My Sucky Teen Romance (2011) 1h 17m

I picked this DVD up from a used store not long after it was released.  That should've been my first warning.  The second warning should've been that I got it for something like $3.  Think of that scene in the first Wayne's World movie where The Shitty Beatles are playing and Wayne asks "are they any good" and we get the reply of "Oh, they suck!" and the joke rounds out with Wayne saying "Then it's not just a clever name." My Sucky Teen Romance...is it any good?

Welcome to Spacecon!

We start in the 1950's where we see an obvious vampire greaser who looks like Edward from Twilight if he was an extra in Grease.  We then flash forward to present day where a comic nerd is talking about how great Spacecon is going to be while his coworker finds him lame.  A fellow nerdy girl has a moment with him, but shortly after she leaves our Edward wannabe comes in to fuck up robbing the store.  We are then introduced to the rest of our crew and they all go to Spacecon... where there are very few people actually dressed for anything space related.  In fact, this "convention" looks like what I picture when I think of that Dashcon debacle.  The cashier from the supermarket was turned into a vampire and he accidentally bites the check-out love connection.  The rest of the film is them trying to prevent themselves from turning into full blown vampires by hunting down Greaseball Lightning.

I just heavy sighed before I started typing here so that's an idea of what's about to come.  This film is equal parts good and bad.  For an independent horror-comedy the actors and cinematography actually pull through pretty well.  On the flip side, the script and set design feels unnatural in a way that makes you think that there is some sort of continuous inside joke that you're just not privy to.  It's so self-deprecating to geek and fandom culture that rather than laughing along with the film My Sucky Teen Romance just does that awkward laugh to itself when none of the jokes really hit.

That said, there are two parts I did like.  One is when our two main female characters go to the "teen" room and it's supposed to be cool and instead they open the door to a room of awkward people and one girl just yells "LOOK! MORE TEENAGERS!"  The other is at the vampire panel (which, if you do watch this DVD, watch the deleted scene from this because its adlib is much better than most of this scene) where the obvious Twilight fangirl asks if vampires were real would a centuries old vampire fall in love with a teenage girl and they could live happily ever after and the main panelist just replies with "That's fucking gross!"

Speaking of this scene, I don't know why I never made this connection before, but almost all vampires are pedophiles (or ephebophiles if you want to get technical) as they are usually dozens if not hundreds of years old.  Just because you look 17 forever does not mean you are 17.  You're 800 and trying to pick up some 16 year old.  That's fucking gross!  See!  Now I said it too!  That makes it true!

Back to My Sucky Teen Romance... it was okay, but I must say that it's not just a clever name.

I give My Sucky Teen Romance 1 lame vampire out of 5:

The Bloodthirsty Trilogy 2-Disc Blu-Ray + Extras (Arrow Films)

Oh shit!  We're coming back with another Saturday Screamers and this one is huge!  Today we're going to be talking about Michio Yamamoto's The Bloodthirsty Trilogy 2-disc set that was lovingly sent to us from our friends over at Arrow Films.  So thank you, Arrow Films!

To catch you up on what The Bloodthirsty Trilogy is, from 1970-1974 Mr. Yamamoto combined Japanese and European vampire lore in order to create three movies.  Released by Toho films, The Vampire Doll, Lake of Dracula, and Evil of Dracula can be sited as one of the first instances of our modern gothic take on vampirism seeping into J-horror.  Their pale visages with golden eyes become wrapped in flowing white gowns or dapper gentleman clothing to create a mash-up previously unseen.  Shot and scored similarly to the U.S. Hammer Films with a dash of the Universal Monsters and, of course, Toho's style, this is a great collection of rare J-horror that may have been overlooked in the past.


The first film, The Vampire Doll (a.k.a. Legacy of Dracula) takes us to an affluent home where a man has come to visit his beloved, only to find that she died two weeks prior in a car accident.  He is still given room and board while he deals with his feelings but he begins to see his lady friend in the house or running through the grounds at night.  The product of a curse brought upon her family by her father, she can only rest once the her father pays for his crimes... and then she deflates like a balloon.

