By 2019 a plague has transformed the vast majority of the population into vampires. With very few human beings left blood supplies have fallen to unimaginable lows, scientist Edward Dalton (Ethan Hawke) tasked with finding a hemoglobin substitute that will keep their race alive.

Willem Dafoe and Ethan Hawke in Lionsgate Films' Daybreakers

But Dalton is not a happy vampire. Refusing to drink human blood, disgusted by the farming facilities set up to drain the remaining population, he’d rather find a cure than an alternate feeding source. It all seems like a pipe dream, a pipe dream, that is, until he meets resistance leader Lionel ‘Elvis’ Cormac (Willem Dafoe). Not only is he and his second in command Audrey Bennett (Claudia Karvan) doing all they can to protect the remaining humans, but for Dalton they’re also the key ingredient in his research. Joining forces, the trio stumbles upon a secret that could change the face of the Earth, those in power willing to do anything to make sure their discovery doesn’t force a single vampire into the light of day.

The Spierig brothers Michael and Peter, the creative mind behind the visually imaginative and dramatically vapid Australian zombie thriller Undead, try to rise up to the next B-movie level with their new end of the world vampire epic Daybreakers. Happily, for those willing to go with its rudimentary premise and slickly designed comic book thrills I think they more or less succeed, and while the pair run out of ideas towards the end overall for genre fans this one is one heck of a bloody good time.

The first half, in particular, is really quite good. In incredibly brief brushstrokes the filmmakers craft a brand new world that’s instantly believable. I understood immediately the differing socioeconomic layers, knew what the hierarchy was and was able to grasp the Orwellian stranglehold those at the heights of business were able to achieve. Dalton’s distaste over what has become of the world and his own treasured humanity is visceral and palpable, his relationship with corporate superior Charles Bromley (icily played by Sam Neill) a fittingly uncomfortable one I couldn’t wait to see come to a gruesomely fitting conclusion.

The introduction of Dafoe’s character to Hawke is also well done. The whole set piece takes place under a secluded country tree, sunlight streaming through the branches like daggers hoping to cut a person’s flesh in two. The actors tango back and forth beneath the leaves, their relative silence ultimately broken by the reckless cacophony of the screenplay’s first relative missteps.

It is from this point forward things go in a fairly conventional direction. While the secret behind the potential cure is unusual, what it leads to is anything but. Additionally, for a film that is as relatively smart and inventive as this was is for it to fall into a state of humdrum predictability during the last forty minutes is a bit of a disappointment. The whole boils down to a series of dimly lit confrontations where people talk way too much and the action is a blurry razzle-dazzle shadowed in a blue mist, and while it all looks artsy that still doesn’t make it any less cliché.

Be that as it may, it’s not a total loss. The Spierig have a grisly gift for blood and gore, and those hoping for some viscera-drenched fireworks the brothers do not disappoint. There is an instant where one person gets ripped to complete shreds inside an elevator in full-on George A. Romero fury, their head proudly severed from their shoulders and then held up like a ghastly trophy ready for display.

But more than that, the duo pace their film excellently so even when the idea well runs dry they manage to keep the energy level at such a fever pitch I was still entertained even when I knew I should have been feeling otherwise. The climactic horror sequences have a cathartic kick that fits the genre flawlessly, and no matter how absurd things got I was still sitting in that theater enjoying myself all the same.

Could Daybreakers have been something more, maybe breaking out of the slickly produced B-grade pack in the process? Most definitely, especially if the Spierigs had continued to buck convention and stayed somewhat original instead of choosing to follow a typical path especially during their overblown climax. They could have done something special here, and in a world that devours Twilight and its ilk like no tomorrow the pair could have cut a bloodily inventive vampiric swath actually worth fussing over.

But I’m not going to go and hold this against them. I was in the right frame of mind when I sat down to watch this movie, ready to accept it for what it was just as long as it was well made, reasonably intelligent, scored in the visceral thrills department and was competently acted. Daybreakers hits on all those fronts and more, and while playing the game of what might have been is fun what the film actually is is of a higher merit than it probably has any right to be.