"Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant" is a huge disappointment to fans of the book series and finishes well short of a promising potential.

By Megan Carroll

Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant sucked the life right out of me. It was one of the worst film’s I’ve seen this year, hands down. All I wanted to do was get up and actually enjoy the rest of my Sunday, but I took one for the team.

The series of books written by Darren Shan was wonderfully written, imaginative and a total joy to read. I am not sure what happened between the book and the screenplay, but the ball was dropped. I find it extremely frustrating and confusing when the filmmakers/screenwriters don’t tap into the author’s voice and vision. From DarrenShan.com, under the frequently asked questions section, Shan states, “I have nothing to do with the movie side of things”. This speaks volumes as to why the film was made so poorly. When directors, screenwriters and authors work closely together, you see the benefits of that relationship in the film, such as with director Spike Jonze’s and author Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are.

This film was overstuffed, scatter-brained and had zero character development. The story felt rushed and lacked feeling. The viewer had nothing to connect with on screen and that all comes down to Weitz not taking the time to create a film with which the audience could relate. And what makes it even more frustrating is that he had an excellent cast at his finger tips and a series of books which could have turned this film into the next Twilight saga. John C. Reilly was the saving grace for me. He was brilliant, and really tried to make the prosaic script work.

Visually, the film was dated; another piece of evidence that Weitz lacks vision and imagination. It felt like a made-for-TV movie on the ABC Family Channel. The person in charge of costumes and makeup could not have been over the age of 5; you could see exactly where the costumes ended and the actors began. It was so bad it was almost laughable.

Weitz and the other half of the screen writing team, Brian Helgeland, never allowed this film to actually rise from the grave. They stunted the magic that was Cirque du Freak, the frightening story of a boy who chooses a life of adventure and unknowingly fulfills his destiny. Ignore this film and get the books, because Weitz failed miserably in his attempt. The only thing Weitz created was a colossal bore of a teen vampire film which felt like a CW sitcom.

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