The second of the trilogy is Lake of Dracula which was the weirdest for me to watch.  When a woman was five years old she lost grip of her dog's leash and followed him to a strange house where she was almost attacked by a man with golden eyes.  She woke up safe later and it was assumed to be a dream.  Flash forward to the film's present day and she's now a full grown woman with a totally different dog that has the same name.  She is haunted by the golden eyes in her dreams and when a coffin is delivered to her town without any return address then vampire shit goes down.

The reason this one was the weirdest to me starts with the dog thing, but then the score and foley work.  At one point the music sounded like the composer was playing a slide whistle through a series of effects pedals or at least an odd theremin.  Then, when our main character is an adult and finally catches a glimpse of the vampire the sound cue right before her discovery sounds like a quick deep fart.  It's hard to stay in the movie moment when I assumed the vampire farted and that's how she found him.

Rounding out our trilogy is Evil of Dracula where a girl's school becomes terrorized by their vampire principal.  I'm not quite sure if he's been doing this all along and just upped his game or if this just all started because he was grooming a new man to be his replacement principal.  I watched all of these in a row and this one was probably the loosest and least attention grabbing of the three.

Despite my waning attention span with the third film, I definitely enjoyed this collection.  There is really only one big extra which is the journalist/horror author Kim Newman talking about the vampirism in the films.  Other than that you get the OSTs and film trailers but compared to something like The Addiction that I covered last week, there is less additional content.  Although if they brought Michio Yamamoto back from the dead for an interview then that would've been awesome.  Unfortunately I don't think Arrow has the money for that.  Anyway, you get three films with this, so it's a fair trade off.

If you like real vampires (not sparkly ones), J-horror, or just look and feel of Toho or Hammer then I recommend picking this set up.  Thanks again to Arrow Films for the hook-up with this.

Also, if you're interested in picking up this film you can do so here from Amazon.  It's currently running around $26, which for a blu-ray with three films on it is a steal.  Also, if you order by clicking that link then that means Amazon kicks a little back to us so that we can pay for this website and fuel it with canned energy drinks.

The Addicition + Extras (Arrow Films)

 Chalking up another entry with our Saturday Screamers is Arrow Films' release of the 1995 movie, The Addiction. Thanks to Arrow Films for hooking us up with this screener copy to review.

Shot entirely in black and white, The Addiction is a vampire film that makes no effort to hide the fact that this affliction is a metaphor for heroin addiction.  Kathleen (Lili Taylor) is working toward a doctorate in philosophy.  One evening Kathleen is pulled into an alley by Cassanova (Annabella Sciorra) and is given a chance to tell Cassanova to leave.  When she doesn't, Cassanova bites her and leaves while telling her everything is about to change.  From here Kathleen begins to fiend, injects blood she takes from homeless people, and starts dressing and acting like Lou Reed, just with intense philosophical monologues.

This film took a bit to grow on me.  Initially the philosophy was heavy handed and it made me feel like I was watching a Jim Jarmusch film that lacked any mirth.  The turn around here came when Christopher Walken was introduced in what may now be one of my top 5 Walken roles.  His character initiates this vacuum where everyone and everything start coming together for the climax.  The earlier philosophical exposition becomes justified when Kathleen is defending her dissertation and makes a point of philosophy being nothing more than propaganda of a single individual.  The very end in which spiritual salvation leads to freedom from the affliction might as well have been an AA/NA commercial, but seeing as how Kathleen is unable to control her habit, it's what works for her (and in this case, some people dealing with addiction issues).  So who am I to sit here and talk shit on something that works for people?

Aside from top notch casting in The Addiction, it's also directed by Abel Ferrara.  You may know him for his work on Body Snatchers, Bad Lieutenant, and Ms. 45.  Additionally, Russell Simmons of Def Jam records was a producer.  I have nothing against Mr. Simmons and everything Def Jam has done, but my biggest complaint with The Addiction is that the only non-score music we get is hip hop and it feels so incredibly out of place.  That, and the fact we get the same Cypress Hill song played twice for street shots is too much.

