What We Do in the Shadows

What We Do in the Shadows [2014] is the vampire mockumentary from writing/directing/acting duo Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi. Without a traditional narrative style much like others in the mockumentary genre, the film follows a group of vampires through their modern, mundane lives as New Zealand flatmates. Instead of gothic horror or moody young adult romances, this is a silly spoof of the vampire mythology and how that would translate in a modern landscape.

Substance over style. This is not auteur filmmaking, although the filmmaking style is used to its advantage. This film is about bringing the laughs and it does so with great success. The mockumentary style keeps things simple. Not letting complex cinematography distract from the undead lunacy going on throughout.

Brief and brisk. This film is not one of those comedies that drags on forever with jokes that wear out their welcome. The jokes come a mile a minute with seemingly everything being played for laughs. The jokes are witty and never drag or stretch on too long. This is not Apatow-style improv where there’s 4 different versions of the same joke and the running time stretches to 2+ hours. The film is under 1 hour 30 minutes and just flies by.

A future cult classic. What We Do in the Shadows has been criminally overlooked and underseen thus far. It’s a very small budget film that only hardcore cinephiles probably know about. This is a tragedy. This film has the quotability to enter into the zeitgeist and remain there. It is among the funniest comedies of 2014.  It’s hard to talk about this film without spoiling some of the hilarious jokes and gags so I’ll just leave it at that.