Day Shift

"Day Shift" is about vampires, but it's one of those Frankenstein-like movies stitched together from used parts, with Jamie Foxx as a family man version of ...

That produces lots of banter, bickering and unfortunately, pants wetting, a natural if low-brow response to the new-to-him prospect of getting killed. Making his directing debut, veteran stuntman J.J. Perry and writers Tyler Tice and Shay Hatten seek to unearth laughs and fun where they can, which includes having Snoop Dogg on board as a veteran vampire hunter. Parenthood is again at the heart of the plot, such as it is, in "Day Shift," which could just as easily be titled "Dad: Vampire Slayer." Foxx plays Bud Jablonski, a bounty hunter (he masquerades as a pool cleaner) struggling to make ends meet financially, suddenly given a major motivation to earn cash: His ex (Meagan Good) is planning to move away from Los Angeles with their young daughter (Zion Broadnax).

Jamie Foxx, Scott Adkins, Dave Franco, and Snoop Dogg flex their action muscles in Day Shift, J.J. Perry's first directorial project after more than 30 ...

Day Shift is a treat for genre fans and a perfect example of the unusual, flavor-filled projects Netflix should be investing in for the future. Day Shift’s place on Netflix means it will have a lot of competition for viewers’ attention, with the platform’s seemingly never-ending content stream always moving on to the next film or series without giving new releases much time in the spotlight. The chaos in this set-piece feels entirely fitting coming from a director who the stunt community lovingly nicknamed “Loco.” Best of all, none of the intricate fight scenes, intense shootouts, or wild car chases featured in the film are obscured by poor editing or unnecessary CGI. It’s all presented clearly, and fine-tuned for maximum visual impact. His 30-year-plus career as a stunt performer and action coordinator is nearly unparalleled in Hollywood. So when the action design collective known as “87eleven,” (the group behind the John Wick franchise, and many of recent cinema’s best action sequences) decided it were going to proceed with Day Shift as its first fully branded 87eleven film project, the team reached out to Perry, as a longstanding member of the group, to steer the ship. Day Shift’s action has echoes of that “tacticool” Wick style, but the supernatural setting allows him to incorporate more exaggerated elements. Scriptwriters Shay Hatten ( Army of the Dead) and Tyler Tice handle this without falling into the all-too-common mentality of “saving it for a sequel,” which has stopped so many film franchises before they ever really began. The refreshingly low stakes and the way the mundane and the supernatural effortlessly intermix here are just two of the ways Day Shift will remind savvy viewers of the many ’80s and ’90s video-store staples the film is so clearly a love letter to. Someone who has never seen the older films the script and directing nod to will still find a lot of quality subtle world-building that hints at where sequels (and spinoffs) could fit if there’s a suitable demand. Perry’s action sensibilities have always been a bit more freewheeling than those of his 87eleven colleagues, and it shows in the ways Day Shift looks different from Nobody or the John Wick movies. At his core, Bud is just a working schmo trying to get through the day, dealing with a boss who wants to see him unemployed, a partner he doesn’t want to deal with (Dave Franco), and unforeseen complications making his job more difficult, like a gentrifying elder bloodsucker (Karla Souza) who has plans to remake the Valley into a new vampire hot spot. In a blockbuster landscape where all big-budget movies are starting to feel frustratingly similar, Day Shift stands out for its clear point of view, obvious swagger, and decidedly old-school approach. Netflix’s vampire battling action movie Day Shift feels like the antithesis of that pattern.

Do Jamie Foxx and Snoop Dogg survive their fight against the vampire hordes in Netflix's latest film, Day Shift?

A still-alive Seth, who is hiding his decapitation quite well, backs up his new partner, saying that Bud has adhered to the rules of the union, and therefore, should stay instated into the group. Believing his time to be running short, Big John stays behind while Bud goes forward, with John running out of ammo, then setting off what seems like a giant bomb attached to his chest. Bud’s ex-wife Jocelyn (Meagan Good) is planning to move away with their child, Paige (Zion Broadnax), if Bud can’t afford the $10,000 it will cost to put Paige in school and to get her braces.

