Amusing and slight, “What We Do in the Shadows” is a mockumentary drawn from the same sensibilities that produced “Flight of the Conchords,” “Eagle v. Shark” and “Boy,” among others.
Written and directed by the team of Jemaine Clement and Taiki Watiti, this film presents a flock (coven? pride? school?) of vampires, sharing a flat in contemporary New Zealand. The documentarians supposedly have not only been granted access to film the vampires’ private lives, but have been promised that the vampires won’t eat them.
The joke, of course, is that roommates – even vampire roommates – tend to have issues. In this case, it’s the prissy Viago (Waititi), a mittel-European vampire who had himself shipped to New Zealand (on a ship that apparently was a local, rather than an express) – he’s the house mother who maintains the “chore wheel” and scolds the flatmate who has fallen five years behind in doing the dishes.
Viago can’t understand why his cohabitants have to be so messy in general. If you know blood is going to spurt from a victim’s neck, be courteous enough to at least put down a towel.
“We don’t put down towels – we’re vampires,” grumps Vlad (Clement), a Transylvanian so old that his shape-shifting powers are on the wane.
The struggles within the house include generational ones
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