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Nick Knight

Nick Knight

List Price: $9.98
Your Price: $9.98
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 2 stars
Summary: At first they didn't succeed.
Review: Entirely forgettable precursor to the "Forever Knight: TV Series about a vampire trying to atone for past sins by becoming a police officer and fighting against evil. (and also trying to kick that nasty blood habit)

The writing is poor and the story is not compelling. Save your money and get the real deal from the sci-fi series rather than this poor first attempt.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Get the Forever Knight DVDs instead.
Review: Greetings, people. I saw this DVD for five bucks while at the grocery store of all places, and recognized the name Nick Knight as the name of our hero from Forever Knight, hereafter known as "FK." I hadn't heard of this movie, although FK was my favorite by far of the Crimetime after Primetime vehicles back in the day. Five bucks, what the heck, so I picked it up. I figured it out, this must have been the pilot for the series.

First of all I like FK very much, and therefore was comparing it to FK and being very hypercritical toward it. I do have to say that everyone in the movie did a capable acting job in my opinion, although I am no authority in this department.

I've got nothing against Rick Springfield, he did a good job. I liked the part at the beginning in the tanning booth, in fact I think they who made this movie should have made hime spend a few minutes in the booth where his angst would build, maybe with a flashback to being caught out in the sun starting to self-combust. I know why they didn't. They want you to not know that he's a vamp, but to figure it out from the clues. But they contradicted themselves in this line of reasoning here, because everyone who watches it already knows anyway, because this story is advertized as the story of the vampire detective, and they themselves are the ones who advertized it as such.

But I have to say, the sound quality is truly pathetic. And this is a DVD no less, friends. Couldn't they have cleaned up the sound a bit for us? No, evidently not! I had to turn the volume all the way up to 11 to catch what the people in the movie were saying, then the static and other noise was unbearable. Also I didn't like the vampire makeup in this version. The visual quality isn't too good either, although the DVD of the 1st season of FK also doesn't have very good visual quality, maybe the master tapes are bad.

While I'm sure that the actor who plays Nick's confidante the medical examiner is a nice guy, I think the idea of having Dr. Nathalie Lambert in FK is a much better idea, because as we all know vampires are supposed to be sexy and sexual tension (or tension of any kind) of an ongoing nature between characters makes for more riveting drama. That tension is lacking here, except for that between Nick and the museum lady, and Nick and Janette (who is smoldering in FK, but more on that later.)

The LaCroix we see here (ditto about the actor being a nice guy) seems to me to be more like a human baddie than one of the Undead. His voice and look remind me more of a human gangster (from the 70's, not the 20's) with a much too serious mien than the timeless (ok, 2000 year-old) evil vampire with the sick, twisted, but funny sense of humor and irony that Nigel Bennet has bequeathed to us, the FK faithful.

I also think this version falls short of FK in that to my memory, there are no flashbacks to take you back with Nick into his past to really remind you that he is older than he looks, and that he is more then the (in this cas L.A.) detective he appears to be, but rather a product of several lifetimes of experiences.

I like Janette in FK much better, as well as Captain Stonetree from Season 1 of FK, because they each seem to have more personality than their respective counterparts in this version.

Oh well, since this eventually led to FK, I am glad that it was made. But since FK is so much better, I can't under normal circumstances recommend it. Get this only if you really want to have it to compare to FK, or you're a Rick Springfield fan, or something like that. Otherwise, stick with just the FK DVD.

As Skanke would say, Ciao.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: The Begining of a great show
Review: I am a huge fan of the vampire genres. From Bella Legosi to Christopher Lee to Nosferatu to Subspecies. This was originally a made for TV movie (from what I can recall) and was playing during the week of Halloween. As many may know, the vampire genre seems to repeat itself on occassion (well sometimes ALL the time). The themes, plots and story lines seems to be regurgitated: Vampire is awaken from a long sleep, he seeks his bride he lost so long ago, and ends up dying at the end in the process of bringing his bride across and being deafeated by the vampire hunter/the towns people - the end.
Well Nick Knight who is played by Rick Springfield, is a 13 century vampire trying to atone for his sins by becoming a cop in the 20th Century. He denounces the "gift" given to him by his master who tries to make Nick's pretend "mortal life" a living hell.
This movie initially became a t.v. series known as "Forever Knight." Rick Springfield did not reprise the role of Nick Knight but John Kapelos reprises his role as Nick's wise cracking partner Schanke. This movie was a great first attempt, but fell short for a t.v. movie. It kind of left the viewer questioning a few things. For a better well rounded explanation of Nick Knight check out the series "Forever Knight." But I would still recommend on purchasing this video for all you die hard fans of the series. This was the begining of a great thing.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Vampire on the Night Shift
Review: I remember watching this when it premiered on television. Network television was going through one of its periodic obsessions with police procedural shows and the introduction of a vampire to the night shift of a metropolitan police force had a certain amount of appeal.

The show that finally ran (Forever Knight) was quite a bit different and therein lies some of the appeal of watching this movie-- the chance to compare and contrast. I had just recently bought the first season of Forever Knight so I had a prime opportunity here.