EXTRAS:

In comparison to some of the extras we covered with other Saturday Screemers, The Addiction is tamer and geared more toward the film geek side.  We have a new interview with Abel Ferrara as well as director commentary, an interview with Brad Stevens (film critic) who wrote Abel Ferrara: The Moral Vision, and a series of interviews entitled Talking with the Vampires.  The Talking with the Vampires was my favorite of the extras as it was made specifically for this release and features Lili Taylor, Christopher Walken, Abel Ferrara, cinematographer Ken Kelsch, and composer Joe Delia.  It felt very relaxed, like a conversation between friends.  You find out things like Lili was listening to Debaser by The Pixies a lot while making this film, or Christopher Walken singing a song for Abel.

First pressings of disc also come with an illustrated collector's booklet which has new writings on The Addiction by critic Michael Ewins.

If you're a fan of vampire films then I definitely recommend picking this one up.  I didn't know this film even existed until I was sent this disc but it's well worth the time.  Thanks again to Arrow Films for sending us this for review.

If you want to pick up this blu-ray then you can click here and get it from Amazon.  It's currently around $25 and if you want to get the collector's booklet then I definitely recommend getting it soon.  Also, if you click on that link or the link above for Brad Stevens' book and buy either from those links then we here at 30 Days of Plight get a small part of that sale and it goes towards paying for this website and energy drinks.

9th Cut Starts! The Lost Boys (1987) 1h 37m

When I was in college I took a course on vampire lore.  One of the first things the professor asked us was "why are people interested in vampires?"  After the typical collegiate round of answers she finally just yelled "it's because they're sexy!"  I think that this film really makes that ring true.  Sure, there were the Hammer films of the 70's which were just shy of (or just were) porn coming before this.  But this, this is 80's leather jacket sex on legs... and a possibly queer Corey Haim with his sexy Rob Lowe poster on the wall, camp style clothing, and a beaver hidden in his closet.

The Lost Boys takes place in Santa Carla, California where Michael, Sam, and their mother move in with her father.  Michael instantly falls for a girl that hangs out with David (Kiefer Sutherland) and his gang of assholes which includes Bill (Alex Winters) from the Bill and Ted franchise.  Sam ends up befriending the Frog brothers at the local comic store and they give him a comic about vampires that they say may save his life.  Michael gets turned into a dhampyr by David's crew, Sam freaks out, the Frog bothers want to kill all bloodsuckers.  So we get this rag-tag group of dorks trying to find and kill the head vampire all to one of the best soundtracks to ever exist.

This movie is a classic.  You can't hear that dark synth and child chorus singing "thou shall not want" without getting hyped immediately.  When the final fight happens we get some great vamp kills, including the infamous "death by stereo."  The casting and acting are all spot on.  Kiefer is pretty much the only one in the vamp gang that has real lines and his presentation plants him firmly in the realm of "this dude is a badass."  My big question mark for this film is that as one of the Frog brothers, I have no clue what Corey Feldman's voice is supposed to be.  I don't think he even knows what it was.  It's like he was possessed by a 70 year-old chain smoking grandma. "Read this comic and pick me up a carton of Reds!"

There were two modern sequels made to this film.  I'm not sure why.  I haven't seen them so I can't say.  I doubt I will ever willingly sit down to watch one of them by my own volition.  This movie didn't need a sequel.  All of the loose ends are tied up so to me it's like looking at something like the Mona Lisa and deciding it would look good to copy it but just make her have a big cartoon dick behind her.  Big ol' floppy purple wang flappin' in the breeze.

I give The Lost Boys 5 unnecessary Zombie Peter Pans out of 5:

The Transfiguration (2016) 1h 37m

I don't think anyone can say that they never emulated (even a tiny bit) a character they saw in a movie or on TV.  To this day it still takes effort to not act like Razor Ramon if I'm using a toothpick, and he was just emulating Scarface!  Also, as kids, I'm sure we all ran around with plastic vampire fangs cutting our gums, drool running from our mouths, as we mumbled about sucking blood.  There is a line that most of us don't cross though.  We don't begin to believe we are who or what we are copying.  So when someone blurs that line between reality and fantasy, we get something like today's film.

The Transfiguration focuses on Milo, a teenage boy living in project housing with his older brother.  He's an outcast, friendless, and referred to by others as "freak."  His primary solace is found in his collection of dubbed vampire flicks and online nature videos.  Eventually he befriends a girl named Sophie and she gets close.  So close that she finds out that his obsession with vampirism goes beyond watching it on the screen.

