Female vampires once ruled the world. Now they are overlooked for glittering guys with big hair. It's time to point out why the female of the species should be the center of attention.
The Gist: A vampire couple worlds apart and living seperate lives comes together to support each other at their lonliest.
Clarification: This movie was universally critically praised and words were used to describe it such as "beautiful" and "artistic" not to mention it was nominated for a lot of awards at many film festivals and from many organizations I've never heard of. In other words fans of this page won't get it and probably won't like it very much. It's pretty much 2 hours of stereotypical high class indy film cliche's shoved into a horror movie that has no scare factor whatsoever. Adam (played by the Avengers Tom Hiddleston) lives in Detroit and is a tortured musician. Eve (played by Tilda Swinton) is....well...I'm not sure what she is other than a chick who looks like an albino and lives in Europe.
Both do basically nothing and have different ways of getting blood delivered to them to prevent from getting diseases because vampirism apparently isn't as fool proof as the other movies make it seem as vampires can get sick from tainted blood.
Eventually Adam contemplates suicide but a phone conversation with Eve where she decides to come to Detroit to see him rejuvenates him. After she gets there the movie is just two people talking along with the occasional sight seeing tour of abandoned buildings in Detroit.
Selling Point: If you like Academy Award style artsy films and not looking for any horror, as said before this is a highly praised one.
Female Vampire Factor: Well they are vampires but they don't drink via biting people due to drugs and diseases etc. Despite this fact when they drink from whatever they drink their blood from their fangs do come out so that's a plus.
Eve after Drinking
In the middle of the lovers reunion they get a visit from Eves little sister Ava (Mia Wasikowska) who is not in any way as reserved and under control as Eve. This becomes the closest thing to horror you get out of the movie as Ava kills Adam's closest human confidant Ian after seducing him (though you don't actually see the bite).
This leads to the movies finale where Adam and Eve ditch Ava and head to Europe together (as Ian was last scene with them before his death) and the grand finally which is the only time you see Adam and Eve attack someone old school style.
So if you're into artsy moody films go for it. If you want a similar film with less art and more sexy Vampire T&A go for the film Kiss of the Damned. I give this a Vampire Beauty Rating of 3 out of 5.
The Gist: A group of friends decide to check out the brand new strip club in town unbeknownst to them it is run by a group of vampires who use it to lure in victims.
Clarification: So if this story sounds familiar it's because it's been done about a million times before especially in low budget "B" movies like this. While it's not the worst of them it's still pretty bad. Luckily it's a watchable bad as the corniness of the film is slightly entertaining if you're attracted to that kind of film (IE you were the type to watch USA Up All Night level or local TV ghoul host type cheesy movies.)
The first thing you will notice about the film is that it's extremely low budget. I'm talking the film has 3 locations, an apartment, the outside of some type of warehouse and the inside of the warehouse which is made to somewhat resemble a strip club by way of decorations that look like they were stolen from a high school home coming celebration which is OK since they don't actually strip anyway.
The second thing that you will notice is it does suffer from that low budget film cliche of just trying way too hard by adding film cliche after film cliche. You've got three vampire strippers, they don't need any reason as to why they're doing what they're doing other than they're three vampire strippers yet for whatever reason every murder they commit outside the main plot has some type of justification to it. A good example is the below scene where the worst vampire hunter in the world admits to stalking the women for years without doing a thing when he was supposed to be avenging his brother and when he finally gets the opportunity acts like he has absolutely no clue how to handle vampires. By the way just so you know he's a vampire hunter he's wearing a long leather coat and a hat when you first see him.
Selling Point: The third thing you will notice about the film which is a positive is that all three of the vampires have different styles of fangs from each other though it's a much more radical difference then we saw in Dracula 2000 who also had different fangs for each female turned. Oh yeah and they're hot.
Female Vampire Factor: Well as mentioned there are 3 and there is a lot of biting scenes though they tend to resort to "B" movie gore more times than not.
The blonde "Serena" (Monika Wild - Bottom video above) is the biggest monster of the crew often being the one doing the killing. "Treasure" (Elina Madison) is the leader, there is a sub plot of her falling for one of the lead guys but the whole "your friends are killing my friends in my apartment" thing gets in the way of any relationship between the two. The third girl "Monique" (Allison Beal - Top Video above) is just kind of there to growl a lot.
