This film sets out to do for modern goth kids what The Crow did for them ten years ago. It's about a war between vampires (or Vampyrs) and werefolves (Lyken, not to be confused with lichen). The undead become ten times as cool if they have a y in their names. Our main character is Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl. She's a Death Dealer. In other words, she goes around killing werewolves.

The movie starts off with a big shootout in a subway, since subway shootouts are popular in these post-Matrix days. Vampires and werewolves are shooting each other and actually dying (they actually explain this later, which was a shock to me). Kate-in-Vinyl gets away and reports the the weapons guy to show him the new anti-vampire bullets. They're filled with UV rays that act as concentrated sunlight. This is clearly a plot device to allow for exciting subway shootouts. Meanwhile, the werewolves didn't get what they were after. There's the large, deep-voiced, black dude who's basically just undead muscle, there's the mad werewolf scientist who's experimenting on something, and there's the scrawny, bearded werewolf leader who decideds that if he wants to get anything done, he'll have to do it himself.

It turns out the werewolves were after some guy, and Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl figured out who. It's some doctor named Michael. She decides to go after him, but the leader of that particular group of vampires, Kraven (possibly named for film director Wes Craven, or maybe they just thought it was a cool name for a vampire), tells her not to because, umm, he's a jerk.

She goes anyway and waits at his apartment. At the same time the werewolf guy, Lucien is after him, too. There's a big chase through the apartment building, and ultimately, Lucien gets to him first and bites him on the neck. Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl and Michael get away, and I guess she almost drowns, and he saves her life, even though she's a vampire. I don't really get it either.

Well, it turns out that Kraven is really a traitor in league with Lucien, and they're after Michael because he's the last descendant of blah blah blah. Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl finds out about it and awakens one of the Elders who is her father-figure type guy. They have this neat systemwith three Elders, where one will rule for a hundred years and then play dead while for a couple centuries while the other two take their turns in 100-year terms. Not a bad system, if you ask me. Anyway, only an Elder can awaken an Elder, but Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl decides the problem is urgent enough, so she awakens Vincent. I'm not sure that's his name, but it is now. He doesn't buy the whole plot theory until later when Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl takes the mad scientist werewolf prisoner after a big shootout with her defending Michael. It's never really explained why the mad scientist was out on retrieve Michael, since that's something more directed at, you know, guys who can fight.

Meanwhile, Michael's been captured by the werewolves, and they have him chained up and stuff. He asks Lucien why this war was going one, and then it's all revealed to him and us.

Back in the day, werewolves were vampires' slaves. Lucien's master was Victor or Vincent or whatever. Victor was one of those our-race-must-be-pure kinda guys, and he didn't approve of Lucien's marrying Vincent's daughter Sofia. So, as punishment, Victor had Lucien chained up and Sofia (his own daughter!!!) tied to a post. They let the sun in, and Sofia, who was pregnant, was reduced to ash while Lucien was forced to watch. Pretty harsh stuff, but that's what you get when you try to mix races.

So, now everyone understands that the vampires are really the bad guys, and the werewolves are really the good guys, which brings us to the present. Michael's special, because werewolves, vampires, and humans all have a common ancestor, and Michael is the last human descendent, and only he can have the werewolf and vampire crossover. Make sense? Ok. This whole ordeal was Lucien trying to fulfill his dream of racial unity. A regular Martin Luther King, this guy.

Around this time, the vampires show up and there's more shooting and killing. The vampires have new siver nitrate bullets filled with, well, silver nitrate, which, in reality, is clear, but in the movie is silver for dramatic effect. Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl is also there, but she's there secretly. She shows up right after Kraven shoots Lucien and right before he shoots Michael. Oh snap! And she loved him so!! Lucien tells her to bite Michael, and she might as well, since he's going to die anyway. Kraven tells Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl how she really became a vampire, that Victor killed her family and turned her into one. Kraven dies a rather undramatic death, and Michael goes through his vampire-werewolf change, which makes him look like a cross between Nightcrawler in X2 and Trent Reznor. He fights Vincent, and there's no clear winner. Then Kate Beckinsale in skin-tight vinyl comes along and does the classic cut-through-the-bad-guy-with-the-really-sharp-sword-so-it-takes-a-minute-and-a-half-for-him-to-realize-he's-dead trick. The end.

I have to say, as far as recent horror flicks go (and you can tell it's a recent horror flick because of the cheesy CGI and that infernal blue filter they used in Resident Evil, The Ring, and everything else remotely scary to come out in the past 5 years), it's not that bad. It's enjoyable hokey.