Shifter – review

Director: Jason Xavier

Release date: 2011

Contains spoilers

You’d be forgiven for wondering if this was a werewolf film (with vampires). It is not – the shifters referred to in the title are vampires who can shift from one body to another (so we are in the realm of vampiric possession), not only that but also alien vampires – which I’ll get to.

Unfortunately, it isn’t a great film, by any stretch. Performances ranging from histrionic to so laid back the actor might be horizontal (and was, often). As such it isn’t actually a shock that I stumbled over this posted to watch for free on YouTube.

out of the grave

It starts with two guys, Ramos (Damon Calderwood) and Kronin (Shawn Stewart, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency), the latter chasing the former. They get to a cemetery and Ramos is less running and more limp running. Kronin gets to him, beats him silly and rips out his heart (though it looks more like some random offal than a heart). He tosses it to the side and buggers off. Ramos’ body vanishes and a hand bursts out of a grave, a man (Ryan (Pale Christian Thomas)) pulling himself from the earth.

the gang picking Carry up

That last scene seemed poorly photographed but it noticeably improves as we see Bailey (Nathan Dashwood, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency & Stan Helsing), Michelle (Nicole Watson) and Robyn (Lia Como) pick up Carry (Janessa O'Hearn). They are going to a cabin owned by Carry’s parents but she is not happy as last time there her brother collapsed and went into a coma… for three years. He died 7 months ago when her father turned off life support.

Bailey and Terry

Be that as it may, they are going to meet Robyn’s cousin James (Drew Taylor) and his girlfriend Clea (Tamara Prescott) and also friends Terry (Brett Wise), Nigel (Wade Gibb) and a couple who I could guess at the names of (we do hear, I didn’t make a note) but as they’ll be dead in a couple of scenes who cares. And here we have a major problem with the film – it sets up a cabin in the woods scenario but has a large cast who are just too numerous to do anything meaningful with and whose characters (the guys at least) are mostly interchangeable. Nigel is a jock, but still an affable pot head and Terry and Bailey are two comedy character pot heads when one would do. They are also a major part of dragging the viewer out of the film.

effect of hot water

So horny couple go for a walk and are killed by an unseen assailant who is Kronin. The others end up playing strip poker until Robyn ends the game (just before Carry strips naked) because she is worried and sends the three stoned friends out to find the couple. They return instead with an unconscious man they found and Carry faints – it’s her brother Ryan, who we saw rise from the grave. He has, it turns out, amnesia and a line of sharp nails appearing when he washes his hands in hot water (heat produces vampiric effects). So what has happened?

Shawn Stewart as Kronin

Ramos and Kronin have been opponents for years. Each knows some vampire tricks, but not all of them or the same ones (Ramos can create other vampires, Kronin cannot), because the one who made them, Master Ling (Kenneth Chan), restricted their teachings individually – Kronin later killed Ling. When Ramos died he shifted his life force into a suitable vessel – Ryan’s corpse (it was remarkably not decayed given 7 months in the ground). Ryan/Ramos eventually gets both the vampire’s memories back and Ryan’s, good news for Michelle who used to date him. However, Kronin is still about and wants to finish him off for good.

the alien

We discover that Master Ling was a Chinese farmer who witnessed an alien crash. The creature merged into him and they became one – so the vampires can possess bodies (and enter a symbiosis, I guess) but need to drink blood to replenish the host body. If the vampire essence leaves the body the vacated host crumbles to dust. How they can then create other vampires is glossed over but generously we can suggest a bit of vampire essence will develop into a separate entity. Ryan turns three of the friends (on request) to help him fight.

laid back vampire

So, the acting is pretty darn bad. The interchangeable stoners are pure comedy and it is too much (and not funny). The dialogue is awful – faced with vampires they continue to get on with asking for strip poker and getting stoned, their unnatural reaction destroying any suspension of disbelief. Carry flies into histrionics every so often but has no underlying simmer to make it seem reasonable. As for Ryan, he is the most laid-back vampire (and narcoleptic – replenishing energy by just switching off). The laid-back attitude infuses the whole performance and seems unreasonable (and very different to the flashback Ramos). It’s bad all the way round.