Bud Jablonski (Jamie Foxx) is no ordinary pool boy. Plumbing the depths of Los Angeles, Jablonski has a secret – he's actually a vampire hunter. It turns out ...

Day Shift has a lot to say, too, about the socio-economic landscape of modern L.A. There’s a clear dichotomy between the working-class Black vampire hunter and his white supervisors at the union. That’s the good thing about Day Shift – it’s a film that knows exactly what it is. Soon enough, Day Shift turns into a vampire buddy cop movie with Franco and Foxx becoming the vampire-slaughtering odd couple we never knew we wanted. It’s not quite a straight-up vampire movie, with a lot more going on beneath the bloody, vampire-busting façade. Foxx, Franco, and Snoop Dogg tear down the walls, laying bare a dark, cruel Los Angeles that puts a twisted spin on real-life SoCal sensibilities. Perry’s background as a stunt coordinator is felt throughout as Day Shift offers up some of the most intense vampire fights you’ll see on screen. Jablonski may not be the best pool boy in the world, but he’s a decent vampire hunter and an even better dad. These little touches elevate Day Shift from a rote vampire action flick to something more. Kicked out of the union for a long list of code violations, he’s down on his luck and then some. Jablonski is a bona fide badass and smarter than he seems, and Foxx plays it perfectly, walking the line between wise-cracking smartass and genuinely ingenious vampire hunter. He’s forced to turn to back-alley merchants to shift his trophies – fangs collected from the vampires he’s slain. Day Shift is a ruthless, bloodthirsty romp through all the traditional vampire cliches. and that’s just the realtors.On top of that, there are plenty of vampires, too.

Snoop Dogg and Jamie Foxx standing next to each other in a cluttered office in Day. (Image credit: Parrish Lewis/Netflix). Vampires are ...

Playing the role of Troy — a pawn-broker with connections to the vampire-hunting business — is Peter Stormare, who last worked with J.J. Perry on John Wick: Chapter 2. Bud’s neighbor, Heather, is played by Natasha Liu Bordizzo — who made her debut in an action-packed Netflix original movie (2016’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny) and later starred on the platform’s short-lived coming-of-age fantasy seriesThe Society in 2019. As Bud and Jocelyn’s daughter, Paige, we have Zion Broadnax — who has already acquired a lengthy resume in her few years in the business. As Bud’s vampire hunting partner, Seth, we have Dave Franco — certainly no stranger to horror having starred in the 2011’s Fright Night remake, as well as writing and directing The Rental, to name just a few. Look for his name in just about any article related to Batman. Adkins is also part of the MCU, having played one of Kaecilius’ henchman in Doctor Strange in 2016. Making his horror debut as vampire hunter Bud Jablonski in Day Shift is Jamie Foxx, who has done almost everything else under the sun since his stand-up career led to a break-out spot on the In Living Color cast. Lange also has a horror-comedy under his belt with 2016’s Fear Inc., with Abigail Breslin. Dracula and Godbrand on Netflix’s Castlevania. Day Shift is only his latest Netflix collaboration — following Dad Stop Embarrassing Me! and Project Power — and won’t be his last in 2022 with upcoming sci-fi comedy They Cloned Tyrone. Among his other roles, he voiced a sentient joint in Machine Gun Kelly’s Good Mourning. I mean that both in the sense that these creatures of the night are ageless (as long as they drink enough blood, avoid garlic, and don’t get stabbed) and that stories about this classic staple from some of the best horror movies will likely continue to get made until the end of time.

Stuntman-turned-director JJ Perry used his stunt and action experience to create vampire-slaying mayhem.

