Breed starts sometime in '...The Near Future...' where homicide detective Steven Grant (Bokeem Woodbine) & his partner Phil (Reed Diamond) follow up a lead on a particularly nasty serial killer who's running around at the moment. The lead happens to be a stolen van which they find & in a nearby building discover yet another dead body. The mysterious killer is also there, he most definitely resists arrest & even though Grant repeatedly shoots him he kills Phil by biting his neck. Grant survives but the killer disappears into the night... The 'National Security Agency' contacts Grant about the incident, the agencies director says that what he, & Phil, were dealing with was a renegade Vampire. He carries on to inform Grant that there are about 4000 Vampires worldwide & they revealed themselves to 'us' to try & live in harmony together, he also says that Vampires are genetic mutations & feed on a synthetic substitute for blood. Grant is assigned a new partner, a Vampire named Aaron Gray (Adrian Paul) & they are told to work together to discover the identity of the serial killing Vampire who wants to sabotage the peace between the two races...

This American Hungarian co-production was directed by Michael Oblowitz & is average at best. The script by Christos N. Gage & Ruth Fletcher is the real problem here. Too many things just didn't work for me, for a start could a high ranking scientist create a virus that has the potential to wipe out the entire human race without a SINGLE person questioning him or finding out? I mean the guy is even using the 'Nation Security Agency' laboratories for Christ's sake! Considering the Vampire race has been around for 1000's of years it seemed strange that there was only 4000 throughout the entire world & that they had never been noticed before. The central relationship between Grant the human & Gray the Vampire was clichéd & really cheesy, I mean at first they don't don't get on & seem mismatched but by the end they are best of friends & have saved each other's lives, we've seen it all before & done a lot better. The whole story is predictable & I can't believe it took Gray over half the film to figure out the painfully obvious. The whole concept just didn't work as far as I'm concerned & the film spent a good 30 minutes explaining it's own set of Vampire 'rules' as Grant would ask a question like how to kill a Vampire & Gray would tell him thus making sure we, the viewer that is, know as well. The breed also makes a few feeble attempts to say things about racism, trust & acceptance, you know all the clichéd things one would expect.

Director Oblowitz thinks he's making a cross between The Matrix (1999), Lethal Weapon (1987) & Vampires (1998), well no-one told him that you need a budget to pull that off. He films the fight scenes with people 'flying' through the air plus shooting & reloading their guns in a 'cool' way but they come off as looking ridiculous. He films everything with bleached out colours & a greenish tint. As for the films supposed style, you need to do a bit more than tilt the camera, shine a few neon lights & have some mist swirling in every shot. The gore is none existent, one neck biting, a couple of slit throats, a few gunshot wounds & someone explodes CGI style at the end & it looks terrible.

With a really low budget of about $400,000 it shows. The Breed has reasonable production values but it looks cheap throughout & you can tell it was shot in Europe, in this case Hungary. Even though it is meant to be set in the future the cars, clothes & the like suggest otherwise. I found the acting awful, whats with the gay moustache Paul? Woodbine gives a terrible performance & just wasn't right for the role at all. Ling Bai is quite sexy looking whenever she appears.

I was disappointed by The Breed, it's one of those films that make a fantastic trailer when they show ALL the cool bits in the space of two & a half minutes set against some techno music. Unfortunately there's another eighty seven & a half minutes to sit through if you decide to watch it. Personally I didn't think much of it.