newly turned 

The story is simply cabin in the woods with a touch of ten little Indians. Honestly, I didn’t care one way or another (for the humans or either vampire). The background of alien vampirism and possession lifts this up slightly. But only slightly. A search should find it on YouTube if you wish to give it a go or it is on amazon (US only as I write). 2 out of 10. The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

Dr Liebenstein – review

Director: Erik Karl

Release date: 2014

Contains spoilers

First thing to note is that I understand a special edition of this film was pulled together in 2018. I’ve not found much but from what I can ascertain it added a framing reference for the film (in the form of a journalist) but I can only assume most of the film stayed the same. I am reviewing the original 2014 release (that went to DVD via Amazon US).

Some framing would help as would cutting down the prologue section considerably, as we’ll discuss in a second or two. This film was ambitious for an indie budget film and the biggest take away, I think, is that it serves as another reminder why an amateur/indie filmmaker shouldn’t write/direct/produce and star in their own film – breaking these things apart would allow for some dissent and temper moments where the singular filmmaker can’t see the woods for the trees.

Rachel and post-production blood

So that prologue… We start in 1972 and a young man – I thought he was called Geoff? – and his girlfriend Rachel (Jessica Henwick) are out and about, so is a blonde woman. Rachel sits up in grasses and calls for Geoff who we see kissing the blonde woman. Rachel is attacked and killed by a cloaked figure – a spurt of post-production blood telling us she was bitten. The scene has no relevance to anything else in the film but our prologue doesn’t stop there.

entering through fire

Jump forward to Halloween 1998 and we see Crystal (Mia Doran) in a cemetery making out with a guy, later revealed to be Dave Liebenstein (Erik Karl). We then see her get to her home with groceries. She changes from her outfit into an oversized shirt (which seemed like an excuse to show her in her underwear) and she gets a phone call just before taking a bite of an apple. Her girly chat (with a jokey comment about being grabbed from the grave by Lauren (Lauren Bartusek)) is interrupted by a sound. Her groceries are gone – she looks outside and her apple returns on fire. She retreats but fire appears from under the door and on the stairs and a vampire (I’m assuming Robert Carroll) enters.

day for night shot

It is interesting that this vampire can travel via flames he creates through some form of pyromancy, but the phenomena is not discussed in dialogue. Anyway, he goes for Crystal. The film then cuts back 6 months and we get to see the fate of the aforementioned Lauren. She is with Dave and he breaks up with her because she went to a party, after telling him it was a girly night out, and ended up with two guys. She isn’t happy at being dumped (no one dumps her). In bed that night she awakens, hearing her name being called. Grabbing a knife she steps outside (into obvious day for night, with actual night shot establishing footage making it painfully obvious). She screams as a cloaked figure gets her.

a film in a film

Now, whilst the middle section with Crystal gives us an establishing story for Dr Liebenstein (or Dave) the Lauren part and the 1972 part seemed to add nothing. The prologue is overlong (the opening credits roll after this – I’ll come back to them). Nor do we ever establish why the vampire went for any of the girls (and why it seems focused on Liebenstein, getting two of his girls and, in the film proper, terrorising kids living in his old house). as for the opening credits, they go on to show a lot of characters that are not part of the film – indeed through recognising one actress later it seems all/a lot of this comes from a film within the film that a horror show broadcasts and we see precious little of.

fangs on show

The credits show way too much of the crew (they contain credits for jobs normally credited in end credits such as “boom operator”) and are therefore over long. I also need to mention the music, not just over the credits but also through parts of the film. We are in emo central here but the music doesn’t necessarily fit (especially in, but not reserved to, the 1972 segment) but it is also domineering, distracting the viewer rather than adding to the film. It shows, for the wrong reasons, why picking a soundtrack is an art in and off itself.

friends

So, the film proper is 15-years later (or 2013, and its 15 years after the Crystal section, rather than the Lauren section, as it is Halloween). We go to the house where (we’ll subsequently discover) Dave Liebenstein used to live, and now is home to sisters Michelle (Claire Coppi) and Renee (Monica Szaflik) who are with their respective boyfriends Ron (Kevin Craig Wesley) and Greg (Travis Porchia). Both sisters seem to love Halloween, though Renee loves it the most. It comes out in conversation that Renee likes to satisfy her libido and Michelle is a virgin, saving herself.

