Does "Blade II" carry on directly from where its predecessor left off?
Yes it does. At the same time, it's a surprise. It has a lot of elements that the first one didn't have and I think it's a hell of a good movie. Completely in another vein than my last film, "The Devil's Backbone". That's a meditative, deep, and personal movie. "Blade II" is just fun and nastiness. This is the first time I've made a perfectly politically incorrect movie.
So what's new in this film?
What we have done is create a new breed of vampire. The vampire race has a mutation, which is called Reepers. These mutated vampires go back to a much more animalistic vampire. The scenes where they are sucking on characters is akin to finding a leach in your armpit. It's not really nice. It goes back to the icky feeling of being brained.
Were you nervous taking over from "Blade" director Stephen Norrington?
I didn't mind it at all. I knew there were certain things that he established that I needed to follow, but there were so few that were etched in stone. The man that knows and controls Blade, as a character, is Wesley [Snipes]. Blade is a character that doesn't change, that's part of the joy - he's not reading TS Eliot and crying by the end.
How does it feel to direct a blockbuster?
I believe that if you make a movie with your heart and your balls, something comes through that is you. It would be so stupid of me to come in and say: "Now I'm going to do Guillermo Del Toro's "Blade II"." It would destroy the movie and destroy the franchise. It was a great exercise to refrain myself from being in the spotlight, while at the same time, putting all my heart into making it.
