Vampires are among the most beloved monsters in cinema. Over the past few decades, they have been portrayed as fatal lovers and romantics, killers, and superheroes. In 2003, 'Underworld' was released, giving viewers another vampire universe. Let's fi...
Kate Beckinsale is an actress who has firmly earned the title of eternally young. She is now 49 years old, and she looks as if she just stepped off the set of 'Underworld' back in 2003. Truly a vampire in the flesh in the 21st century. Although, most likely, it's all about genetics and regular training.
'Underworld' became the first in a series of films for Beckinsale dedicated to all sorts of monsters (for the role, by the way, she lived on a diet of chicken and cabbage). The following year, she would star in 'Van Helsing' with Hugh Jackman, directed by the creator of the 'Mummy' franchise, Stephen Sommers (though poorly aged, it was groundbreaking in terms of special effects at the time). And then, with varying success, she would keep returning to the black latex suit of the unapproachable vampire (and the diet), appearing in a total of 3 more films (and one figuratively) that expand the dark, albeit often illogical, universe of 'Underworld'.
In this article, we pay tribute to the very first part of the franchise, directed by Kate Beckinsale's ex-husband, Len Wiseman (which also featured her other ex-spouse, Michael Sheen). The fantasy thriller about the war between vampires and werewolves turns a proud 20 this year, and compared to the sequels and prequels, the original has much more meaning and interesting details. On a broader scale, this franchise stands out as one of the few vampire projects not based on a book, game, or comic.
Mythology
The name of the main character, Selene, was borrowed from Greek mythology: that is the name of the goddess of the Moon. This is very symbolic, given that night is the preferred time of day for vampires.
Furthermore, the film's screenwriter, Kevin Grevioux, was also inspired by another character when writing the heroine — the supervillainess Selene Gallio, also known as the Black Queen, from Marvel comics. This character was a psychic vampire from the X-Men universe who first appeared in comic books in 1983.
Not only Kate Beckinsale was lucky with her character, but also Scott Speedman, who played the human carrier of a unique gene combining the traits of a vampire and a werewolf. And, in parallel, he falls in love with a vampire. According to the plot, his character is named Michael Corvin, which can be seen as a reference to Matthias Corvinus of Hungary. According to legend, he was an ally of Vlad the Impaler, the very person considered the prototype for Count Dracula.
Plot-Story
The first film in the 'Underworld' franchise can be classified as urban fantasy with a touch of neo-Gothic. Here, we seem to be walking through a familiar setting, reminiscent of New York (but in the plot, Budapest), but looking from a different angle, new places and unexpected creatures suddenly reveal themselves to us.
This genre is beloved by one of the main fantasy masters, Neil Gaiman, who explored it well, for example, in the novel 'Neverwhere'. By the way, there are many similarities between this book and the film: a mysterious stranger leads the hero into the underground world of London, where a completely different world opens up to him in the tunnels. And speaking of cinema, one thinks, for example, of the comic book film 'Constantine' by Francis Lawrence, released two years later. There, Keanu Reeves fights other monsters existing in the underground.
In 'Underworld', Len Wiseman managed to create this feeling of unreality, of otherness. Here, we look at an underground platform but feel as if we are in another dimension. This sensation is created not only by the story but also by the dark color grading, the set designs in the frame, and the emphasis on specific details in the scene. And the phrase 'man is a wolf to man' in the 'Underworld' universe transforms into an analogue of 'vampire is an enemy to the werewolf'.
Monsters are often used as a metaphor reflecting human psychology and adaptation to changes in society. Earlier, monstrosity was used in cinema to talk about racial intolerance, and recently it has been used in discussions about the rights of various minorities. In 'Underworld', this kind of subtext was inherent from the start. As screenwriter Kevin Grevioux admitted, the love story of Selene and Michael is based on the idea of interracial relationships. And the film itself was originally positioned as 'Romeo and Juliet for vampires and werewolves'. Only later did its theme expand to the centuries-old enmity between two clans of different monsters.
These ideas helped avoid the cardboard nature of the main characters. There are no exclusively positive or negative characters here: each 'monster' harbors both good and bad within. And in the finale, the characters have to make a difficult moral choice: go against love or blood ties. Another question is that within the framework of a film with an abundance of action, the creators didn't have enough time (or maybe something else) to add depth to even the main characters; their personal nuances are applied rather superficially.
The Surprisingly Impressive Cast
You can say whatever you want about 'Underworld', but one fact remains indisputable — the first part managed to assemble a decent cast. There's the fatal Kate Beckinsale, who had recently made a splash in Michael Bay's action drama 'Pearl Harbor', and the not-yet-star, but already familiar Scott Speedman — a star from the teen series 'Felicity' with Keri Russell. But the real gems were Michael Sheen, who played the leader of the werewolf pack, and Bill Nighy, who played a vampire elder.
Moreover, there were rumors that director Len Wiseman wanted to bring in David Bowie to reprise his vampire role from the film 'The Hunger'. But alas, the parties were unable to align their schedules.
Given the film's genre (and its small budget, which didn't allow for large fees), it's interesting to know how Wiseman managed to entice, for example, Michael Sheen and Bill Nighy. Kate Beckinsale, on the other hand, often said in interviews that the role of Selene attracted her because of the character's trauma, who endured many personal tragedies.