fiery vamp and the cross

They decide to do a spirit board (and a rather fancy Ouija it is) and Renee jokes that they might summon a hot vampire. As it is they do come into contact with a vampire, the planchette moves on its own and states that he will kill them all. It is no surprise, therefore, that Michelle and Ron are subsequently attacked (having gone into the woods to make out it would seem) by the main vampire and a henchman vampire. Ron is killed but Dave Liebenstein happens along and kills the henchman vampire and then wards the main vampire off with a cross. He then decides to help Michelle but Ron doesn’t stay dead and the others are in danger too.

a victim

So, lore… Liebenstein holds off the vampire by wielding a cross and states that a stake through the heart only works when it is blessed. Staking causes the body to disintegrate, starting at the toes and working up. There is a lot of play made around the invitation rule but then the main vampire suggests he doesn’t need to be invited to get in and can use fire and mist to get into places. Some who are bitten turn but others do not. Kill the vampire that bit you and you’ll become human again (the one example of this we see involves a newly turned vampire who hasn’t fed but it isn’t clear whether feeding would negate the ability to turn back).

Erik Karl as Liebenstein

The acting is, at best, amateur mostly – probably the most unbelievable character is Liebenstein himself. Dave hasn’t aged, it would appear, and inherited a huge mansion. He is being blackmailed by his receptionist, who roofied him, slept with him and now threatens to tell the world – her aim apparently being marrying him. It is superfluous and serves only to make the Dave character seem even nicer but it just drags on the pacing. Why the vampire particularly wants to kill the friends, why some are turned (deliberately it would seem) and why the main vampire hasn’t dealt with Liebenstein before is all lost. That said, some of the photography is effective. 3 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

the original cut On DVD @ Amazon US

Diary of a Necromancer – review

Director: Alex DiSanto

Release date: 2017

Contains spoilers

In some respects, you have to admire a teen filmmaker crafting films (just straddling the line between short film and feature, as this does) but, whilst I admire the concept, the film itself contains things that demote this from B all the way down to Z. I do try to be constructive in my reviews but this does many things very wrong and I also have to point those out too.

Vampires, it seems, love to keep diaries. Ah, you might counter, this is a necromancer’s diary – the title states so. That is true but our necromancer is also a vampire. A good vampire, as it transpires, but a vampire nonetheless.

Alex DiSanto as Asher

The film starts with some establishing shots, which actually worked rather well, and we get a voice over from Asher (Alex DiSanto). He is a necromancer who is 350 years old but looks forever 17. He can speak to the dead but seems disconnected from life and intends to die, once he has taken care of some dark forces. Its all well and good but I noticed two things. Firstly, DiSanto didn’t have the presence physically to pull off the gravitas of a 350-year-old-despite-his-youthful-appearance. Secondly, and through the film, his delivery was flat – and this might be because he is more suited to being behind the camera or because it is hard for a director to direct themselves critically.

Emma Fulton as Lily

So, Asher helps out at a farm run by Harvey (Gerry DiSanto) and Anna (Jean Keel). They don’t bat an eyelid at the minor who is a drifter, fails to go to school and works their land. They are expecting their niece Lily (Emma Fulton) for a visit – she’s Asher’s (apparent) age and just moved to the area (later backstory mentions her parents, who are always fighting, making a last-ditch effort to save their marriage). Lily mentions being bullied by three goth girls at her new school and they are identified as the Deaton Girls. On a technical level there were cuts where a scene had obviously been filmed in different takes and the subjects jumped where the takes were spliced due to continuity failure, as well as wind distorting the sound and massively unnatural dialogue.

the Deaton Girls

That night, at the Deaton Girls’ place, the girls – Ivy (Jennifer McNamara), Rose (Vala Rogers) and Violet (Riley Anderson) – are doing drugs, booze and piercing lips. They notice Lily at a window and one, Rose, chases her down, cuts her hand, knocks her out and is about to stab her when a noise scares her off. It is Asher. When Lily awakens he basically tells her all that is going on – he’s a necromancer, and a vampire, how he got turned, how he met the three before in the 80s and how they are cannibalistic witches (who eat people to gain youth, knowledge and power – so vampiric witches). She asks him to train her as an apprentice and he agrees – it is so unnaturally shorthand it is untrue.

