‘30 Days of Night’ is a bloody mess

Among the grazing herd of young, virtually transparent Hollywood heartthrobs, Josh Hartnett could probably be voted Least Likely to Have a Reflection in a Mirror. So it’s apt that he’s in a vampire movie, even one as silly as “30 Days of Night.”

In it, Hartnett plays the last line of defense between bloodsucking ghouls and the various misfits of Barrow, Alaska, the northernmost North American settlement and a place where the sun doesn’t rise for a solid month in winter. This makes it an ideal feeding ground for the undead.

Less ideal is the movie itself, especially for those who would like to see the horror genre become something other than a runaway meat wagon driven by the Marquis de Sade. Heads on spikes, bodies in waste maulers, decapitations by dull ax, all this and a love story too!

Sheriff Eben Oleson (Hartnett), like every other Barrow-ite, is preparing for the onset of midwinter depression as the sun sets one last time before disappearing for 30 days.

Adding to his torpor is a deteriorated relationship with Stella (Melissa George), his estranged wife. Stella, a fire marshal, wanted children during the marriage but apparently gets over it once the vampire legion of Marlow (an impressive Danny Huston) arrives and starts eating entire family units. (The 5-year-old female feeding on her mother is an old George Romero device, but it somehow continues to shock.)

Stella’s progressively warmer feelings toward Eben are indicated by lines of dialogue that arrive like avalanches, given that all around her people are being devoured like Halloween candy.

Based on the comic book by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith, “30 Days of Night” has a great opening, one that will engage the true horror freak and is the stuff of nightmares: a troop of vampires so strong and so fast it can burst into a home and whisk a victim away before her husband (for instance) even knows what’s happened. They can outrun SUVs on ice, are immune to bullets, and -- the weak link in the premise -- are addicted not just to blood but the sadistic securing of same. These are not vampires who need to sup at the font of human life to secure their hellish immortality. Oh, no! They like it.

And as their powers seem to wane -- they get slower, less indestructible and stupider as the movie progresses -- the level of gory violence increases. The movie thus moves from truly creepy to truly inane, which is, unfortunately, all too common in films of this ilk.

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“30 Days of Night.” MPAA rating: R for violence and strong language. Running time: 1 hour, 50 minutes. In general release.