“He’s very visual,” Bordizzo explained. Bordizzo plays a katana-wielding vampire in the film that fights alongside Foxx, cutting enemy vampires in half with outstanding acrobatics. In “ Day Shift,” Perry used his extensive knowledge of stunts and action scenes to create vampire-slaying sequences with garlic grenades, katanas and silver bullets. The supporting cast is rounded out by Meagan Good, Natasha Liu Bordizzo and Zion Broadnax. And in Perry’s eyes, directing his first feature film wasn’t that tall of a task. And hopefully we’ll be doing it again.” “I’ve been directing second unit for 20 years now, which is arguably harder to do than first unit,” Perry said.

Day Shift filmmaker JJ Perry says the Netflix vampire movie was much smaller in scale when he signed on.

So hopefully, if we get to do another Day Shift — a Night Shift or Graveyard Shift — we’ll get to come over the hill and do it in Hollywood and Downtown. I do it because it’s a lot of fun, and it’s a business and I get to do all kinds of wild shit. And I’ll be honest, I was scared to death about who was gonna play Seth. As soon as Jamie signed on, I was like, “OK, who can volley with that dude?” You can’t put a lightweight in there with Mike Tyson. It was Jamie that said, “Hey, have a look at Dave Franco.” As soon as I met Dave, I knew I had the right tool. He was one of the first people I met when I got out of the Army. He was a budding stuntman, as well, and we were both starting out in the business. It’s been a longtime movement to get stunts recognized by the Academy and in mainstream awards shows. Absolutely. I chose Day Shift because it’s the world of the hunters that hide in plain sight. And then there’s the world of the vampires that hide in plain sight. As a stunt coordinator, you become a department head which kind of informs what you have to do as a director because you have to interface with all these different departments. It really sets the tone for the rest of the movie, and also for your style as a director. I actually tried to pitch this to the last 35 or 40 directors that I’ve worked with, but they [didn’t get it.] And I was like, OK, cool. I stumbled upon this reverse photography with contortionists back in, like, 2014 on a movie I did in Hungary. I tried to pitch it to the director, but he wasn’t having it. With a martial arts background dating back to childhood — he got his black belt in Tae Kwon Do at the age of 12 — Perry never intended to join the Hollywood scene.

The new Netflix film, which liberally mixes action, horror and comedy, stars Jamie Foxx as a San Fernando Valley pool cleaner who doubles as an infamous vampire ...

I know there’s some in the Valley but there’s a lot more on this side of the hill, man I’ll be Koreatown, go down to West LA you go down to where the studios are. And I think you know, having Chad as a producer, I think that attracted some names to it as well. When I got out of the army, I moved to the Valley and it was this wacky mystical place. I just brought the 90s back to the Valley and actually got kicked out of a couple locations up there for being a little too rowdy. So now you shoot in the Valley and all of a sudden people go, “Holy shit. And that’s how that’s how we chose to treat it in this movie. People said, “Let’s do another ‘John Wick.’” And I was like, “Well, I already did ‘John Wick’ with Chad.” They knew I was in the army and said, “Let’s a sniper with PTSD.” And it’s like, “Well, the world is kind of dark right now, I want to do an action comedy with horror. For the last 10/15 years, I had a bag of tricks that I pulled out and dumped out on the floor. But I stumbled into the stunt business with the likes of Chad Stahelski and David Leitch and a bunch of our generation in 1990 and ’91. The stunt business and the second unit business was being overseen by a bunch of stunt cowboys that came from the ’80s and ’70s. And they’re all of our big bros. I want to do a mash-up.” That’s how I kind of ended up for me. You’d take a scene out of “Meals on Wheels” or a scene from “Armor of God” and we would recreate it with a video camera and even cut it before Final Cut Pro, we would cut it from tape to tape with two VHS tapes. When Final Cut, and Adobe and all of the editing software became a consumer product, we all bought that.

J.J. Perry breaks down his directorial debut in Day Shift, working with Jamie Foxx, the potential for sequels, and what makes vampires fun.