good sfx

That’s the lead into the main plot and we get fluffed lines of dialogue and the actor repeating the same line, but in film not in a blooper reel and, later still, blooming awful fight scenes – the tussle with sword and axe is just painful and always one swift kick in the genitals from resolution. However, as I mentioned, I am always looking for something constructive and positive to say and for that I must spoil a later plot point. Essentially the witches catch and eat Asher and then he reforms and is reborn, coming out of Ivy’s stomach in a practical effect that actually worked really well.

the kiss of death

Lore-wise, well there is very little. Apparently eating a vampire won’t kill it but sunlight will – Asher casts a spell each day to protect himself. His sire gave him a magic bottle of blood and he has never found a blood as good since but also tends to feed on animals. He is a master of the kiss of death – sucking the blood through the mouth, rather than the neck. That was about it lore wise (other than necromantic/witchcraft bits and bobs that don’t concern us really).

Not great at all – but at least one superb practical effect. 2 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On DVD @ Amazon US

Short episode: The Kirlian Frequency: The Masters of the Night

Director: Cristian Ponce

First aired: 2017

Contains spoilers

And this will necessarily contain spoilers as this episode of the Argentinean animation played with genre tropes effectively but did broadcast its twist from early into its ten-minute running time.

The series itself is set in the city of Kirlian and centres on a radio station and the late-night host. In this case the main character of the story is ringing into the station (as she finds the number as an emergency contact – and is told the cops don’t work at night in Kirlian). Each episode is a short horror type story but isn’t that horrific, rather it captures a really nice sense of the uncanny – helped by the stylised animation.

the bikers

The narrator of this tale was travelling to a hospital, where a friend she had argued with had been taken after crashing whilst travelling home alone. A motorcycle passes by her and the pillion passenger looks directly at her with glowing green eyes. Her car breaks down a few kilometres later (in Kirlian) and a good Samaritan calls a friend who has a garage and they take her downtown to get a room for the night.

the Lost Boys

Passing by a plaza she sees the guys from the motorcycle with friends, who shout towards her – which she ignores. She does make a judgement about them sleeping all day, partying at night and thinking they’ll never die (the source of this reference, obviously, the Lost Boys). In her room she washes her clothes but a neighbour starts releasing a smoke – to keep away the bugs, he says, the bloodsuckers. Without him knowing she puts out the source of the smoke.

encounter

She is awoken with the man arguing with others – things go silent and she goes to his room, the door ajar, clearly blood on the floor, but before she enters she is stopped by one of the bikers, who asks what she is doing in Kirlian – she notices that his feet do not touch the floor. Outside the good Samaritan appears, holding a stake, but is grabbed.

mosquito form

The woman, having spoken to the radio host and then discovering that her friend has died in hospital, comes to a conclusion and goes to the plaza, saying they should let the Samaritan go and take her instead. She explains that she doesn’t want to die and knows they are vampires and can make her one of them. And the twist, they are not vampires and will not live forever – they are mosquitoes in human form (so, a kind of vampire then, we’ve covered a few films that merge vampires with human shaped mosquitoes). Will she get to leave Kirlian again?

Salem's Lot

That, of course, is the question and I won’t spoil that but the episode itself is wonderfully off-kilter, the dialogue we hear is from the woman speaking to the radio host, but conversation within the story makes use of subtitles. I rather liked the whole series and this episode was wonderfully referential and enjoyable. I also need to mention a later episode in the season, The King of Christmas, where the radio host tries to make it Christmas Day in spring (due to a predicted disaster threatening to prevent the real Christmas). A caller repeatedly suggests various scenarios are occurring that are clearly from Stephen King and so, at one point, mentions a child next door dying but now floating at his brother’s window, ala Salem’s Lot.

The imdb page for the Masters of the Night episode is here.

