A bunch of vampiric mobsters are engaged in a gangland war, while also having to deal with people trying to get away from their influence and people trying to embezzle money. At the same time, a mysterious stranger is wreaking havoc.

With a young vampire couple on the run, the mobsters employ an age-old assassin to help them out, and they hire two additional mercenaries for extra measure.

If that sounds like a confusing set-up, that’s because it is. And if you wonder why my summary is full of set-up, but contains very little in terms of story, that’s because the film feels exactly like that.

From time to time, you come across ultra-low-budget productions that I would label “passion projects”, because it seems that the people behind it invested a year’s worth of weekends into the shoot (like Night of the Vampire Hunter) and had to do all the post-production on their own. These films then have the same names (or at least the same family names) re-occurring in the credits time and time again (as in Guardians, or Death Hunter). The same seems to hold true for Strange Things Happen at Sundown.

The four people behind this film are Marc Fratto, Steve Gonzales, Brandi Metaxas, and Frank Garfi. They are the ones listed as producers, but each of them had a dozen other jobs as well, which they dutifully (and, it seems, with a mildly tongue-in-cheek diligence) listed in the end credits. According to these credits, Fratto is the film’s director, D.P., camera operator, editor, and sound editor. He also created the story (together with Gonzales) and wrote the screenplay, and he was responsible for the special make-up effects. Apart from the story credit, Gonzales is listed as second unit director, second unit camera operator, dolly operator, and additional boom operator. He also was an actor in a major non-speaking role (that also allowed him to hide his face throughout), as well as two additional minor non-speaking roles. Metaxas is credited as script supervisor, additional boom operator, costume designer, and for digital still photography & photographic effects. Garfi’s credits include acting, sound mixing, sound design, ADR, as well as foley recording & mixing. He is also listed as location manager, stunt driver, and boom operator. Garfi and Fratto also share the credits for writing, arranging, and performing the musical score, with Gonzales being credited for his guitar contributions and additional credits for Garfi for recording and mixing.

The first thing you notice in this film is some (initially) very uninspired camera work with really odd frame-choices. The camera is always getting really close into everyone’s face, often at weird angles. In combination with the DIY musical score and the 4:3 aspect ratio (that may or may not be merely a DVD thing), the whole affair feels strongly like a rather mediocre film school project.

There are also many theatre-like scenes: people sitting in a large, empty room in front of a black background, simply talking, and talking, and talking. That kind of set-up has budgetary reasons, I am sure, but it also betrays that fact that the filmmakers were in love with the characters and with their own writing. Because the mob characters engage in a lot of stereotypical “Goombah” mobster talk; and I have no doubt that this project was conceived in the wake of the Sopranos phenomenon.

The acting is not nearly as bad as the one I have witnessed in some other low-budget productions. The line delivery is generally very decent, and the fact that it often feels unnatural has as much to do with the writing as it has with the inexperience of the performers. This inexperience shows itself in odd inconsistencies. Masha Sapron, for example, is absolutely fine when delivering her voice-over narration, but often feels wooden when delivering the same kind of monologue on camera.

I said that some scenes feel theatre-like. The film is full of non-speaking (or barely-speaking) roles – mostly vampire victims that writhe and wriggle for what feels like an endless amount of time (in this universe, a vampire bite causes immense pain, like the “venom” in Twilight).

Many of the non-speaking roles are filled by amateurs; and apart from padding out the film there seems also to have been the (unsuccessful) effort to create a bit of eroticism by having the – mostly female, mostly scantily clad – victims wriggle around as much as possible. The reason I am writing this is because some of these minor roles are played by people who seem to have some sort of theatre training or some sort of am-dram background – actors whose deaths looks like an attempt at performance art rather than a mere “wriggling around”. Likewise, many of the mobster goons show a lot of emphasis on body language, which generally seems to work better for them than the line delivery. While this is not a bad thing, it may be something that contributes to the “film school” vibe of the film.

The film’s audio is generally fine, although the sound quality drops in at least one brief moment. The many monologues are recorded well, and the part raspy, part booming voice of the “Reaper” character (certainly ADR’d) sounds great. There is not much to say about the visuals. The final scenes are shot in a yellow-ish, fog-like haze that looks very good but is not necessarily a good fit for those scenes.

The story itself is neither here nor there. The plot is a bit too convoluted, but in spite of the many players and plot lines (of which there are definitely too many) it never falls apart. There is little in way of suspense or story-arc, but you are engaged in this story and you are carried along in part by the prospect of a final showdown. That showdown is a bit disappointing, however. This is mainly down to the fact that – in my opinion – the wrong character constellation was chosen for this showdown (although this was inevitable because of the way the plot had been constructed and the way in which expectations are deliberately subverted regarding one aspect of the plot).

While the story is a bit lacking overall, you at least get some character-arcs of sorts – provided you have very low expectations regarding the quality of those arcs. And it is the (mostly rather interesting) characters that carry you through this film and keep you interested. You shouldn’t expect to get a full pay-off to most of the many plot-lines; but at least you have a film here where most of the major characters (not counting the stereotypical mobsters) are at least halfway multilayered or three-dimensional.

Apart from the questionable and unsuccessful eroticism, the film goes for gore in many scenes (guts, severed-limbs, and gallons of artificial blood – none of which looks fake or cheap). Equally prominent in terms of tone is the humour, which the film also aims for more than just a little. The general “Goombah” mobster portrayal is quirky and it works fine. But whenever humour is attempted within the more horror-oriented plot-lines, it often does not entirely work. While the comedic writing is not bad, and the delivery mostly works, both are not at the level it would need to be in order to convincingly force the humour into these horror scenarios.

While the humour does not clash with the horror, it does, at least, seem an ill-fit with the “existential” drama angle that the film seems to go for at other times.

The film has too many shortcomings to get anywhere near a rating where it could be considered a “good” film. But it is also not particularly bad. It is generally competently put together, and while it is too convoluted, and too long for its own good (105 minutes even without the end credits), it is still amusing and interesting enough to watch without it feeling like a chore. That sets it apart from many similar films.

Rating: 3.5 to 4.0 out of 10