The Things We Cannot Change is a vampire horror/drama that really tries to do something different with the traditional view of a vampire. Written and directed by Joshua Nelson (Cannibals of Clinton Road), this portrays vampires as cursed people suffering crippling addictions to drink blood, and shows this mainly in a way that felt more grounded and realistic, outside of the scenes of violence.
Dr. Abraham (Richard Rampolla) runs a support group for vampires who wish to give up their lifestyle of drinking human blood. Many of the vignettes revolve around the various people who have gone to these meetings. They include Kristen (Jenn Nobile), whose relationship with her husband has suffered after he discovered she's a vampire, a human mother who is dismayed at finding out her daughter has become a vampire, a husband and wife vampire couple who are worried their lifestyle will affect the child they adopted, among many others. Also attending the group is Veronica (Laura Lemire), but her intentions are less noble, she sees it as weakness to try and fight against their nature, and attempts to sway the minds of all who have attended.
It became obvious with the realistic portrayal here that battling addiction was the real theme of the movie, with many of the characters and their situations seeming to be metaphors for real world addictions to things such as drugs and alcohol. This grounded the movie a lot, which is reflected in the design of the vampires. In this world, the tropes of these creatures are shown to not actually be real. They can walk around in daylight, have reflections, eat garlic, and be around religious iconry, with them only altering when they go to feed. It is here where they sport the traditional fangs, as well as lose their pupils (via the use of milky white contacts). With such a feel of realism these scenes couldn't help but look goofy, the vampires look more ridiculous than scary, especially with a few of the actors who seem to be grinning due to the fangs not letting them properly close their mouths. The scenes of violence often occur off camera, with just the shouts of the victims, though there are a fair few biting moments.
While there is a larger plot going on, mainly to do with the conflict between Dr. Abraham's idea of peaceful co-existence and Veronica's view that they should rule over the weaker humans, mainly this is a series of small side stories. This leads to some scenes of drama that worked even better as analogies for real world traumas. Perhaps the most heartbreaking scene has a young man 'coming out' to his mother, only for her to disown him. Then you have other scenes which both include the idea of 'enablers' to addiction, and a classic Renfield type situation of someone who desperately wants to become a vampire to escape from their issues. Having had an addiction myself in my past, some of what was being said was relatable in a way, especially when it comes to the feeling of instant gratification which swiftly gets swapped out for guilt and remorse. The film doesn't try too much to hide the analogy, and even leans more into it for the epilogue.
I think horror works better than many mediums for being able to draw parallels with real world issues. It can occasionally be a little too po-faced with how serious all the characters are acting about their fictional afflictions, but at its heart The Things We Cannot Change has a decent message to it, and should get some kudos for trying something different. The film was released on Blu-ray in February from VIPCO and Bayview Entertainment.
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