I wasn't sure where this film was going while I was watching it.  It took elements that I normally find frustrating while watching a movie and turned them into art.  There are long periods of just ambient noise of the world around Milo, and rather than push me away from the film it pulled me into his isolation.  I kept waiting for the real supernatural element to drop and when it didn't come I felt as though I lost my footing.  Stumbling to understand Milo's actions more and more.

 There's also a great scene which reminds me of Taxi Driver, when Robert De Niro takes Jodie Foster on a date and it's to the porno theater because he doesn't have the social experience to know better.  In this, Milo hangs out with Sophie and he puts on one of those PETA-esq videos of how a cow is killed and processed.  He has this flat affect while watching it whereas she is revolted and leaves him wondering what he did wrong.

This isn't a film for just anyone, and I wouldn't recommend it for a movie night with friends, but I will say if you have some free time and can actively watch this film, then do it.

I give The Transfiguration 4 Barnabas Collins portraits out of 5:

Day 4: The Stranger (2015) 1h 33m

To some of us, the "stranger" is known as a masturbatory technique where you cut off circulation to your hand just long enough to numb it up and then you jerk yourself off with it.  The idea is that since you've lessened the feeling in your hand then it feels like someone else is giving you a handy.  In truth, the "stranger" and The Stranger share something in common... both are a bit different than the norm, but in the end it's still just jerking off the same cock.

The Stranger takes place in bad neck tattoo, U.S.A. where a man returns after 16 years and is looking for his wife. Upon finding she is dead he promptly gets beaten, stabbed, and peed on but the shittiest antagonist and his circle jerk crew.  The 16 year old boy who told him that his wife was dead (sure, you can do that math real quick) sees the attack and tells a police officer about it.  The shitagonist is the cop's son and they attempt to dump the body.  Our boy brings the barely alive man home and this establishes the base for this film.

To be short and to the point, this is a vampire movie.  The stranger is a vampire that only refers to his vampirism as having a curse or a disease.  The one creative take on stale vampire lore is that vampire blood can be used to heal, but it will only heal properly if it is blessed first.  We see this take place when his son is badly burned and performs the ritual and the application.  If it isn't blessed first, and it comes in contact with a wound of any kind, it only heals but doesn't restore and it will pass the vampirism on to the patient.  I don't recall seeing or reading anything like this before.  I've seen the healing with vampire blood or spit before, but I like the idea of taking something impure like that and imbuing it with some form of sanctity for healing.

In the end, this film felt like a slog.  I wasn't super impressed with it but I wasn't totally put off by it either.  However, to put this film in the middle of the road means you might like it and you might not.  I already passed on the only interesting bit of info you can glean from this film so take that and run with it.  Run away from The Stranger!!!

I give The Stranger 2 stranger danger images out of 5:

Day 9: Day Watch (2006) 2h 12m

I fell like Netflix needs to add a disclaimer before sequels that states that something has a predecessor.  Sure, things with numbers such as Friday the 13th Part 3, or Halloween 2, let you know that you're skipping ahead, but a little help sometimes would be good.  Especially since I really wish I would have seen the first film in this series to understand everything a bit better.

Day Watch is the sequel to the Russian horror film Night Watch.  I'm sure you're saying "no shit" to that tidbit, but I felt the need to say it.  Aside from the absurd length of this (being that it's a modern film), my chief complaint was just that I was treated to a wonderful recap of Night Watch all in English, but then all of Day Watch was in Russian.  With the subtitles for this film taking on some playful and artistic twists, I wish the whole thing would've been in Russian with English subtitles.  Maybe I'm being nitpicky while looking for something to complain about.

The overall world was set in a combination of our reality mixed with magic and supernatural creatures.  I hesitate to use the term "vampire" here (even though the film does) because they aren't your run of the mill vampires.  I really need to watch the first film to get the whole story.  What I do know is that there is a sense of "light" and "dark" within the two vampire groups and each patrols the other.

