This review first appeared in The Colorado Springs Gazette. To read this review at its original source, click here.

There are good movies, bad movies and movies that fall somewhere in between. And then there are movies that somehow manage to thoroughly entertain, despite being none (or all) of the above. The first image of Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant tells us everything we need to know about what kind of film this is going to be: we open on a tub full of popcorn.

The Vampire’s Assistant is the story of 16-year-old Darren (Chris Massoglia), or, as his best friend Steve (Josh Hutcherson) calls him, “Mr. Perfect.” Darren is popular and gets straight As while Steve is from the wrong side of the tracks and is frequently accused of being a bad influence on the squeaky clean Darren. One day both boys stumble across a flyer for a traveling freak show and decide to attend. There they see wolfmen, giants (Ken Watanabe), women who can regrow limbs, bearded ladies (Salma Hayek), snake charmers and a vampire named Larten Crepsley (John C. Reilly).

After suffering the unintended consequences of a spectacularly stupid and hair-brained idea, Darren must beg Crepsley for the sort of help only he can provide. The vampire is willing but has his price: Darren must become a vampire and begin training as his assistant. Darren must leave all he knows behind and join the traveling freak show (what better place for freaks to hide than in plain sight in a carnival). But that is only the beginning. Turns out there is a civil war brewing among the fanged immortals, led by the malevolent Mr. Tiny (Michael Cerveris, Fringe’s fedoraed bogeyman under the most convincing fat suit ever put in front of a camera), and Darren finds himself caught right in the middle.

From Twilight to True Blood, the public’s appetite for all things vampire is insatiable. It seems that every script featuring vampires gets instantly greenlit. Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant has the good fortune of not just featuring creatures of the night, but also leans heavily on a tone and aesthetic reminiscent of the omnipresently popular Harry Potter series of books and films. The Vampire’s Assistant, itself based on a 12-part tween book series known as the “The Saga of Darren Shan” by Darren O’Shaughnessy, continually tweaks with the expected stereotypes of its bizarro characters, though if it and others carry on making these sorts of alterations both large and small, future generations will be left with the most muddled lore imaginable.

This is the first film that Paul Weitz (About a Boy, In Good Company) has made independent of his brother, Chris (The Golden Compass), who, ironically enough, recently wrapped production on his latest film, Twilight: New Moon. Paul is the less talented of the two brothers and it is painfully obvious here. While he has a few genuinely inspired ideas about where to place the camera, most of his style is pure amateur hour, leading to a film that feels distinctly low rent and suffers one of the worst editing jobs this year.

That said, The Vampire’s Assistant is still a whole lot of fun, endlessly playful, unapologetically cheeky and often wickedly funny. The film’s macabre sense of humor is a perfect fit to its grotesque vaudevillian heart. John C. Reilly, the last man on earth one would think of to cast as a vampire, bites into his role with obvious merriment, and newcomer Massoglia has moments of startling magnetism.

The last quarter of the film is a shameless set up for a sequel (so much so that it robs itself of an entirely satisfying conclusion); Paul is obviously hoping that fans will grant Cirque du Freak the sort of longevity they denied his brother with the stillborn-on-arrival Golden Compass.

© Copyright 2009 Brandon Fibbs. All rights reserved.