I would reckon if we were going to do a Day Shift 2, and this is a big if, that we would probably do something in Hollywood because there are a lot of vampires in Hollywood, if you know what I mean. I already have got a whole list of new vampires and new ways to kill them. All of the apex stunt performers are all millennials and all Gen Y and Gen Z. I am Gen X. I am 54. I moved to the Valley when I got to LA. When you move to Southern California, it's hard to move right into West L.A. or Hollywood. You kind of have to start in the Valley because it's cheap. When I turned the Zoom on, I didn't imagine it was going to be him. I thought it was going to be some of my stunt buddies pranking me, but it was Jamie Foxx wanting to do Day Shift. The iPad is here. There was a fight double, and then there was a contortionist double. I was like, "Shut the fuck up." Zombieland is the only thing that is remotely like it recently that I can think of that I have seen. Getting Jamie Foxx was almost like winning the Mega Lottery. I got a call saying, "Oh, Jamie is going to Zoom with you this week." I made Bud as much like me as I could because I got out of the army. I didn't want the vampires to be bumbling idiots or the union.

Day Shift, starring Jamie Foxx and Dave Franco, has a fascinating world, but rarely explores it substantially.

If this world does decide to open up more in the future, there’s plenty to explore in the Day Shiftiverse. This is where Day Shift shines, as Perry has decades of experience in the world of stunts, working on such films as Mortal Kombat, Iron Man, and Avatar. The fights in Day Shift are fast-paced and blunt, and almost always manage to feel spontaneous and brutal. Yet even though it never quite reaches its full potential, Day Shift is enjoyable for the aspects it does want to focus on, even though it’s hard not to wish it would investigate the larger world further. There’s plenty to be done within this world of vampire hunting unions, vampire realtors, this apparent underground collection of vampires, and the partnership between Bud and Seth. But again, Day Shift seems only to exist to show the possibilities of this universe, without embracing them or exploring them in any significant way. But while these fights are often impressive to watch, it’s the elements of Day Shift that aren’t explored further that feel like a missed opportunity. Once the coast is clear, Bud abandons cleaning a dingy pool and goes inside, where he takes out two seething vampires, and then pulls their fangs out to sell on the black market.

The movie features garden variety vampires and plenty of cartoon blood-spurting, but the always watchable Jamie Foxx goes above and beyond the call of duty.

(Even Dave Franco’s Seth, the hapless union rep charged with tailing Bud on the job, eventually masters some of the necessary skills.) The action scenes are choppy but brisk, and there’s plenty of cartoon blood-spurting, de rigueur in a work such as this. Day Shift is the story of a guy who’s able to reclaim his past glory—and get some of those all-important dental-insurance benefits—but it isn’t easy: union honcho Ralph (Eric Lange) doesn’t want to let him back in, but one of Bud’s old pals, a union member in good standing, advocates for him. But Foxx goes above and beyond the call of duty, seemingly without even trying. Day Shift, directed by J.J. Perry and written by Tyler Tice and Shay Hatten, is designed to be fast, gory and silly, and it’s all of those things. He and his wife, Joceyln (Meagan Good), have split, and Jocelyn is now threatening to whisk the couple’s young daughter, Paige (Zion Broadnax), away to Florida in the hopes of giving her a more stable upbringing. Vampire entertainment is as eternal as vampires themselves, and from the ever-fertile dust of this genre springs Netflix’s Day Shift, in which Jamie Foxx plays Bud, a modern-day San Fernando Valley vamp hunter fallen on hard times.

'Day Shift', a vampire action flick on Netflix starring Jamie Foxx, Dave Franco and Snoop Dogg, has been released. Is it a thumbs up or a thumbs down?

The movie also features a memorable cameo by Chad Stahelski(director of John Wick movies) and appears to be a throwback to the 90s action films. Unfortunately, the magic of action does not return in the rest of the movie, which is a disappointment. The lady is a vampire, and she pulls herself up from the ground and shows her vampiric colours. Despite being flashy and colourful, the movie turns out to be lacklustre. Jamie Foxxis the vampire hunter.

