Movies - Underworld

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	Movies - Underworld

Underworld is a 2003 horror/action movie (see 2003 in film) about vampires and werewolves, where the latter are referred to as "Lycans" as an abbreviated form of lycanthrope.

Plot outline

The story takes place in the early 21st century in Budapest against a backdrop of a centuries-old war between vampires and werewolves (Lycans), a war not noticed by regular humans. Selene (Beckinsale) is a vampire "Death Dealer", one who hunts Lycans. She finds herself attracted to the human Michael (Speedman), after saving him from Lycans who bit him. It later turns out that Michael is wanted by the Lycans and their leader Lucian (Sheen), because Lucian believes that Michael may be the key to reuniting the vampire and werewolf races, a goal Lucian has been pursuing for several centuries. Meanwhile, Selene suspects that the current vampire leader Kraven (Brolly) has been conspiring with his enemy Lucian to usurp Viktor (Nighy), the vampire elder who holds overall power. Selene awakens Viktor from hibernation in order to stop Kraven, Lucian kidnaps Michael, and everything spirals towards a final showdown between vampires and werewolves. Several dark secrets about the history of vampires and werewolves, as well as Lucian and Viktor's past are revealed in the film's climax.

The following list is designed to help by describing who kills who. Several major characters die throughout the film and not all fight scenes are given spotlight attention. Because of this, some often wonder what happened to a specific character.

Singe is wounded by Selene in a gunfight and ultimately killed by Viktor.
Amelia is wounded in the Lycan ambush but is drained of all her blood by Raze.
Raze kills Soren in a duel.
Viktor kills Raze by breaking his neck and impaling him with his sword.
Kahn is killed when unnamed lycans attack him along with two other vampires.
Kraven shoots Lucian with silver nitrate bullets.
Selene decapitates Viktor.

At the end of the film, the following major characters are still alive: Selene, Michael, Kraven and Erika. Marcus and Alexander Corvinus are spoken of but with the exception of the final shot showing Marcus's eyes, neither feature in the film. However, they both play major roles in the sequel.

Cast

Details

;Runtime : 121 Min (2:01) :(Australian DVD release 116 minutes) :On May 26th, 2004 the "Unrated Extended Version" was released on DVD. It has a total run time of 144 Min (2:24)
;Genres : Action, Fantasy, Horror, Thriller, Science fiction ;Ratings : MPAA: R for strong violence/gore and some language. :Australia:MA,Canada:18A, France:U, Netherlands:12, Norway:15, Philippines:R-18, Singapore:NC-16, South Korea:18, Spain:18, Sweden:15, Switzerland:16, UK:15, USA:R, Japan:PG-12, Singapore:PG (edited version), Finland:K-15, Germany:16/18 (the original 121 Min cut was released with the rating 16, the extended "uncut" edition was released rated 18)

Trivia

The movie was entirely filmed in Budapest, Hungary. It also seems to be set there, visible on car licence plates and signs.
The movie was subject of a copyright infringement lawsuit filed by White Wolf, Inc. and Nancy A. Collins claiming the setting was too similar to the Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse games both set in their World of Darkness setting: White Wolf filed 17 counts of copyright infringement, and claimed over 80 points of unique similarity between White Wolf's game systems and the movie. White Wolf, Inc. also claimed the script was very similar to a story called Love of Monsters (1994) which they published and was written by Nancy A. Collins. A PDF file of White Wolf's filing can be read here: In September, 2003 a judge granted White Wolf an expedited hearing; this was the last White Wolf's press releases had to say about the case. Given that there has never been any further news of this case, and Sony has proceeded to release DVDs and a sequel, it is probable that it was settled out of court under terms that prohibited any further discussion of the matter.
Amy Lee of Evanescence sang in some of the songs by Renholder, but her voice was cut off the official soundtrack, due to legal problems with her record company.
Director Len Wiseman opted to shoot several action scenes live, without the use of computer generated imagery. One such scene involves the Lycan werewolf Lucian seemingly running at high speed behind a speeding car. The scene was shot with actor Michael Sheen running upon a heavy cloth which was in turn being towed by the car he was chasing.
No special audio effects were used to alter Kevin Grevioux
's voice. Grevioux's voice is naturally that deep.

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Movies - Underworld

Plot outline

Cast

Details

Trivia

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