There’s still lotsa life left in the BLADE franchise, judging from the high-octane, full-throttle third installment that is BLADE: TRINITY, opening today to get the jump on OCEAN’S TWELVE (which I can’t wait to see, but unfortunately will have to wait to see, given my schedule).

After joining with vampires to fight other vampires as he did in BLADE II, there’s really nothing else for the Marvel Comics vampire slayer to do but fight Dracula himself. And that’s exactly what happens after the old guy resembling a demon clad in metallic armor is reawakened from a looong sleep by a fanged clad by a very scary Parker Posey.

This time, however, Blade has to be extra careful, as he’’s wanted for murder, having been set up by Posey’s
gang, tricking him into killing a human who was merely disguised as a vampire. But he has some serious help
this time – and I don’t mean from that limping hippie Whistler (Kris Kristofferson) – in the form of a group calling itself “the Nightstalkers.” They’’re led by wisecracking Hannibal King (a bulked-up but still VAN WILDER-ish Ryan Reynolds) and Whistler’s long-lost daughter Abby, who slings arrows as precise at hitting their targets as her pants are tight.

Interestingly, Blade seems like a supporting player to these two, which shouldn’t be a surprise, given New Line’s talk at spinning them off into a NIGHTSTALKERS movie. I’d welcome it. Reynolds is good for some comic relief (if obvious at times), though it’s Biel that kicks the most ***censored***. But what’s with her liking to listen to an iPod as she goes into battle? Wouldn’t that impair her senses? And how the hell do her earphones stay in? Mine fall out just pushing a lawnmower.

TRINITY marks the directorial debut of David S. Goyer, screenwriter of all three BLADE films, and his comfort with the material is evident. You jump right into the action – disintegrating bodies and all – and it rarely lets up. This is pulp cinema, pure and simple, and makes no apologies for it. Nor does it have to when Goyer lets Blade just be fun again, given Guillermo del Toro’s too-sober and overlong BLADE II.

Review by Rod Lott.