When two boys visit the freak show Cirque du Freak they find themselves in thrall to John C Reilly's genuine vampire. He drafts 14-year old Darren (Chris Massoglia) to serve as his assistant... and turns him into a half-vampire who becomes the catalyst in a battle between vampires and the rival Vampanese.
3 stars 12A 
Call it The Hunger, call it Thirst, but From Dusk Till Dawn to Twilight the human appetite for vampires is never satisfied. The question for filmmakers is, do you aim for adult jugulars or prey on a younger audience?
In condensing the first three of Darren Shan's 12-strong Cirque Du Freak books, screenwriter Brian Helgeland (L.A. Confidential) and director Paul Weitz explore an unusual third territory somewhere between The Addams Family and Interview With The Vampire.
For all his intelligence, Darren (Massoglia) is easily led by his tearaway friend Steve (Hutcherson). So when the outlawed travelling show Cirque Du Freak comes to town, the pair head straight for the front row.
Introduced by the imposing Mr Tall (Ken Watanabe), the 'attractions' include a Wolfman, a Snake Boy (Patrick Fugit), a woman who can grow back her limbs (Jane Krakowski), a guy who can eat anything (Frankie Faison), the man with the smallest waist in the world (Orlando Jones), and Salma Hayek as a psychic with a whisker problem.
But the friends are most impressed by real-life vampire Larten Crepsley (Reilly, looking like a cross between Heath Ledger's Joker and Ronald McDonald) and his giant spider Octa (looking like an arachnid version of Captain America).
Mesmerised, Darren kidnaps Octa. Obsessed, Steve asks Crepsley to make him a vampire. Unimpressed, Crepsley refuses.
Later, Octa bites Steve. Dying, Steve's only chance of survival is Crepsley's antidote. Machiavellian, Crepsley will only provide it if Darren becomes his servant. Cornered, Darren agrees.
Once in the Cirque, Darren must adapt to life as a half-vampire. He learns that true vampires never kill those they feed on. That's what makes them different from the deadly 'Vampaneze'.
Led by the diabolical Mr Tiny (Michael Cerveris - imagine Christopher Biggins gone bald) and his henchman Murlaugh (Ray Stevenson), the vampaneze take the resentful Steve under their wing.
Thus freaks become friends and friends become foes on a merry-go-round of nifty effects, abrupt violence and moochy introspection.
The bloodlessness of the younger cast is offset by juicy slices of ham served up by Hayek, Cerveris, Stevenson - who amusingly can't decide whether he's from Prague or Pontefract - and Willem Dafoe, giving it the full Peter O'Toole in his cameo as a vampire elder.
Holding it all together, Reilly cuts a surprisingly romantic figure while presenting a rueful and pragmatic insight into the undead condition: "It's a lonely life, but there's a lot of it."
But despite the crash-bang denouement, the door was always going to be left open for sequels. As a result, none of the characters find any closure.
It's worth the price of a ticket but, like most passing curiosities, the first coming of Cirque Du Freak is all sideshows and no main event.
This Jon Favreau-penned comedy pitches four couples onto a tropical island resort where they are expected to work through their problem relationships. However, only one pair from the group realises that's what they are there for...while the others go out and party. Favreau's Swingers colleague Vince Vaughn joins Kristen Bell, Jason Bateman and Jean Reno for this balmy rom-com.
2 stars 15 
Maverick director Wes Anderson ventures into the world of children's animation with this story featuring George Clooney and Meryl Streep as the voices of Mr & Mrs Fox. Based on the Roald Dahl book, it tells the tale of three rich, nasty farmers who are driven wild by the night-time raids of Mr Fox and are determined to join forces and hunt him down.
4 stars PG 
Trust the director of The Royal Tenenbaums and Rushmore to turn a straightforward children’s story about a fox on the run into a wacky examination of family dysfunction, existentialism and adolescent angst.
And with Clooney’s Mr Fox and his all-American animal chums being hounded out of the British countryside, there’s some sort of sly anti-colonialist message in there too.
But, all allegorical guff aside, Wes Anderson has come up with the liveliest adventure set on English soil since Wallace and Gromit ran into the were-rabbit.
Fourteen fox years (or two of ours) after promising to stop stealing chickens, our vulpine hero has settled down with his wife (Streep) and son Ash (Schwartzmann), an underachieving sulker whose mood doesn’t improve when super-cool cousin Kristofferson come to stay.
Against the advice of his solicitor (badger Bill Murray), Mr F. buys a detached oak overlooking the fowl farms of foul farmers Boggis, Bunce and Bean (one fat, one short, one lean). Unable to contain himself, he promptly raids all three.
Naturally and, let's face it, understandably, cider-swigging Bean (Gambon) and his neighbours hit Foxy with everything they’ve got. They want his guts for garters.
But after trying to dig, blast and flood him out of his ever-deepening foxhole, all Bean gets is his brush for a tie. Unfortunately, the woodlanders are forced into the open when Kristofferson is captured. So, who's got a cunning rescue plan?
In a digitally obsessed world, Mr. Fox delivers some 62,000 frames of jerky, jolly, stop-motion fun. It’s like taking a trip back to the 70s; a nostalgic mash-up between Disney’s Robin Hood and those road safety ads starring Tufty the squirrel.
The script by Anderson and Noah Baumbach (creator of The Squid And The Whale) is so clever you could pin a tail on it – not least in the use of the family-friendly expletive ‘cuss’, as in “This is gonna be a total cluster-cuss for everybody.”
It's bound to raise a few hackles, however, as anyone expecting a faithful adaptation will be disappointed that Anderson focuses on the touchy-feely stuff at the expense of Dahl’s brilliantly drawn villains.
The three Bs of the book were so grotesque and vile you could almost smell them. Here, they’re just a bunch of joyless old grumps.
Streep is also underused and there are a couple of needless distractions involving a silent wolf and Jarvis Cocker as a rubbish folk singer.
But with Schwartzmann, Willem Dafoe (as a sneaky rat) and Wally Wolodarsky’s permanently confused opossum backing the fantastic Mr Clooney all the way, this quick brown Fox jumps easily over every lazy dog in its way.
