Director; J. J. Perry. Starring; Jamie Foxx, Dave Franco, Natasha Liu Bordizzo. Rated R. Color. 113 Minutes.
So many movies have been made in which you must ask “HOW DID THAT GET MADE!?”. Films like “Mad Max: Fury Road” or “Children of Men” come to mind on the good side of that phrase. Alas, there is the other end of the spectrum, the “WHY DID THAT GET MADE!?” type of film. “Day Shift” falls on that side of the film going experience. Similar to, say, a “Jupiter Ascending” or “R.I.P.D.” why does this broke ass horror comedy exist?
Jamie Foxx (do not know why he is in this movie) plays Bud Jablonski, a pool guy on paper who moonlights as a vampire hunter. “Day Shift” wastes little time getting to the action. Bud is cleaning a pool and as soon as the main homeowners leave he pulls out his full gamut of weaponry. He enters the house with grandma waiting, shooting her square in the chest with a shotgun. The creature is not dead and it is at this point we see these vampires are more like contortionists as she begins to crawl around backwards on all four legs. Once Bud defeats grandma and her little crony, he rips out the vampire teeth to be sold on the black market.
Side note; vampire teeth are worth money, not just on the black market but also in a secret underground hunting syndicate. We’ll get to that second part.
Every character needs motivation. Jablonski’si daughter is Paige (Zion Broadnax). She looks up to her daddy and his beat up pool guy truck because she loves him. Only problem is his ex Jocelyn (Meagan Good) is trying to sell the couple’s old house and move to her mothers. On top of that, little Paige needs braces. Jocelyn makes a deal with Bud that if he can come up with $10,000 in seven days they will stay.
Desperate, Jablonski goes back to his old secret society with the help of his old partner Big John (Snoop Dogg). I have no idea what Snoop is doing in this either, plus he looks high as hell with every lyric he says, but hey, who is one to judge “great” acting. After some begging, Bud is back on under one condition, he has a company liaison along for the ride.
Enter Seth (Dave Franco), a tooth to cash bank teller who so wishes to hit the field. He is tasked with constantly shadowing Bub. It does not take long before the pencil neck know-everything-about-vampires kid realizes this is crazy and becomes a real pain in Jablonski’s ass. Checking the boxes is not the position a vampire hunter should possess.
Meanwhile, Heather (Natasha Liu Bordizzo) is an elder vamp trying to find the cure for vampires’s weakness of sunlight when she discovers her grandmother’s severed body, the same grandmother Bud killed in the opening scene. Chick is PISSED!
On the other side of the streets, Bud is hunting for money to save his daughter’s life while slumming along the typical vampire hot spots for teeth. A sequence in which Bud stumbles upon a “hive” which is centered around vicious creatures coming out of the walls is very well constructed. The vampires awakening all over the place is hilarious and unnerving all at once.
And then comes the final climax. It is all about the teeth for some reason. Heather believes to posses the power to release vampires not just into the light, but also has ambitions to take the species to the point of global domination. Such original ideas.
“Day Shift” is a simple cog for action lovers in between the good stuff. This is a glorified Sci-Fi Channel movie that got released on a big time streaming network such as NETFLIX. They even captured a mega-star’s heart such as Jamie Foxx to star. Do not worry, “Day Shift” will not capture yours.
Suck Factor: 5 out of 7 (7 Means Your Movie Really SUCKS!)
The SUCK FACTOR! How it works. We have flipped the script on the rating system. If you make a classic, such as “The Godfather”, you receive 0 SUCKS! If you make complete garbage, say a Michael Bay movie, you receive a well deserved 7, meaning your movie really SUCKS!
Greg Squared Films 