Guest Blog: Cain as Vampire

Today on TMtV we welcome author Dina Rae to the blog. Cain, the biblical figure, has been a source of artistic speculation. Whilst association with vampirism would seem to date to the Vampire the Masquerade game, artistic use of the figure goes back much further (Byron writing a play based on the character where his murderous act is encouraged through mystical visions provided by Lucifer). Like the figure of Lilith, the association of Cain with the vampire is now cemented into popular consciousness and, to mark the novel Peacocks, Pedestals, and Prayers being globally free on September 30th 2021 through to October 4th 2021, Dina Rae offers us a theory for that association.

Vampires have been around since the beginning of time. Cain was the first recorded account of vampirism. Cain's biography began in Genesis as Adam's first son. He and his brother Abel gave God their offerings. Abel was a shepherd, and he gave God a sheep. Cain was a farmer, and he offered God the fruits of his crop. God made it known that He favored Abel's offering. Cain took his brother to a field, and then killed him. Some believed Cain killed him with a rock, while others claimed he killed him with a knife that was used for disembowelling animals. Regardless of the "how", Cain lied to God when asked about Abel's whereabouts. The famous quote "Am I my brother's keeper?" came from this story.

Most believed Cain's motive was jealousy. Cain did not like how God seemed to favor Abel. But in the Muslim faith, Cain and Abel were in love with the same woman, Aclima. She was also Adam's daughter which made her at the very least their half-sister, maybe even their full sister. The offering to God was not about God, but rather using God's favorite gift as a way to determine who would get the girl as a wife.

Furthermore, Ancient Jewish philosophers claimed that Cain was not Adam's son, but Sammael's son, suggesting that Eve was an adulteress. Sammael was an angel who was linked with Satan, or even Satan himself. This made Abel his half-brother. This also meant that Cain was a Nephilim.

But Cain's biography continued. God sentenced Cain to a life of wandering, and he wandered for over seven hundred years. Cain fathered six children, 2 daughters and 4 sons. He was possibly killed by stones when his house collapsed on top of him (Jubilees), a neat and convenient poetic justice from those who believed he killed his brother with a stone. He could have also been killed by Lamech, his great-grandson, who mistook him for a wild beast, which adds further ammunition to the vampire theory.

Somewhere before Cain's death and after he murdered his brother, God put a mark on Cain that cursed him indefinitely. Part of the curse involved an immunity from death. It was written that anyone who tried to kill Cain would suffer a sevenfold vengeance. The type of mark was unknown. Ancient scholar Rav stated that Cain was cursed with horns that protruded from his head. Rashi, another ancient scholar, believed the letter of God was etched into Cain's skull.

Cain wandered away from his family and eventually met Lillith, the first wife of Adam, his father. They had an affair, and she seduced him with ancient witchcraft. She held a ceremony and cut herself open for blood which was collected into a bowl. Cain drank it. This story echoed a pre-anti-Christ Last Supper with the unholy grail.

At some point during Cain's wanderings, three angels independently visited him and offered a chance to repent for his brother's murder. He refused all of them. They further cursed him with a weakness to fire, aversion to sunlight, and an insatiable desire for blood (Talmud, Book of Adam and Eve, and historiolas).

Cain eventually left Lillith and wandered off to Ubar. In the Bible, Cain settled somewhere in the land of Nod which was east of Eden. Cain received fame and respect in his village, gaining power and control. Legend stated that Cain was fascinated by two lovers and changed them into creatures like him. They were given immortality, but chose to walk in sunlight and die after finding out their new kind of life would not grant them children.

Cain was devastated and wanted other beings to be like him. His son Enoch begged Cain to change him into Cain's likeness, and eventually got his wish. Soon the village name of Ubar was changed to Enoch. Enoch eventually learned how to change others to be like him and his father such as heads of state, military, lands, and other high posts. This theory overlapped with other secret society theories connected with vampire dynasties.

Peacocks, Pedestals, and Prayers is a new release about a fallen angel/vampire who hijacks an ancient religion. Biblical lore, ancient cults, Nephilim, vampire allusions, occult, Enoch, exorcism, and mind control are elements of the story.

In Kindle format @ Amazon US

In Kindle format @ Amazon UK

Son – review

Director: Ivan Kavanagh

Release date: 2021

Contains spoilers

If I had to sum Son up it would be a film that takes its beat from what we might guess happened, postpartum and post film, to Rosemary’s Baby. There has been commentary I’ve seen that suggests the film plays with whether the events are all in the protagonist’s head and I do see that but even on first watch I was fairly much of the opinion all the way through that she is experiencing the events and they are not a psychotic hallucination.