Nella Notte – review

Directors: Lorenzo Onorati & Giovanni Pianigiani

Release date: 2004

Contains spoilers

So, I stumbled upon this film on You Tube under the English title of Into the Night and whilst I can absolutely see why it is floating around for a free watch I am still, several days after watching, reeling from the crazy plot that twisted and turned like a twisty turny thing – not with plot twists as much as absolute tangents.

Indeed, the day after watching I met up with a friend for a bit of a catch-up and tried to explain the plot to him. Every so often, as I paused for breath, he’d make a comment expressing his incredulity and I had to say that there was more to go through. If a film’s goal is to make you talk about it, then this film is a success. As a piece of cinema… well, probably not so much!

Giorgi can't cook

So, it starts with a man held by thugs who cut off his fingers (in a really poor sfx) and then cut his throat. It then cuts to an unrelated man, Giorgi, preparing a chicken in the kitchen but struggling. His girlfriend, Marina, says he should learn to cook and makes an exit from the room. He struggles for a moment, picks up a knife and follows after her. He then says it isn’t working and leaves. At home there is a message from a mutual friend, Marina is besides herself with upset. He unhooks the phone, puts a dial-up on his computer and goes to a chatboard where he reveals his misogyny. Another user, the Count, suggests he goes to the Russian Hearts website – he declines.

the Count

At Russian Hearts a man walks in and declares himself the new owner – revealing the fingers of the man at the head of the film to prove this fact. One of the girls (Iuliana Ierugan) is ill and needs medicine. He agrees to get it depending on how she is with the client he has lined up for her. She is dropped off with the Count (a film producer) who has Giorgi with him (who clearly changed his mind about Russian Hearts). The Count starts manhandling her and reveals that he is a killer and has Giorgi film as he beats and hunts her, and then has Giorgi join in. Russian Hearts supply girls for “special clients” (read serial killers) we later find out.

eating Giorgi's heart

The girl vamps out – she is never named in film and the credits on IMDb have her as La vampira – and rips out Giorgi’s heart and then chases down the Count and digs through his back. The next day, at the Agency, the new owner is shocked to see her beaten. The truth of the business outs and he gets a list of clients. She then kills him, reveals the medicine is to prevent her craving for blood and takes the list. Ok, so we have a revenge against the men on the list film? You’d think so. However, the next we see her she is living rough with the city’s homeless.

with sleeping Sandra

Nearby there is street racing on motorbikes going on. The triumphant winner is a woman, Sandra (Linda Di Pietro), who takes her winnings and has essentially enraged the mobster who runs the betting and wants her gone. Nearby the police raid the homeless, sadistic in their treatment of them. The vampire runs from the police and is spotted by Sandra who picks her up and takes her home, promptly taking a sleeping pill and going to sleep. The vampire vamps out, legs it from the flat and gets to a pharmacy – we then see her shooting up the medicine (we are never told what this medicine is).

the vampire girl

The next day Sandra goes to work – she’s a cop. She has a go at a wheelchair bound inspector who ordered the homeless purge and sets to go out when she is grabbed off the street and driven off. The mobsters also have the vampire woman, rendered insensible. This is spotted by a fellow cop who chases after them. They get the women to a hideout and the mobster sets to work, cutting Sandra’s back up, snorting cocaine off the bloody wounds and then stabbing her (she dies). They turn their attention to the vampire girl but they are interrupted.

demonic avatar

We have seen some bad sfx, imposed eyes occasionally and these seem to belong to a creature that appears in dry ice. At first we only see the eyes and hear the voice. The mobster complains – the deal was they get it victims and the entity take care of cops and yet Sandra had infiltrated the racing ring. The entity reveals itself to be a demonic looking thing that feeds on adrenaline and pain and kills the mobster by sucking out these things with a tentacle sucker that emerges from roughly the mouth area. It then becomes apparent that the entity is an avatar for the wheelchair bound cop. It starts to feed on the vampire but it is too much and, back at the station, the cop’s head explodes!

chicken drinker

So, she gets away but is seen by the cop that followed Sandra and her vampiric face is published in the papers. She starts enjoying herself, getting a new outfit and then meeting a guy on a tram who draws her – but draws the vampiric side. At first he says it was accidental (it was a caricature that just looked like the vampire side) and they have sex. Later he seems to be missing and she finds him drinking a chicken’s blood. He reveals he is a muli – a son of a vampire and a mortal, and so not the muli described in Bane, which is the female form of the Serbian Mullo and is very much undead. He agrees to help her track down the men on the list.