Day Shift, the new action comedy vampire movie starring Jamie Foxx on Netflix, comes from legendary stunt man J.J. Perry. The director spoke to Polygon ...

“Make them the character.” “MMA changed everything, because of the expectations,” Perry says. “But getting Jamie Foxx was like winning the lottery.” “You’re watching MMA and you’re watching people really hit each other, then you turn on a movie and all of a sudden the punches are stacked in a weird way. “There’s a lot of tells when you shoot in reverse,” Perry says. Add a dash of lucha libre and MMA moves, and you’ve got a fresh take on one of the oldest movie monsters around. In addition to the contortionism, Day Shift brings an MMA-style set of fighting moves to its vampires. The older vampire in the opening scene was played by four different performers, Perry shares. So when the opportunity came for me to use it, I was like, I got something fresh and new.” The unique take on vampires in Day Shift leaps out from the very first scene, when Jamie Foxx’s character clears out a house of vampires. “Look at [John Wick directors] Chad [Stahelski] and Dave Leitch, and it started with Hal Needham from the American guys,” he says. “And also you have the burden that somebody could get killed on your set.

Bud Jablonski (Jamie Foxx) is no ordinary pool boy. Plumbing the depths of Los Angeles, Jablonski has a secret – he's actually a vampire hunter. It turns out ...

Day Shift is a raucous, over-the-top vampire flick that goes for the jugular. Gruesome. Right from the very first scene, Day Shift erupts into a no-holds-barred romp through vampire clichés that feels like From Dusk Till Dawn on steroids. Day Shift has a lot to say, too, about the socio-economic landscape of modern L.A. There’s a clear dichotomy between the working-class Black vampire hunter and his white supervisors at the union. That’s the good thing about Day Shift – it’s a film that knows exactly what it is. Soon enough, Day Shift turns into a vampire buddy cop movie with Franco and Foxx becoming the vampire-slaughtering odd couple we never knew we wanted. Perry’s background as a stunt coordinator is felt throughout as Day Shift offers up some of the most intense vampire fights you’ll see on screen. It’s not quite a straight-up vampire movie, with a lot more going on beneath the bloody, vampire-busting façade. Foxx, Franco, and Snoop Dogg tear down the walls, laying bare a dark, cruel Los Angeles that puts a twisted spin on real-life SoCal sensibilities. These little touches elevate Day Shift from a rote vampire action flick to something more. Kicked out of the union for a long list of code violations, he’s down on his luck and then some. Day Shift is a ruthless, bloodthirsty romp through all the traditional vampire cliches. It’s more From Dusk Till Dawn than Interview with the Vampire, and Day Shift knows it, playing up every over-the-top fight scene with gory extravagance. and that’s just the realtors.On top of that, there are plenty of vampires, too.

Jamie Foxx headlines the new vampire action comedy Day Shift. Here's who else stars in the Netflix film.