By the way, Milla Jovovich and Halle Berry were considered for the role of the main vampire. Later, each of them found their own film where they got to show off in latex.
No (Almost) Computer Graphics
Mystical fantasies are always half computer graphics. Inserting fangs for vampires is a matter of five seconds, but developing the rest of the fictional world is more complicated. Nevertheless, Len Wiseman, for whom this film was a debut, did not overuse computer graphics and decided to shoot everything live whenever possible.
For example, the huge shaggy images of the werewolves are actual animatronics, i.e., robotic models of the lycans created for filming. There were also special suits worn by stunt doubles for the action scenes. The miracles of computer technology had to be used in shots where the transformation of a human into a werewolf is shown in close-up.
Another example of practical shooting is the spectacular jump of the main character from the tower of one of the buildings at the beginning of the film. It was filmed in several takes with the participation of stuntmen and Beckinsale herself at the moment of landing.
The technical complexity of staging some scenes is a distinctive feature of 'Underworld'. For example, in the scene where Michael Sheen, as a werewolf, accelerates to over 50 miles per hour while chasing a car, a special tow rig was used. It made it possible to capture this moment and create the sensation of insane speed in reality.
References and Quotations
'Underworld' is rich not only in vampire fangs and woolly werewolf hides but also in references to pop culture. For example, the black latex suits are nothing more than a tribute to 'The Matrix', which launched the trend for such outfits in pop culture in 1999.
In the early 2000s, the music industry actively began talking about the band Evanescence. It broke through partly thanks to the powerful female vocals of Amy Lee against the backdrop of other rock bands of the time with male vocalists. And in 2003, the album 'Fallen' was released, bringing them two Grammys. But in popular culture, Evanescence's popularity came with the film 'Daredevil' starring Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner: for all its flaws, the undeniable merits of that film are the soundtracks 'My Immortal' and 'Bring Me to Life'. 'Underworld' also pays tribute to the rock band by featuring the Gothic icon Amy Lee in its soundtrack.
Speaking of cinematic citations, Len Wiseman's film has a scene that references the sci-fi film 'Nemesis 2' from 1995, which, by the way, featured the director of 'John Wick', Chad Stahelski. In that film, the heroine also fires a barrage of bullets, drawing a circle around herself and breaking the floor to escape from enemies.
A less obvious but still interesting reference was used in the tunnel scene where the heroine encounters a werewolf. In the background, she hears a wolf howl: this sound effect was borrowed from 'An American Werewolf in London' from 1981.
Overall, the very atmosphere of the vampire lair, whose top tier consists of aristocrats dressed in outlandish clothes, was inspired by old vampire horror films. There, bloodsuckers were often depicted as the elite of society. At the same time, the creators of 'Underworld' wanted to update this view by adding latex, modern weapons, and other attributes of the early 21st century.
Part of the Vampire Cinematic Universe
In the second half of the 1990s, vampires moved away from the role of the romantic hero or the main monster in horrors, and sometimes comedies, and began to more actively adopt the image of a kind of superhero. The first seeds appear in the teen series 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer', where we are introduced to the vampire Angel on the side of good, and later to Spike, a slippery character by nature who eventually becomes a positive one. But the first full-fledged superhero from the vampire clan was Blade, played by Wesley Snipes, in 1998. He lives in the underground, is not afraid of the sun, suppresses his thirst with a special serum, and kills his own kind. And Selene, in essence, is a female version of Blade, only with photophobia.
There is a lot in common between the vampire worlds of Selene and Blade: the creatures living in them follow the same laws of survival, feud with werewolves and among themselves, have underground organizations, and most importantly, they have their own rebels who join forces with humans. It's no surprise that the creators of 'Underworld' wanted to make a crossover with the 'Blade' franchise, bringing Kate Beckinsale and Wesley Snipes together on screen. They approached Marvel with such a proposal, but they refused.
Although some connection between the two franchises did occur thanks to the actor Tony Curran, who played Marcus Corvinus in 'Underworld: Evolution'. He also appeared as a vampire named Priest in 'Blade 2'.
Interestingly, the idea of making a crossover wasn't only with 'Blade'. Producer David Kern, during the PR campaign for 'Underworld: Blood Wars', considered proposing to combine the vampire world with the zombie world from the franchise ''. But he never publicly dared to voice this idea, and later Paul W. S. Anderson himself stated that he would not have approved such a twist.
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Latex suits, neo-Gothic style, a fatal Kate Beckinsale in blue contact lenses, an abundance of quality action, behind-the-scenes facts, along with a decent cast and a dark visual atmosphere (thanks to the art direction for that), gave the first film a sufficient fan base that loyally endured the not-so-successful sequels and prequels within the franchise.
The original 'Underworld' became another stepping stone in the history of vampire superheroes, while bringing to the forefront a sexualized but female image. Therefore, we can safely consider that the film contributed to the process of reevaluating the role of vampires in popular culture at the beginning of the 21st century, which gave it cult status, at least among fans of the genre.
And it must be said that even 20 years later, 'Underworld' doesn't look like an aged film; on the contrary, it is still a pretty decent atmospheric action movie in the fantasy genre. And considering everything written above, one can even argue that the first film, which kickstarted a fairly large franchise, is significant for the entire vampire cinematic universe, which has been forming for many decades and includes a wide variety of characters.
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