Russian agent

Whilst the muli section occurs we have been cutting to Russia, where the vampire’s aunt is picked up by the secret police as they decide to search for her. The vampires were the result of genetic manipulation and they have most of them captive but she is loose and they need to find her, for plausible deniability reasons. There is a strange moment with remote control killers and the film eventually ends with the Russians ready to hunt her down in Italy and the muli ready to track down the men from the list for her – from what I can tell a sequel was never made.

adrenaline draining appendage

So, phew… twisting and turning all over. There is little coherence in the way the plot is presented and the acting is blooming poor as are a lot of the sfx. That said, all the twisting and turning is a route to it being at least a tad amusing and it never becomes boring as there is always something new going on. Half-vampires and adrenaline draining physical avatars are interesting parts. Is it good? No. Is it terrible? Probably, but it is at least entertaining in its terribleness. 2.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Honourable Mention: Char Man

I am not massively a fan of the found footage sub-genre of horror, for every one that works there are plenty more that don’t and plenty that leave you with a bad case of the ‘why are they still filming’ blues. Interestingly, Romero’s Diary of the Dead (2007) actually plays with the concept that someone would carry on filming, even in the face of utter horror, in a real and interesting way.

Luckily this is not a vampire found footage film… so, you might ask, why cover it here? Well the film dates to 2019 and was directed by Kurt Ela and Kipp Tribble, who play primary characters Cameron and Eric respectively. They aim to make, with the help of hired camera man Andy (Nick Greco), a documentary about the Ojai Vampire. Ojai is in California and Anthony Hogg covered the (urban) legend here.

driving to Ojai

Anthony tracks the story to a section of Rosemary Ellen Guiley with J.B. Macabre's The Complete Vampire Companion (in a chapter actually written by Martin V. Riccardo) where the story is placed in the 1980s. Later, on Weird California’s Char Man page, the story appears in a side box with the date of the events revised to 1890. Given the same physical location for the two stories (Ojai) and the appearance on the same page, it is not surprising that the filmmakers used both stories as the basis for this flick.

meeting Andy

It is also clear that the story is a modern urban concoction (with, as Anthony points out, some similarities to Curse of the Undead). This, then, makes the fact that characters Eric and Cameron are just going to make up the 'facts' of the documentary seem quite natural. We see them decide he is a toymaker, just so they can use a toy clown Eric has with him, and watch them try to scope a suitable 'vampire' location out (and, apparently, they have brought five pre-constructed and aged coffins with them, to put at the location).

Jeff Kober as Kent Bridewell

Their path changes, however, after they go to meet local historian Kent Bridewell (Jeff Kober, Kindred: the Embraced & Buffy the Vampire Slayer). He tells them the legend of Char Man (or one variant of it, at least) and their interest in the vampire angle wanes so fast its almost supersonic. And the interest the blog has in the film wanes also but I am left with an interesting conundrum – what sort of label do I give this article. It isn’t “belief in vampires” as none of the characters believe and it isn’t “acting as a vampire” as that doesn’t happen either. This would seem to be more of a case of “exploiting vampire legends”, not the first story to do so, but the first time I’ve used the label.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Zombillénium – review

Directors: Arthur de Pins & Alexis Ducord

Release date: 2017

Contains spoilers

Based on a graphic novel series by Arthur de Pins, this French animation tore me slightly – I recognised the fact that it was limited in character development and didn’t seem to know whether it wanted to be aimed at families or adults (some of the industrial aspects probably would go over a child’s head for instance) but at the same time I rather enjoyed it for what it was.

It certainly made me want to read the graphics – but I also get the feeling that they will make the film somewhat disappointing, just from the blurbs they seem more involved. However, having not read them as I write this, I am looking at the film without the distraction of prior knowledge.

