What We Do in the Shadows

What We Do in the Shadows is an above average mocumentary about four vampire housemates living out a modest, undead existence in Wellington, New Zealand. Written and directed by stars Jemaine Clement (co-creator/co-star of HBO’s Flight of the Conchords) and Taika Waititi (Eagle vs Shark), the film is a spot-on send-up of the exhausted vampire genre and an amusing commentary on the slacker generation. 

Mocumentary is one of the youngest genres in cinema, beginning only in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s with Albert Brooks’ Real Life, Woody Allen’s Zelig, and Rob Reiner’s This is Spinal Tap. It’s a style of movie that’s easy to do well, but almost impossible to do brilliantly—Spinal Tap is still the only truly great example of the form that I’ve yet seen.  Mocumentaries require a delicate balance; they’re satires that must maintain a truthful, recognizable credibility over the feature-length duration. Too often, directors working in the genre indulge in farcical set pieces that spoil this tonal equilibrium, and comic actors fall into the temptation of playing characters much too broadly (I’m looking at you, Eugene Levy).

In the case of What We Do in the Shadows, Clement, Waititi, and their cast do a good job of walking the fine line between fully committing to the reality of their situations and winking at the camera. The movie is unapologetically sophomoric, and it fails to offer any inspired insights about the styles, tropes, and milieu it sends up. By the end of the lean 86-minute running time we’re left with a palpable sense of how far the filmmakers had to stretch to find enough humorous material to fill out a feature. But there’s no denying that What We Do in the Shadows will make even non-vampire-movie fans laugh out loud many times. In the end, that’s all that really matters.