Vampire Academy

Since this movie wasn’t screened for critics – usually a surefire sign of disaster – I bought my ticket today with everyone else (actually, the theater was near empty) and took a chance. Why you ask? Because it was directed by Mark Waters, who did the terrific Mean Girls, and written by his brother Daniel Waters, who did the script for the classic Heathers. If anyone might break the no-advance-screenings jinx it would be these guys. Not so. The only thing scary about Vampire Academy is how bloody boring it is. I’d like to think the Waters brothers were kidnapped and forced to shame themselves at gunpoint. Really, there’s no other excuse. Based on the Young Adult series of six books by Richelle Mead, the movie wants to be the evil spawn of Twilight‘s Bella and Harry Potter, and ends up spawning only endless tedium. The setup alone goes on for an eternity as we learn the history of St. Vladimir’s Academy in rural Montana, a school for vampires run by Headmistress Kirova (Olga Kurylenko), Queen Tatiana (Joley Richardson) and an elder named Victor (Gabriel Byrne). Good actors bringing shame on all their reputations. Vampire Lissa (Lucy Fry) and her guardian Rose (Zoey Deutch) want out, but they keeping getting pulled back in. That’s it. One idea, mixed with lame jokes, and stretched beyond coherence. Vampire Academy doesn’t need a review. It needs a stake in the heart.