So in the end you have an over thought, poorly acted film about strippers who don't strip but hot women with fangs and logicless sub plots. I give the film a Vampire Beauty Rating of 3 out of 5. For a better attempt I would recommend pretty much any Fred Olen Ray film (yep this is that bad) but especially "Twilight Vamps".
The Gist: A vampire dormant for centuries is awakened in modern day New York to find his home occupied by a woman having life issues and together they attempt to restore his humanity.
Clarification: This is one of those "person in an awkward situation" comedies where the guy from a different century learns about modern day. To be honest there are a ton of similarities between this film and the Tim Burton comedic remake of Dark Shadows that starred Johnny Depp from 2012. In fact that movie is more of a remake of this one than it is of the dramatic Dark Shadows series it was named after (though this is the far superior of the two which doesn't say much).
Selling Point: As said above it is a more watchable version of what Tim Burton was attempting with his Dark Shadows movie.
Female Vampire Factor: When I say the stories between this and the failed Dark Shadows remake are similar I mean it. With that said there's only one female vampire and she plays the part represented by Angelique in Dark Shadows. In this case her name is Norissa. She is the vampire who originally turned the lead vampire of the film Zachary Simms and she doesn't take too kindly to his new love interest Kindall Gordon helping him become human again so she joins up with Kindalls ex Dwight to help break the two apart.
The bad news is Norissa does not have fangs (she explains in one biting scene that she actually does but they're "tiny"), The good news is she rocks a sexy vampire secretary look (she works in politics now is the running joke) and is played by a young Michelle Forbes whose most recent claim to fame was as the sexy Maenad cougar Maryann Foster on True Blood.
Other than that bit of vamp trivia there isn't much else to say. While it's better than the film that mimics it you'll find way better films in the vampire romantic comedy genre. I give the film a Vampire Beauty Rating of 2 out of 5.
The Gist: A possessed hotel long abandoned resurrects its former owner who committed suicide there as a vampire to collect souls for it.
Clarification: Based on the Frietz Leiber short story of the same name Louise Bellflore was a model in the 1930's who owned the hotel. When she found out her husband was cheating on her she hung herself in her room. Without her the hotel eventually went under. After the last tenant left (a homeless man straggling there in modern day Miami) the hotel brings her back in an effort to save itself.
In order to do this she must collect souls by killing people via sucking their blood. Along the way she meets a photographer whose down on his luck and they take interest in one another (being that they're both tortured souls) much to the dismay of the possessed hotel.
Selling Point: Don't let the love story part of the plot fool you, this movie is genuinely creepy. There are some slightly funny scenes as Louise is pretty looney at a certain point but if you are in the mood for a scary vampire movie this is a pretty good one. They definitely don't make them like this anymore.
Female Vampire Factor: The only one is Louise played by Christina Fulton but she's more than enough. The entire movie pretty much follows her going in an out of blood rage and as mentioned when she gets hungry she's pretty nuts in a creepy Nosferatu sort of way.
The funny thing about this is that everyone who runs into her while like that just passes her off as being a junky which would be understandable if it weren't for the fact that her fangs are in full view when she's raging and stay out till she finally feeds which means full on conversations with people with fangs in full view and them acting like it's nothing.
Basically the movie jumps back and forth between extremely dark horror and extremely sadistic comedy. It's an acquired taste but definitely works and Louise is very sexy when she gives in to the blood lust and goes after a victim. I give the film a Vampire Beauty Rating of 5 out of 5.
Tyra Scott is a trans gender model out of the state of Virginia. In this scene she is a sexy Vampire who turns the tables on a hunter sent to stake her.
Last week Nina Dobrev who's played the character Elena (as well as what seems like hundreds of Elena dopplegangers) announced that she was leaving the show after the current season (Season 6) ends.
Seemingly after every season there is some type of speculation regarding one of the big 3 of the show leaving so this should come as no surprise to fans of the series. While I do believe the show might take a slight hit in the ratings it is after all a primarily female fanbase so keeping the male leads on board should soften the blow. On top of that season six has so far pretty much taken the focus off of the Elena character altogether and replaced her with Caroline as the female lead.
So does this mean it won't be watchable for guys?
Not Necessarily. So far as mentioned above the character of Caroline Forbes has become a bratty kind of evil so she fangs out a lot more than she used to (which was hardly ever).
Also the Salvatores mother Lillian (played by Annie Wersching) has been discovered as one of the evil undead as well so there is hope going forward for some crazy cougar biting.
Vampire Diaries airs Thursdays on the CW Network in the US.
.jpg)
