Mini movie review: Stake Land

It's curiously synchronous, I guess: I'm rereading the wonderful book, The Passage, about the apocalyptic destruction of the world as we know it due to a vampiric epidemic and then I also just watched Stake Land, a little 2010 indie horror movie about the apocalyptic destruction of the world as we know it due to a vampiric epidemic.  Only 96 minutes long, Stake Land is kind of like crossing The Road with The Walking Dead, only replacing the zombies with the nasty-ass vampires from 30 Days of Night.  These bloodsuckers do not sparkle.  They are fast and vicious and make a really big mess, and the entire world has fallen apart under their onslaught.  Society has fallen apart and the surviving humans are splintered into straggly groups of survivors.  Some are trying to rebuild in small communities, including the mythical "New Eden," way up north where the vampires are fewer; some have banded together into wicked scary religious cults.  Some folks, like our heroes, teenaged orphan Martin (played by Connor Paolo, previously seen as rich teen Eric van der Woodsen on Gossip Girl!) and the vampire-hunting man who saved his life, Mister, are just keeping mobile, trying to survive.

There's not much plot to follow: Mister saves Martin after his family is slaughtered and they slowly move through the ravaged U.S., picking up and losing companions along the way, trying to avoid the fanatical Brotherhood, heading towards New Eden.  The violence is bloody but not truly scary and the movie ends on a slightly hopeful note.  A decent entry into the genre.