Lucy with Hector

The film starts with Hector driving a car with his daughter Lucy. Hector’s wife had died and he is taking Lucy to her boarding school – where she stays over the week whilst he works. She sees a billboard for theme park Zombillénium and asks whether she can go to it – when Hector gets a work call. It is from a colleague saying that the workers at a factory they are going to demolish are protesting. Hector is a safety inspector and says the factory isn’t up to spec and it has to go – he drops Lucy off mid-call, agreeing the trip to Zombillénium.

arrive at the park

As he drives off, a skateboard blur that seems to fly swoops past the car and he crashes (later we discover that this is Gretchen, a witch and intern at Zombillénium, who has a skateboard attached to her broomstick). A shaken Hector goes to a café and is told that she’ll be from Zombillénium and decides to launch a surprise safety inspection and heads to the park where he is met by park manager Francis Von Bloodt. Hector manages to sneak off, takes an employee elevator and finds a hidden floor button – the elevator takes him to Hell.

Francis

So, the background was actually given during this sequence and over the credits. The site was a mine years before and the miners actually broke through to Hell and were killed and zombified for their trouble. The park was later built over the site and is staffed by monsters. We later discover that Francis convinced Satan to back his plan for an Earth based business where monsters could live – but promised a financial investment return and the park is struggling. However, in the here and now he has to take care of the human who has stumbled onto the secret.

a low-rent Hellboy?

We see Lucy at a cemetery – her father is dead and she has to remain (as an orphan) at the school. Hector, meanwhile, awakens. As well as being bitten by Francis – a vampire – he has been bitten by a werewolf and they wait to see what he’ll become. Unfortunately he seems to be an ordinary zombie and is put to work on the cotton candy stall. As the film moves on, he morphs more and more into a demon – there is no explanation of how this occurs but let’s just go with it (and enjoy the Hellboy comment).

Steven sparkles

He quickly discovers there is a hierarchy at the park – with zombies at the bottom end and the vampires lording it over them – Victor alone is open to monster equality, the other vampires, including main vampire Steven, are not. Steven is drawn with a “Cullen” look and actually sparkles at times, whilst all the other vampires (bar Francis) are goths and emos. We also discover that vampires invented the garlic myth and can turn into bats. Steven entertains people on the Ferris wheel as a heartthrob but the scary side of the park is struggling. Hector, of course, turns that around as well as befriending skeleton union leader Sirius. However when humans come to invest in the park, Steven hatches a plot to take over, make it a romantic vampire theme for the whole park and get rid of the lower class workers.

Cerberus

It is that industrial aspect that kids just aren’t going to get – worker exploitation, in line with the Marxist depiction of “Capital is dead labour, that, vampire-like, only lives by sucking living labour, and lives the more, the more labour it sucks”. Venture capitalists undermining the things they touch, spoiling the artistic concept, and rejecting the workers (sending them into Hell to push *the* wheel in endless exploitative torment). At this point, as an aside, can I mention Cerberus guarding the damned souls on the wheel depicted as having one of the three dogs heads as a yappy dog was genius. Beyond the aside, there was an interesting political/economic allegory going on that just didn’t feel comfortable with its place in a family animation.

explaining the garlic myth 

The same allegory saw the clash between scary monsters and romantic monsters and the conclusion (spoiler, but obvious) that the punters actually want scary monsters even though they seem to have fallen for a romantic vampire narrative. The film didn’t build the primary characters enough, however, whether this was family entertainment or more adult. I liked the animation style but, in keeping with the family side, it was fairly bloodless (making the scary monster vs sanitised/romantic side ironic in many respects). The theme of child abuse (the teacher is outright abusive to Lucy and locks kids in cupboards generally) is never satisfactorily resolved. On that adult/family dichotomy, having Satan actively involved (we don’t see him, but see his shadow, hear him and see fire belch out of monitors/phones when he calls) was a brave move but one that further obscured who the vehicle’s target audience was.

Gretchen using her powers

All that said, I did enjoy this for what it was; I do want to try out the graphic novels at some point and suspect that they will gear more towards adult audiences and build characters (and play with the political economic themes) that much more. My enjoyment of the film makes me want to give it 6 out of 10 but suspect its generous.

The imdb page is here.

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon US