In a movie that is at least somewhat better than Twilight, an attractive Iranian chick walks home alone at night stalking seedy individuals--because she is a vampire, after all--in the moody Iranian thriller A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night.

Set in a fictional town called Bad City, a place where bad things happen, writer/director Ana Lily Amirpour drifts in and out of the lives of its inhabitants, and slowly proceeds to kill them off. The girl (Sheila Vand) isn’t evil, but she is hungry and has no problem eating criminals or threatening little boys.

The movie, shot in black and white and more reliant on lighting, mood and camera angles than action or traditional suspense, plays almost like a spaghetti western; Bad City isn’t unrealistic, but it is a stylized version of reality--and of course there is that feeling that this is an Iranian version of a crappy city in America.

A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is decent, more successful due to its technical merits than the actual experience it delivers. Some critics have raved about it, and I get it, but the average moviegoer isn’t going to be won over by black-and-white film and mood lighting. I watched it a week ago and already don’t remember a lot of the things that happen, which either speaks to my memory or the lack of bite that the film ultimately inflicts--or some combination of the two.

Review by Erik Samdahl. Erik is a marketing and technology executive by day, avid movie lover by night. He is a member of the Seattle Film Critics Society.