This version is slicker, with an 80's rock background that has a certain retro appeal. It was obviously shot in a warmer climate. Rick Springfield has a lean and hungry look that contibutes to his tortured vampire character as he runs the gamut of emotion from tormented to tormented. While probably a better actor, Geraint Wynn Davies who played the character in the series, has to fight against his sleek, blond appearance. Somehow it is easier to look as if you have a brooding, soul-destroying secret if you are a brunette.

I also really enjoyed the contrast between Nick's starvling, blood junkie pose and Alyce Hunter, the Mayan scholar, constantly stuffing herself with junk food. I also enjoyed her look since Wardrobe apparently dressed her from Banana Republic back in the good old days before BR became a mall shop.

Anyway, the movie is not bad at all if you are in the mood for some vampire mind candy with a bit of retro.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Vampire on the Night Shift
Review: I remember watching this when it premiered on television. Network television was going through one of its periodic obsessions with police procedural shows and the introduction of a vampire to the night shift of a metropolitan police force had a certain amount of appeal.

The show that finally ran (Forever Knight) was quite a bit different and therein lies some of the appeal of watching this movie-- the chance to compare and contrast. I had just recently bought the first season of Forever Knight so I had a prime opportunity here.

This version is slicker, with an 80's rock background that has a certain retro appeal. It was obviously shot in a warmer climate. Rick Springfield has a lean and hungry look that contibutes to his tortured vampire character as he runs the gamut of emotion from tormented to tormented. While probably a better actor, Geraint Wynn Davies who played the character in the series, has to fight against his sleek, blond appearance. Somehow it is easier to look as if you have a brooding, soul-destroying secret if you are a brunette.

I also really enjoyed the contrast between Nick's starvling, blood junkie pose and Alyce Hunter, the Mayan scholar, constantly stuffing herself with junk food. I also enjoyed her look since Wardrobe apparently dressed her from Banana Republic back in the good old days before BR became a mall shop.

Anyway, the movie is not bad at all if you are in the mood for some vampire mind candy with a bit of retro.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Pilot movie for Forever Knight series
Review: I saw this movie on TV long before the Forever Knight series first aired. If you're a fan of the TV series, you'll like this DVD as a compare-and-contrast exercise to the first 2 episodes of the TV show. If you like vampire stories, it's better than most. If you're looking for a great movie, you won't find it here. But it is entertaining, humorous and fun.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Pilot movie for Forever Knight series
Review: I saw this movie on TV long before the Forever Knight series first aired. If you're a fan of the TV series, you'll like this DVD as a compare-and-contrast exercise to the first 2 episodes of the TV show. If you like vampire stories, it's better than most. If you're looking for a great movie, you won't find it here. But it is entertaining, humorous and fun.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: All Good Things Must Begin Somewhere
Review: I saw this movie when it first came out on TV as the pilot for the somewhat popular Forever Knight series. I remember that I loved the pilot at the time and didn't realize that this was a pilot an not just another made for TV movie. Then about two years after I saw Nick Knight, Forever Knight came out. I was much disappointed that they had not kept more members of the original cast and had chosen to reshoot the pilot and air it like Nick Knight had never been. It took me the whole four years that Forever Knight was on TV to warm to the cast and I absolutely hated the cheesy flashbacks! I didn't need to be beat over the head to know that Nick was obviously older than he looked! I mostly watched the series out of loyalty to the original pilot and hoped that the series would get better with time, but obviously they must have replaced the original director and writers to come up with the sloppy mess they put out for the series. All in all, the original Nick Knight was the best of the bunch and I recommend this movie to anyone who is not yet biased by the trash that came out in the series.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: All Good Things Must Begin Somewhere
Review: I saw this movie when it first came out on TV as the pilot for the somewhat popular Forever Knight series. I remember that I loved the pilot at the time and didn't realize that this was a pilot an not just another made for TV movie. Then about two years after I saw Nick Knight, Forever Knight came out. I was much disappointed that they had not kept more members of the original cast and had chosen to reshoot the pilot and air it like Nick Knight had never been. It took me the whole four years that Forever Knight was on TV to warm to the cast and I absolutely hated the cheesy flashbacks! I didn't need to be beat over the head to know that Nick was obviously older than he looked! I mostly watched the series out of loyalty to the original pilot and hoped that the series would get better with time, but obviously they must have replaced the original director and writers to come up with the sloppy mess they put out for the series. All in all, the original Nick Knight was the best of the bunch and I recommend this movie to anyone who is not yet biased by the trash that came out in the series.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: solid vampire TV movie
Review: I think that the "Nick Knight" pilot is an underrated made-for-TV movie. In some respects I like it better than the series that followed (although the series LaCroix, Nigel Bennett, was superior). Ultimately both this pilot and the series were great ideas with mediocre execution, but even so, bot hare worth checking out if you like vampires. At least it tried to do something different (for the time it was made). I also recommend Susan Sizemore's "Stirring of Dust" novel, based on characters from the series.


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