Vamp or Not? Blood Sucking Babes from Burbank

Okay, by the title this obviously leads you to the vamp conclusion but, as I have said before, a title indicating that a film is vampiric is a poor gauge. Indeed this low budget, shlock horror from 2006 and directed by Kirk Bowman seems very un-vampire as things progress in the movie.

The film actually starts part way through the film, as a scene setter and then goes back in time as archaeology student Sam (Heidi Brucker) goes online to hear details of a paper competition. Professor Stockwell (Burke Morgan) is asking teams to come forward to present a paper – the best will win a foreign trip.

In Burbank there are two teams. The one led by Janet (Yasmine Vine) are doing a paper on the sex toys of Pompeii and the one led by Chelsea (Christina Caporale) are mounting an expedition to find the fabled Angela’s Jewellery Box – something Stockwell believes to be myth.

Anyway, out in the woods and followed by a mysterious stalker – whom we later discover is called Zach (Danilo Mancinelli) and who wishes to stop the box falling into anyone’s hands – they find said box. Actually a girl from the team and her boyfriend do. It contains semi-precious stones (or was that cut glass?) and Wendy (Ker’in Hayden), the girl, strips and rubs the stones on herself. She drops the box and Josh (Kevin Surrey), follows her – ignoring just how black her eyes have got. She eats him and someone else picks up the box.

Yes, eats him. Not so much sucking blood as a desire to strip off to underwear (and in one case further) and eat male flesh in a cannibalistic orgy – and then forget what happened. It seems that the box is cursed, but that is not entirely true. Angela was a witch who enchanted the box to keep her and her female companions safe on the trip from Spain to the New World – giving them an equal (or greater) strength to men.

It is the jewels that cause the enchantment, and the magic runs out fairly soon- though the thief scattering them around town means that cannibal women are cropping up all over the place. The box itself is like a charger. The curse or enchantment can be lifted by dropping the box in salt water – not so much because of the water but because of the salt content one guesses. So why are the women becoming cannibals?

Well the film tells us it is because the enchantment was not designed for 21st century women. It reacts strangely to modern hormones and the pollution absorbed by the body. Hmmm… It also has the effect of causing the women’s eyes to go black (not consistently) and for them to sprout fangs – bad, ill fitting plastic gnashers that seem to drop at inopportune snarling moments.

The fangs, the magical source and the increased strength could be a vamp indicator but I do not think strong enough to call this a vampire movie. This is fairly much a magic cannibal flick (if there is such a thing) and one that is getting a sequel (if you can believe it!). Not a great movie and definitely not vamp.

The imdb page is here.