Spierig brothers completism, inevitable after Predestination (2014). It's either a high-concept vampire flick or low scifi, something that Arnie may've been proud to star in back in the 1990s.
The premise is that for one reason or another most of the population are now vampires. By obvious Malthusian logic this put excess pressure on the availability of human blood leading to an expanding underclass of brainless desperadoes who look like a horde of junkies. Sam Neill heads a vast corporation that aims to produce synthetic blood (retaining the upsides of the condition) but of course there are humanists too. One such is Willem Dafoe (in the Arnie role) who undergoes a revelatory accident, leading to the only science we see: Victorian-era self experimentation by Ethan Hawke in a wine vat. Vince Colosimo is undertasked with some nonsense towards the end. Claudia Karvan does her best to ameliorate the sausagefest so typical of post-apocalyptic movies.
Some of it is very funny: an early gag is an ad for whitening toothpaste, and the science proves to be not so straightforward. It's a bit auteur-ish, like Dark City (1998) with some direct lifts from The Matrix (1999) (farming humans as blood bags, corporate brainlessness, mobs of military thugs, aesthetics). Clearly some funding came from General Motors: every vehicle is a(n electric?) Chrysler or a Chevrolet. I thought they missed a trick by not incorporating a zombie theme (may as well use the whole human) but it seems the Spierigs have been there already with Undead (2003).
Roger Ebert: two-and-a-half stars. "This vampire health plan has no public option" — was it an allegory for Obamacare? Jeannette Catsoulis made it a Critic's Pick. Wikipedia. It seems to have been thought of as a response to Twilight.