As for the magic, there are your typical witch characters, but also a story of the Chalk of Fate which takes an eventual center stage.  With the Chalk one is able to change events and rewrite history... with some small restrictions.  The story telling of the Chalk is one of my favorite parts of the movie becauseit could have been ripped from any Mike Mignola comic.

I know this review is shorter than most.  Truthfully I feel I need the whole story.  If I sat through a 2+ hour movie, in Russian, then just know it was a good film.  Not quite in my top tier, but a good film nonetheless.

I give Day Watch a solid 3 Gorbachev birth marks out of 5:

Day 8: Vampire In Brooklyn (1995) 1h 40m

As a kid I thought this movie was okay.  I'm sure I initially watched it on the USA network or something random like that, but as an adult I wasn't sure this would hold up.  Now, I'm very much a white guy, but like most rural/suburb white kids I grew up watching stuff like Martin, In Living Color, Living Single, and really liking those shows.  They don't hold up well now because I could fake identify with them then, but living in cities for my adult life has made me not relate to them at all... plus Fire Marshall Bill is pretty fucking dumb.

So with adolescent flashbacks out of the way, I was fucking floored when Wes Craven came up as the directing credit for this!  Most of the time everyone thinks of Nightmare on Elm Street or Scream, but never fucking Vampire In Brooklyn!  The more surprising thing is that this is meant to be more of an "urban" horror film, and it pulls it off well for the mid-90's.  I will say that the characters are a bit stereotypical, and while I love John Witherspoon, the man only has one fucking character he plays in every film.

What we get with Vampire In Brooklyn is a good backstory of vampires originating in Egypt, but later being scattered to Eastern Europe and even the New World.  That I can buy.  Eddie Murphy's accent as a vampire... not so much.  We get a typical vampire movie plot of he wants a specific girl and does everything in his power to get her.  Rather than a Renfield we get Kadeem Hardison becoming Eddie's "ghoul" and rotting/falling apart the whole time.  He's no Tom Waits, I'll tell you that... but it's also how the character is written in this.

I was behind Eddie Murphy in this film until, as my notes so masterfully describe, "Fuck Eddie Murphy dog exploder," and "Killed a cat."  Yeah, at one point Eddie looks at a police dog and sparks appear under the dog as he shoots into the air and dies in water some 50-yards away.  He also disguises himself as a shitty ganster wanna be and shoots a cat.  It's weird.  Chainsaw people in half, torture them, make them eat their own butt raw, whatever; I'm fine with that.  You "kill" an animal and you're instantly a scumfuck.  Maybe I'm the real monster after all...

So bringing it back to did this film hold up?  Sure, it was actually still good. If I were going to recommend an urban horror film though, this wouldn't be the top on my list.  That goes to Bones.  Honestly, Snoop and that crew did a good job of making a modern version of classic Italian horror... urban classic Italian horror?  urban horror Italian classic?  Unlimited salad and bread sticks?

I give Vampire In Brooklyn 3 copies of Delirious out of 5:

Day 3: Rigor Mortis (2013) 1h 43m

I have a love of horror films from Asian countries.  I've seen a few that have been really awful, and some American attempts at copying that style that have failed miserably!  However, Rigor Mortis was a solid C-horror (that's Chinese horror, not C-grade horror) film that does an excellent mix of vampires, ghosts, and magic in a way I haven't seen in a long time.

Focusing on Chin, an ex-actor that moves into an apartment building after his wife apparently left with his child, we're treated to a cast of provocative characters.  There's Yau who comes from a line of vampire hunters, but since vampires have long died out he is merely a cook.  Gau is a dark magic practitioner that exists with everyone else but is called on to help bring a man (Tung) back to life by his wife (Aunti Mui).  Finally there is Pak, the small boy, and Yeung, his mentally traumatized mother.  Chin's apartment 2442 once housed a murder followed by a suicide, and after his own suicide attempt causes one of the spirits to attempt a possession, the supernatural elements come out of the woodwork.

The ghost twins in this film are as stunning as any macabre spirit you find in Asian cinema.  Their presence is enhanced by the dramatic CGI elements encircling them.  The vampire is straight out of Chinese lore; gliding just above the ground with both arms straight out.  The fight scenes are vivid and dynamically filmed.  Couple that with martial arts and mysticism and they make this almost two hour film grip you until the credits roll.  Seriously, I loved this film from the moment the suicide/possession scene started.

