A downside to living in Japan is the movie studio’s scattershot approach to releasing movies in the cinema. Some movies, inexplicably, are released here ahead of other territories, while others leave a large gap, and more still simply don’t get released at all. As such, I was able to enjoy The US Vs. John Lennon in the cinema last week (amusingly renamed PEACE BED), I’ll take in I Am Legend tonight, and 30 Days Of Night shows no sign of making an appearance at all.

Fortunately, my living room does a respectable job of replicating the cinema experience, save for the buttered popcorn and overpriced cola.

Anyway, 30 Days of Night. The title refers to the northernmost town in Alaska, which every year experiences 30 days of darkness. Things start to go wrong for the inhabitants who choose to stay for the duration when holidaying vampires turn up to take advantage of the darkness and drink their fill of human blood. Santa Ponsa isn’t for them, I guess.

30 Days of Night is yet another movie based on a comic graphic novel, directed by a music video director. As such, it shares many traits of it’s siblings. The directing is full of quick-changing camera angles as well as beautifully-framed shots, the supporting cast is largely 2 dimensional, and the dialogue can at times seem a little hammy.

And yet for all this, it is a surprisingly tense, claustrophic affair. This isn’t an over-the-top gorefest of the likes of 300 (though there’s plenty of the red sauce on show), but instead closer to Snyder’s Dawn of the Dead - in so far as the band of survivors’ biggest problem may not be the external threat, but rather the interpersonal problems of the group. However, this side of the film is left underdeveloped, and the film sadly slips down a gear into a more predicatable, mundane affair.

That leaves the film somewhere in No Man’s Land. Infinitely more stylish, tense and gripping than most of the dross masquerading as horror these days, but not quite enough to leave a lasting impression or be considered a true classic of the genre.

Special praise must be awarded to Josh Hartnett, who seems to be metamorphising from Hollywood cutie into a more serious actor, a la Leo Di Caprio some years ago. His performance here is a great addition to the film.