Starring Konstantin Khabensky. Directed by Timur Bekmambetov.

(In Russian with English subtitles. R. 116 minutes. At Bay Area theaters.)

In the labyrinthine mythology of "Night Watch’’ — a wildly entertaining fantasy thriller that propels Russian cinema into the 21st century — a chosen few are lobbied by the forces of good and evil to pick a side. A 12-year-old boy is among these so called Others. Before becoming the center of a tug of war, the lad is shown in his comfy living room with "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" blaring away. Sarah Michelle Gellar sounds especially threatening spouting Russian.

It’s a good bet that "Night’s" director, Timur Bekmambetov, is a devotee not just of "Buffy," but also of "Star Wars," "Star Trek," "The Omen," "The Matrix" and "The Terminator." He borrows liberally from these franchises. His warriors do battle using neon tubes that look suspiciously like light sabers. The leader of the Dark Ones — a menacing collection of vampires and other black arts practitioners — contorts his spine in a motion reminiscent of "Star Trek’s" Borg Queen.

But "Night Watch," an enormous hit in Russia, brings a brooding sensibility to such hocus-pocus that obviates the feeling you’ve seen it all before. A very human story of parental love left unexpressed for complex and surprising reasons never gets lost amid the fantastical elements.

Based on a best-selling novel by Sergei Lukyanenko, the Stephen King of fantasy, "Night Watch’s" central conceit is some silliness about a truce declared 1,000 years earlier between the armies of good and evil. The film opens with them galloping up on horses, covered in armor that makes the soldiers look like Monty Python in search of the Holy Grail. They agree that a night watch composed of the good guys and a day watch of the bad ones will patrol one another with the goal of maintaining a balance between the two forces at all times.

Konstantin Khabensky, one of Russia’s top actors, stars as Anton, who is unwittingly recruited as an undercover agent on the night watch. He first appears in a Beatles haircut calling on a fortuneteller for advice on enticing his girlfriend back. This is a pivotal scene to understanding the unnecessarily convoluted plot, so pay close attention.

In the blink of an eye, the action moves 12 years ahead, and Anton, looking leaner and with shorter hair, is prowling Moscow on the lookout for evil. Khabensky brings a likability and humanity to Anton that makes you suppress the urge to laugh when, in the line of duty, he’s called upon to slurp pig’s blood. Unbeknownst to him, he’s on a trajectory to prevent the balance from tilting.

"Night Watch" has a sleek futuristic look enhanced by animation and special effects. Some of it is appealingly simple, such as zooming in on video game figures or using a whip pan to blur traffic moving through a tunnel at breakneck speed. But there’s also state-of-the-art CGI done on a $3.5 million budget, proving that imagination trumps moola.

Like "Moulin Rouge," "Night Watch" employs hyperkinetic editing to make less look like more. You could get whiplash hurtling between scenes. The fast cuts don’t give you time to realize that the same settings — mostly Moscow’s streets and barren underground system — appear again and again. Unforgettable, however, are the bats that flap about repeatedly, harbingers of evil doings.

The sound effects have been intensified. Sirens seem to be inside the theater. A bolt from an endangered airplane comes undone and, after flying through space, lands in a coffee cup with a loud plop.

In a prologue, a narrator speaking English with a heavy Russian accent portentously explains the terms of the centuries-old truce. Fortunately, the American distributor had the good sense to switch to subtitles rather than dubbing the rest of the film into English, trusting that audiences, even those who go to multiplexes, know how to read. Cleverly, the titles become part of the special effects, changing shape and color — red letters are favored, in keeping with the blood undercover agents have to drink. In one scene set near water, the words dissolve into liquid.

It’s not giving anything away to say that by the end, it’s still not clear whether good or evil has triumphed. There’s a reason for this. A sequel, "Day Watch," has already been released in Russia and will be coming to these shores in the near future. Anyone who sees "Night Watch" is sure to eagerly await the next installment.