Case Number 17781: Small Claims Court

THE WITCHES HAMMER

MTI // 2006 // 91 Minutes // Rated R
Reviewed by Judge David Johnson // November 25th, 2009

The Charge

Stop. Hammer time.

The Case

A young woman is killed and then magically resurrected by a top-secret counter-terror unit that specializes in turning dead young women into vampires, siccing them on other vampires and assorted supernatural evildoers. It's a bold maneuver, sure, but do you have any better ideas? Didn't think so.

So our heroine is turned into a vamp-hero and just in time because there's some big bad stuff going down -- a super powerful plot convention called the Witches Hammer, a magic book created during the witch-burning days by some lady filled with Satan's fury. This book has fallen into the wrong hands, specifically some bad-ass vampire murderer, and it will fall to the newly turned femme fatale and her ultra-annoying nerd friend to defeat the forces of evil.

And there you go, the plot description for an achingly abysmal exercise in vampire action-horror that proves to be as entertaining as an Orc kick to the kidneys. I don't really know where to start with this thing, as it fails on nearly every level imaginable.

The Acting
Ridiculous. Though there's no one here who earns a pat on the back for their performance, the guy who plays the smart, awkward, exposition-barfing sidekick blasts out some epic and horrifying line-readings.

The Action
About as thrilling as a high-stakes game of Candyland. The actors aren't particularly gifted in hand-to-hand combat, but it doesn't matter. The choreography is stilted and boring, attempting to convey mortal combat coolness in a doomed mission from the start.

The Effects
Probably some of the worst I've seen all year. When the vampire dies, they supposedly explode into fireballs, but the CGI used to transmit this looks like it was pulled from the opening of Reading Rainbow.

The Story
Needlessly obtuse, littered with preposterous flashbacks and offering no discernible pay-off, the narrative pushing this sad enterprise forward succeeds only in distracting from the shoddiness of everything else affiliated with the production.

That's it. No more. Fake widescreen, 2.0 stereo, and no extras, as if to add to the pain.

The Verdict

Drive a stake in this one. Nice and deep.

Scales of Justice
Judgment: 40

Perp Profile
Studio: MTI
Video Formats:
* Full Frame

Audio Formats:
* Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo (English)

Subtitles:
* None

Running Time: 91 Minutes
Release Year: 2006
MPAA Rating: Rated R

Distinguishing Marks
* None

Accomplices
* IMDb
http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0400944/combined