No. no No NO. You are doing it WRONG. I admit, there were elements in both Dracula and Interview that I enjoyed (I'd frankly rather pan fry my own clit than watch Twilight, however) but these are not staples of the horror genre. They're more like those little nonpareils sprinkled on top of cupcakes: they're good, but they're not the reason you bought the fucking cupcake.
Look, just give me the genre and let me show you how to do it properly.
Made in 1932, Vampyr is perhaps the first silent movie with sound. Wait, what? No really. This is what I imagine an opium addict's dreamlife to look like: eerie, gauzy, a hushed and solemn boat ride drifting leisurely down the river Styx while the tortures of the damned unfold upon the banks before you. Loosely based on Camilla, Vampyr is a shamefully neglected treasure.
Blood on the Highway is a refreshing transfusion, pure type A positive all the way. Boasting the best in bathroom humor and weaving a complex and colorful tapestry of inventive expletives, Highway is a nonstop ride on a runaway tractor through White Trash USA, one that not only successfully combines blood and boobs but offers some clever and scathing insights into the Wal-Mart mindset as well.
200 year old vampire whore Clara and her virginal vampire daughter Eleanor shack up with a lonely old git who inherited The Byzantium, a broken down hotel which Clara quickly transforms into a brothel. In the meantime, Eleanor falls in love with a terminally ill boy whose mom is played by Liz from Shaun of the Dead, and both women are being hunted by
Directed by Neil Jordan, whose previous films – Interview With The Vampire & The Company of Wolves – firmly established him as the gothic fairy tale master, even if I still haven’t forgiven him for the green-apple splatter train wreck that was In Dreams.
Plot: Unsparkly vampire boy becomes a blood bottom-feeder in downtown L.A.
Special Guest Star(s): Larry Cedar and That Guy I always confuse with That Other Guy who was in Blade Runner.
Nudity-fu: Yeah, pretty sure the girl gets all the way naked…or else NatGeo slipped in some footage of a walking stick mating session.
Glitter Factor: Only thing glittering in this flick is the coke on Mary’s nostrils.
Best Scene: Nosebleed Super Orgasm.
Best Line of Dialogue: “Wanna Blow Pop?”
Valerie, much like Rosaline in Neil Jordan’s 1984 menstrual-horror film The Company Of Wolves, is taking that mystical journey from childhood to adultery…uh, I mean adulthood. It’s a darkly erotic, trippy fantasy world through which Valerie floats dreamily, draped in pretty lace dresses, cuddling with doves and swimming in lily pad strewn ponds amid the flowery fields.
But this isn’t a 70s Tampax commercial by any means. When it gets dark, it gets fucking dark, and poor virginal Valerie finds herself evading the clutches of a horny priest, drinking chicken blood, getting trapped in an underground tomb and being burned at the stake before all is said and done. Oh, and there are vampires. The end.
Filmed on location in Romania during what looks like a crisp autumn season, Subspecies is a stunningly beautiful film with a great score to match! Okay so the leads are a little stiff and Angus Scrimm is killed off before the opening credits, but the local supporting cast is wonderful, and gets to show off their colorful traditions during a cemetery celebration scene. Andres Hove as the disgusting Radu steals the whole movie as the shar pei-faced baddie with the overactive saliva glands. You end up rooting for him, as his personality and devotion to the role blows everyone else off the screen.
Girls in lingerie, swords fights, plenty of blood and some really cool claymation monsters make Subspecies a winner, sort of a weird combination of a Hammer flick and an old Ray Harryhausen vehicle.
If you were to combine the frozen isolation of 30 Days Of Night with the colorful camera work of Russia’s Night Watch series, throw in a Beastie Boys video and a hit of acid and then shake well, the result might look a lot like this weirdass Swedish vampire flick. You think it’s going to be a pretty straightforward vampire film, maybe the Scandinavian version of The Lost Boys (and indeed, that film is referenced during the course of this one) but Frostbitten absolutely refuses to conform to any preconceived notions. Part Breakfast Club, part Dead Alive, Frostbitten is just batshit crazy. Literally!
Best Line: "Stop throwing gnomes at me!"
As previously stated in my full length review of this Kiwi mockumentary: HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!
Fear not, horror lovers. An appreciation for the works of William Shakespeare is not required in order to enjoy this film. I’m not saying that a rudimentary grasp of the Bard’s works (especially Hamlet) wouldn’t come in handy and make the multitude of in-jokes even funnier. Being an acquaintance of Stoppard definitely wouldn’t hurt either. But neither, as previously stated, is required. This is a vampire satire and, as such, has all of the fangs, blood and bare boobs one could possibly hope for.
Upcoming categories: zombies, witches, ghosts, demons, serial killers, werewolves, aliens and whatever the hell else I can think of.
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