Surprisingly, according to IMDB, this film did not do well State-side with the reviewers.  Well, fuck 'em!  Watch this film if you like foreign horror and don't mind subtitles.  There might be a dubbed version, but c'mon... subs are bullshit!

I give Rigor Mortis 3 Chinese vampire table-top miniatures out of 5:

Day 29: From Dusk Till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter (1999) 1h 34min

Okay, so a sequel that I have some background with.  I've seen the original From Dusk Till Dawn, which was written by Quentin Tarantino and directed by Robert Rodriguez.  From Dusk Till Dawn 3 is written by Robert Rodriguez's cousin, Álvaro Rodriguez.  I know that sounds like it's made up, but it's true.  It was filmed by a guy whose credits include unnecessary sequels to films that were already great (such as Lost Boys: The Tribe) and TV shows based off of films (but not the From Dusk Till Dawn TV series).  This gives you an idea of what's going to go on here.

Actually, I'm not entirely sure what's going in here.  Our two groups of characters end up all at the bordello where Danny Trejo serves up tequila and angry looks.  One group is banditos and the other group consists of a pastor, his wife, and the American author/journalist Ambrose Bierce.  Ambrose was a real person that went to join Pancho Villa's army and was never seen again.  That's what happens when a white guy from Ohio does stupid shit.  Equally stupid shit people from Ohio have done, worn a Brown's jersey at the one diner in Pittsburgh and supposedly got stabbed in the bathroom.  I'm pretty sure that's an urban legend, but it's one Yinzer's like.  Also, it's a better story than this film.

This is all pretty much what you expect from a From Dusk Till Dawn film.  Vampires, snake women vampires, debauchery, lots of killing and like a half hour fight scene, and my favorite part where the main vampire woman (that isn't the hangman's daughter) dies.  Dawn comes, she gets caught in the sun and is trying to back into the bordello.  She ends up getting trapped in the door spike/lock things and becomes burnt super crisp for a second.  I half watched the scene and was exhausted from work so I looked over and just said out loud "Whoopie Goldberg?!" before the vampire turned to dust.  The whole movie then ends with some shitty SyFy channel style CGI where the entire screen is just a computer generated shart.

I give From Dusk Till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter 1 plastic vampire fang out of 5:

Day 24: Dracula III: Legacy (2005) 1h 26min

I never saw Dracula 2000 (which sounds like a terrible techno-goth band) or Dracula II: Ascension but these are what come prior to Dracula III: Legacy.  That's how numbers work people. 2000 -> 2 -> 3

Surprisingly this is the second film starring Jason Scott Lee to appear on this blog.  Equally surprising is that Rutger Hauer plays Dracula in this film.  Although Dracula gets probably between 8-10 minutes total of screen time and it's mostly for a fight with his giant and obviously fake sword.  You can watch the sword flop like a semi-flaccid dick on close-up shots.  It's bad.  The design of the sword is bad.  This movie is kind of bad.

It seemed like it was going to be awesome though.  The opening credits are shots of things that look like they belong in a Castlevania movie.  There are whips, blades, vampires, fighting.  All it needed was Jason Scott Lee to eat a pork chop he found in a wall and I would've been sold.  Unfortunately this movie consists mostly of them traveling and a semi-related side angle involving some sort of criminal group collecting Romani for vampires to drain.

The simple plot is that JSL is some sort of dhampir style vampire where he isn't quite human but not a vampire either so he can go out in the day and he wants to kill Dracula.  He does.  Then he sits on Dracula's throne with a lady on his lap... posing like some Heavy Metal magazine spread, suave mother fucker that he is...

That's it.  Some say it's not the destination but the journey, but the journey sucked too.  There was maybe one good fight sequence in the whole thing and it was not like Castlevania at all.  In fact, the first time he fights real vampires they're in fucking clown paint.  Juggalo fuckin' vampires!  Vampalos!  Fuck it.

I give Dracula III: Legacy 1 Castlevania pork chop out of 5: