Cubussoli Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

SoftInloveRox Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined

SteinMo What a freaking movie. So many twists and turns. Absolutely intense from start to finish.

movieman_kev Lucy Liu stars as Sadie, a reporter who disregards what could be a big scoop until she reads of a murder of a girl on the front page. She investigates & is promptly killed by vampires. The End... wait, no the movie goes on (dammit) Sadie now a vamp herself, decides to get even with those that turned her with the help of the cop (a severely under-used Micheal Chiklis)whom fathered the aforementioned murdered girl.This movie could have been better, as far as vampire flicks go, I've seen much worse. But this film is still a female Blade clone and Sadie herself is a bit one-dimensional and repetitive in her actions to hold my interest for long. Still the film moves at a brisk pace even if it lacks any kind of originality. I didn't hate it nor love it. I guess that's called indifference.Eye Candy: Cameron Richardson gets topless; Samaire Armstrong and Lucy Liu provide T&A My Grade: C-

Athrond Movies If you're into all that goth 19th century poser action and lustful blood gorging of for instance "Interview with a vampire" or films like that you'll be disappointed by this movie.Lucy liu plays the role of Sadie a reporter writing a piece about the Goth people of her town (which are portrayed as "dungeon and dragons posers" :) ) One of her friends finds an address on a website, investigates, and ends up dead. When trying to find her friend Sadie gets caught by vampires, raped and left for dead. She wakes up in a drawer in the hospital morgue and is fairly confused. After making her way to a homeless shelter her vampirism takes over and she "chooses" a weak old man for her first meal (In one of my favourite vampire scenes ever :) ).Faced with the horror of her new existence she decides to kill her self and jumps of a bridge into the traffic below. Here starts the revenge story.What make this a different kind of vampire movie is that it doesn't just copy and paste the ole' vampire stereotype into the story. Sadie may have become a vamp, but she hasn't lost her mind and feelings in the process (That is, except an irresistible need to feed). Murdering people isn't cool at all, she just can't help it, and when it's done she naturally feels quite bad about it. It's not the sexy bloodgasms of other films, she doesn't even have any fangs to help -and hardly any awesome powers at all... It's just UGLY.The director manages to communicate the horror of this existence and Lucy Liu does a very good job acting the role out. 9/10 from me.Oh yes, some people will characterize this film as a "Lucy Liu nude"-film... We're all born naked, so get over it.