Not every vampire in the movie is portrayed to be a bloodsucking monster and Natasha Liu Bordizzo plays the friendly neighbor Heather, a night nurse who was forcibly turned into a vampire in the 1970s and is one of Jablonski's friends. The director recalls his conversation with Snoop Dogg in which he emphasized that he didn’t want Snoop to turn into Big John rather it was Calvin Broadus who he wanted to see play Big John, who was modeled after Perry’s platoon sergeant, similar to Calvin in appearance and personality of a wise tall man, who served as a father figure and guide. Bordizzo played Julia in the 2021 Amazon film The Voyeurs. In the same year, she played Li Na Weng's voice in the animated comedy Wish Dragon. She was also chosen to play Sabine Wren in the Star Wars limited series Ahsoka in November 2021. She is acquiring houses and inflating prices to absurd levels in order to build a kingdom for her affluent clientele of other bloodsuckers. His rise to stardom began in 1992 when he appeared on Dr. Dre's first solo single, "Deep Cover," and then on The Chronic, Dre's first solo album. Souza portrayed Laurel Castillo, an ambitious student of intimidating lawyer and law professor Annalise Keating (Viola Davis). In 2021, she appeared as Marina Hayworth on the ABC sitcom Home Economics. Dave Franco plays Seth, a young faint-hearted union representative who is keeping a close eye on Bud and his methods to determine whether he can rejoin the organization after a string of infractions. For the ninth season of the ABC sitcom Scrubs, Franco was cast in a regular role to play Cole Aaronson, a medical student whose family had paid Sacred Heart Hospital a significant quantity of money so that he could participate in an internship. His ordinary pool cleaning work in the San Fernando Valley is just a front for his true source of money, which comes from hunting and killing vampires, with the payment received on the delivery of the fangs of the murdered vampires. Jamie Foxx is a renowned actor, comedian, and singer who has won numerous honors, including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Grammy Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. He joined the In Living Color cast in 1991 and played a prominent role therein through its end in 1994. In an effort to prevent his estranged wife Jocelyn (Meagan Good) and daughter from selling their house and moving somewhere less expensive, Jablonski is making every attempt to help them. Day Shift on Netflix is one of the most recent vampire films.

The ecosystem of film has shifted a great deal in the past decade or so, with superhero blockbusters crowding out smaller movies at the cineplex (and that's ...

The film was shot over the course of 42 days in the midst of the pandemic, and between the time constraints and the budget it had to get creative. He calls up his old friend Big John (Snoop Dogg, in a cowboy hat) to give him a recommendation, and the union agrees to give Bud a second chance — provided he has a union rep accompany him on his hunts. Based on press interviews Tice gave, it’s pretty clear he wrote a cute little blue-collar vampire hunter movie with, like, maybe three actual vamp slayings in it, and then 87eleven came in and added about 300 more dead bloodsuckers to the proceedings. The John Wick comparison is earned, or perhaps created, thanks to the combination of forces that worked behind the scenes to make Day Shift happen. The ecosystem of film has shifted a great deal in the past decade or so, with superhero blockbusters crowding out smaller movies at the cineplex (and that’s when going to the movies is even an option, COVID permitting). It’s a cash grab ouroboros of studios devoting resources to sure-bet IP with endless merchandising potential, and theaters devoting screens to whatever lands the most butts in seats and keeps the lights on. Netflix spends hundreds of millions of dollars on securing franchises that should be theatrical tentpoles, like Snyder’s Army of the Dead and the upcoming Knives Out sequels, and then they’ll dump out their loose pocket change on VOD-equivalent fare with no recognizable talent save for a single notable cameo to cut into the trailer (yeah I see you, Megan Fox in Night Teeth). The big stuff feels wasted, with lackluster marketing failing to uplift the properties (Glass Onion, the first Knives Out sequel, premieres at TIFF next month!

Netflix's Day Shift (2022) takes the vampire killing business pretty damn seriously. The Jamie Foxx starter takes the genre.

The biggest takeaway from the ending of “Day Shift” is that we could be in for a potential franchise. The film has its flaws, but with a tighter script, less clunky dialogue, and a more grounded scope (the premise was at its strongest when it was kept at street-level), a follow-up could easily build upon what worked and mend out the kinks here and there. That’s what you want in a movie like this; nobody is throwing on “Day Shift” to bear witness to the beautiful acting chops of Snoop Dogg – we want action, baby! In the end, the film does get too ahead of itself, as well, relying on an unfortunate attempt at an epic third act, that mostly falls on its face. Bud isn’t effortlessly cool like Django, or a cut-throat criminal like Bats from “Baby Driver”; he’s a desperate working-class father, and Foxx, even with a quick dry-wit and knack for killing monsters, never loses that aspect of the character. It’s shaping up to be a great month for simplistic action-packed horror, with the sci-fi thriller “ Prey” (prequel to 1987’s “Predator”) hitting streaming services last week, to overwhelmingly positive reactions.