What We Do in the Shadows 2014

Patrick Z. McGavin, Chicago Sun-Times: The New Zealand-made art comedy What We Do in the Shadows is a bracing reminder of how the right burst of energy and style breathes fresh ideas into a genre threatened with creative exhaustion. Read more

Kyle Smith, New York Post: Most of the best gags are in the early going and the film seems ever more stretched and thin as it goes on. It would have made a brilliant eight-minute sketch, though. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: A fresh, unexpected and welcome take on vampires-from New Zealand, of all places. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: It's good bloody fun just hanging out with the vamps at their house, listening to them squabble, watching them make pottery ... Read more

Rob Nelson, Variety: Some genre fans who prefer the silly to the satiric may bite, but the anemic pic isn't remotely weird or witty enough for cult immortality. Read more

Mike D'Angelo, AV Club: More often amusing than gut-busting, but it doesn't wear out its welcome, and that's fairly impressive in itself. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: There is so much love and understanding of all the genres the film is skewering that "What We Do in the Shadows" transcends its lowbrow inspirations. It's a real treat. Read more

Peter Keough, Boston Globe: A farce nearly on a par with "Zoolander" (2001), "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby," (2006) and that gold standard of inanity, "Three Amigos!" (1986). Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: I'm so sick of vampires I'd have pounded a stake into my own heart not to have to watch this, but it turns out to be a pitch-perfect spoof of MTV's The Real World and a sly satire on millennial slackerdom. Read more

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: If we see two or three more comedies this year that know what they're doing the way this one does, it'll be a very good year indeed. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Maybe it's something in the water Down Under, but these fellows have managed to concoct a whole new perspective on fangsters. Read more

Cary Darling, Fort Worth Star-Telegram/DFW.com: Shadows takes what could have been a one-joke sketch and turns it into a very funny, and occasionally even touching, take on brotherhood and friendship...It's certainly more authentic and realistic than recent seasons of The Real World. Read more

Kevin P. Sullivan, Entertainment Weekly: Proves that some tropes, like the undead and roommate problems, are eternally funny. Read more

John DeFore, Hollywood Reporter: However tired one may be of the mockumentary format, the shtick is well suited for this material; in fact, it's easy to imagine a straighter storytelling approach falling flat or playing like an Addams Family rip-off. Read more

Michael Rechtshaffen, Los Angeles Times: Just when it looked like the vampire genre had been bled dry, along comes the insanely inspired horror-satire "What We Do in the Shadows" to give it fresh bite. Read more

Anthony Lane, New Yorker: I found myself cackling at "What We Do in the Shadows" like a witch with a helium balloon. Read more

Joe Neumaier, New York Daily News: It succeeds not because it gets the dead-ghoul stuff right (sudden flights, tomb bedrooms, Lestat-like wardrobes), but because it sends up the true-life genre that just won't die. Read more

Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times: At heart a dotty look at oldsters struggling to adapt to an unwelcoming modernity, "Shadows" has the bones of an anarchic sitcom. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: It's a cheerfully horrific affair, a sanguine comedy that feels more than a bit like a Christopher Guest farce or an elaborate Monty Python sketch, imprinted with the Kiwi comic sensibilities of co-directors Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi. Read more

Peter Travers, Rolling Stone: Is this New Zealand mockumentary just one comedy sketch stretched to movie length? Maybe. But when the aging vampires hit the town to party with werewolves, zombies and humans, you won't be able to wipe the smile off your face. Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: A surprisingly delicate vampire spoof that's both hilarious and respectful, and that captures all the silliest, scariest and saddest aspects of the bloodsucking tradition in one delicious package. Read more

Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle: It's funny because of the absurdity of vampires in this context. And it's funny because the context itself is hackneyed to begin with, even if we've never thought so until now. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: "What We Do in the Shadows" is bloody awesome. Read more

Nathalie Atkinson, Globe and Mail: Like a Christopher Guest movie with a widow's peak, What We Do in the Shadows depicts a supposed "New Zealand Documentary Board" film gone gruesomely, hilariously awry. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: What We Do In the Shadows leaps to the top of the pack, by resolutely sticking to deadpan humour and absurd riffs on the awkwardness of being a vampire in a world made for humans. Read more

Alonso Duralde, TheWrap: So smart and perceptive about the quotidian ups and downs of its protagonists' lives that it's almost a jolt when, say, they start levitating off the ground or get into a passive-aggressive argument with a pack of werewolves. Read more

Cath Clarke, Time Out: This isn't much more than a series of ridiculously dotty sketches, and might have worked better as a sitcom, but it's surprisingly hilarious. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: If Twilight made you queasy and Dark Shadows felt like a missed opportunity, this pitch-perfect genre spoof is worth relishing. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Village Voice: What We Do in the Shadows is never as self-conscious as you fear it might be, and it has some of the loose, wiggy energy of early Jim Jarmusch, only with more bite. Read more

Michael O'Sullivan, Washington Post: You've got to love a thing to skewer it as thoroughly as Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement do in their delightfully silly vampire mockumentary "What We Do in the Shadows." Read more

Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal: No deep meaning or social relevance, only welcome diversion from these troubled times-i.e. superbly silly fun. Read more