owen_twistfield (In this comment I try to focus on the movie as a work. When you judge my comments please sent me a message to tell me what and why as I can then work to improve the comments)Rise is not an ordinary vampire movie. I expected it to be one as the text on the DVD hinted at this. But the word vampire is never used and the persons afflicted by the condition never show fangs or fall to pieces in the sunlight. Yet on the other hand some vampire signs are on evidence: the dependency on blood, the fact that they don't cast a reflection in the mirror and that the afflicted are uncommon strong and resilient. What is different is that the movie spends time on how Liu feels when she finds out that she has become a thing of the night, forever barred from normal live. At heart rise is a revenge movie. Lucy Liu is a reporter who is killed when her investigation set her on the trail of a weird sect. These people turn out to be a sort of vampires and Liu becomes one of their victims. Liu however rises from the dead(hence the title)as one of the creatures and hunts them down one by one.Woven into the revenge story is the story of Chiklis who plays a police cop whose daughter got the same treatment as Liu. He is hot on the trail of both Liu and the top bad guy, either in the hope to find his daughter or find out what happened to her.At the end both stories interconnect as Chiklis catches up with Liu and face each other and finally the top bad guy.The choice of having both stories into the movie makes the revenge story more intricate as Chiklis as 'normal' human can as well help Liu as sabotage her desires. In this way also him being a cop is at odds with him being a concerned father. The story itself plays at night, in dark and usually uncomfortable places(I use this word as this is what all these places are meant to be). This is also interesting as it illustrates how Liu's world has suddenly become estranged. The story is mostly made up out of one-on-one confrontations that exist mostly out of conversations. The camera is close to the person and shots are medium and close up mostly. The fight scenes are short and unspectacular: most are more like executions.The story itself is easy to follow, yet at some turns one wonders about the choices made. Liu comes in contact with someone called the alchemist who has been usurped by the leader of the weird vampiric sect. He gives her a small crossbow with which she kills all the others, yet seen doesn't turn on him. Also the choice of the crossbow feels odd as it's such an unhandy weapon to use in a fight. The killings of their victims by the vampiric sect are strangely bloody, with bodies and surrounding furniture covered by blood and blood splashing and spraying everywhere. It somehow doesn't fit in with the mood of the movie, certainly as compared to the subdued fighting scenes. It seems as if at regular intervals the movie needed to interrupted by a horror scene.It is a common thing that 'vampire' movies are associated with seduction. In Rise this is downplayed. Liu herself seduces one(well she actually more or less jumps her victim). In all the other cases seduction seems more or less a side story then a pivotal event.Acting is reasonable but it loses at the point where the script seems to bare the actors from playing out their role. Liu seems to be shocked at first time and there are some tears when she realizes what she has become. But you would expect someone to show more emotions after she has been brutally murdered and risen from the grave: just some sign of mental stress beyond the anger Liu displays. Also Liu is somewhat too certain she needs to kill herself. Liu lacks things like doubt, uncertainty and fear. She show mostly anger. Chiklis also does not a really great job when he moment of truth comes as he is confronted by his daughter turned-vampire. She pulls a gun out and shouts abuses at him and he is quite emotionless. Nor is he in doubt once Liu has shown him that she can't be seen in the mirror. This latter seems actually a plot device that is needed to convince Chiklis of Liu's condition. I found it so unfitting as everything else vampiric is merely hinted at and then suddenly this inescapable proof is offered.Rise makes me think of The Brave One. Both involve women who undergo a traumatic experience that changes their world forever and exact revenge on perpetrators that are the cause of the change. But where Jodie Foster convinces in the role of a woman that suffers a lot and who's action are in tune with her person and experiences, Liu fails to convince as she mostly displays anger. Her change from an reporter into a determined one-woman-murder-squad leaves enough to desire. The movie seems neither fish nor foul: for those people who expect another underworld there is not enough fighting, beauty and sensuality. For those who like movies like the brave one, there is just not enough reality in the movie. The gory bloody scenes are in either case misplaced.Rise is a reasonable movie that I think could have been better if the creators had decided either to infuse more of the fantastic or if they had introduce more of the realistic. They could probably have played out the break between her normal life and her undead life better. Nevertheless a interesting vampire movie.

bth2004 I can't say I've seen every vampire film out there, and I don't collect vamp memorabilia or anything, but I consider myself a fan of vampire films and lore; of what I've seen, this is one of the worst.First, I do have to say that the acting isn't bad. There's a good cast here: Lucy Liu, Michael Chicklis (hope I spelled these names correctly), Carla Gugino, Mako, possibly a few other recognizables. Nobody does a bad job, but there are no truly memorable performances here.Now then, the plot: there is one dimension to this plot, and from it there is no straying. An innocent reporter (Liu) is working on a story and gets attacked by a group of vampires who proceed to (semi) gang rape her, feed on her, and try to kill her. One vamp, however (Gugino), decides to turn her into an immortal. Upon awakening, the newly-made vamp goes about to take revenge on those who killed her. This quest involves her stripping down multiple times, faking being a lesbian in one instance, killing a couple of innocent people, and enlisting aid from a cop (Chicklis) whose daughter was killed...until the end when the daughter shows up as a vamp and gets killed. Finally, the lead vamp is killed by both of them, and then the cop kills the anti-heroine. No redeeming plot points.Now let's talk about the vampires themselves: the only indication of what they are is that they drink blood and are immortal. That's it! There are no supernatural abilities that vampires are known to have--they don't even have fangs! The entire vampire experience is done away with, and it is greatly dissatisfying! Plus, the gore and depressing state of affairs is jacked way too high up. There is no room for any sort of redemption, the revenge thing is kinda cheap, and nobody is really worth rooting for (possible exception of Chicklis).All in all, the vampire myth and the film industry together kinda tank on this one. Don't watch it, please; it's not worth your time or attention.