What We Do in the Shadows is a 2014 New Zealand mockumentary horror comedy film written and directed by Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi and the first installment in the What We Do in the Shadows franchise. The film also stars Clement and Waititi, along with Jonathan Brugh, Ben Fransham, Cori Gonzalez-Macuer, Stu Rutherford, and Jackie van Beek. The film's plot concerns several vampires who live together in a flat in Wellington, New Zealand.
What We Do in the Shadows premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2014. It was released theatrically on 18 August 2014 by Madman Entertainment, and received critical acclaim. The film earned $6.9 million on a $1.6 million budget.
In the movie, a documentary crew follows four vampire roommates—Viago, Vladislav, Deacon, and Petyr— who share a flat in the Wellington suburb of Te Aro. All of the vampires possess supernatural powers, including levitation and the ability to transform into animals. Viago is a 379-year-old dandy from the 17th century, who originally traveled to New Zealand in the 1910s in search of Katherine, the love of his life; Vladislav is an 862-year-old known as "Vladislav the Poker", who is haunted by memories of his nemesis "the Beast"; and Deacon is a 183-year-old former peddler and the "young rebel" of the group who was turned into a vampire by Petyr—a reclusive, 8,000-year-old vampire who behaves like a feral animal.
Each night, Viago, Vladislav, and Deacon take the bus into town and prowl the streets of Wellington for people to kill. Deacon's human familiar, Jackie, runs errands for the vampires and cleans up the gore left behind by their feeding. A married mother, Jackie hopes to attain immortality, but is frustrated that Deacon will not turn her into a vampire as promised. Deacon requests that Jackie bring virgins to the flat so that the vampires can feed on them. She lures a woman who insulted her in primary school and her ex-boyfriend Nick to the flat. Though neither are actually virgins, the woman is killed, and Nick is chased throughout the flat and manages to get outside, only to be caught by Petyr, who turns him into a vampire.
Two months later, the vampires accept Nick into their group and bond with his human friend Stu, a computer analyst who introduces them to modern technology. Viago uses the Internet to find Katherine, who is now a 96-year-old widow living in a rest home in Wellington, and also briefly reconnects with his old servant Philip. Despite being able to get his new friends into popular bars and clubs, Nick struggles to adapt to life as a vampire. Nick is also held in contempt by Deacon, who resents Nick's newfound popularity and his careless revealing of his vampirism to strangers he meets.
Source: Wikipedia.org