I did consider whether this should be cast as a vampire film or whether it just used tropes from the genre. All in all the events are certainly vampiric – you might disagree but you can’t escape the use of tropes.

in the diner

The film starts, after views from a windshield driving through torrential rain, in a diner with a woman – at this point in her life called Anna but through the majority of the film going by the name Laura (Andi Matichak) – whose feet are naked and muddy. Two men enter, sitting at different tables one directly behind her. She gets up, holding her heavily pregnant belly, and leaves. The men follow. She drives off the road and into a field, the rain still torrential, her labour started. What happened with the men is never shown. She tries to will the baby not to come, she doesn’t want it, but is soon holding her baby son.

idyllic

Cut forward 8 years and Laura is leaving the house with son David (Luke David Blumm), over the road neighbour Susan (Erin Bradley Dangar) says Hi and Laura checks she is still ok to have him after school. The banter between son and mother is friendly and amusing to them both, she drops him at school and goes to her job as a teacher; she is late that evening as she is doing a course herself in childhood PTSD. She collects him from Susan’s but little does she know that is the last idyllic day.

home invaders

She is sat on her bed, working on a file, when she hears movement. Thinking it is David she calls out but doesn’t get a response. She goes to his room, opens the door and there are people stood round the bad – the door slams shut and she can’t get in. She runs out of the house screaming for help, gets to Susan’s and asks her to call 911 and goes back to the house. Inside she gets to David’s room but no-one is there, David is led across the bed naked. The cops come but can find no trace of forced entry. One, Steve (Cranston Johnson), doesn’t believe her but his partner Paul (Emile Hirsch) is more sympathetic.

rash

A day passes. Paul visits her to say they found no prints other than the expected. David complains of not feeling great, but Laura points out he hasn’t eaten. That night, when she thinks she notices a prowler, she calls Paul. He can find no one but David comes downstairs unwell and vomits blood. At hospital, when they cut his pjs away has a virulent rash that is opening to sores. They don’t know what is wrong with him and tell Laura to expect the worst. She sleeps by his bed, in scrubs, but awakens to find he has blood at his mouth and calls out for help. Cut to the morning and it is as though nothing is wrong with him.

satisfying the hunger

Abandoning the blow-by-blow suffice to say that David continues to not eat, despite appearing well, and by the evening has become ill again (having seizures and regaining the rash). Laura has told Paul she escaped a cult (the official version is that she escaped a paedophile ring run by her father) and believes there is a cultish conspiracy with the hospital, so goes on the run with David. One thing that was not explained was, after the escape from the cult and subsequent birth, what became of David during the time that she was placed into a psychiatric facility. She quickly discovers that David, when ill, becomes ravenous for human flesh and that eating it cures his illness and clears his skin up.

prowling

This is our vampiric element – the need to consume flesh and blood, a ravenous hunger and an inability to imbibe normal food. Without feeding there is illness, when the hunger overcomes him his strength is prodigious (we see him take down a large man (David Kallaway, Angel & Gothic Harvest) and he is only 8) and he becomes angry and the opposite of the loving son he normally is – for instance shouting “Give me some F*cking food, you bitch”. Laura becomes convinced he was conceived with a demon and that his new state was triggered by the cult (in his bedroom) and they must have given him flesh to eat (trope-wise this fits with the type of lore when a feed sets a new turn's vampiric nature).

holding vigil

The film is fun. There are some twists (though mostly the beats follow as you would expect) but even on a second viewing it manages to maintain interest well. There is a certain rhythm that reminded me a tad of Angel Heart (though not nearly as powerful as that film). The plaudits must go to Luke David Blumm who does really well, especially with the more physical acting but also by feeling really natural with dialogue and Andi Matichak who does all the heavy lifting for the film. The Blu-Ray release has a brief set of interviews with cast and crew and deleted scenes. Those deleted scenes give a lot more background to Laura’s escape from the cult but were rightly deleted as I can only imagine them snarling the pace. That pace is what keeps the film interesting and is integral. 7 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon US

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon UK

Short Film: Elysia

Viewed at the 2020 IVFAF, this 2020 short was directed by Wesley Mellott and comes in at 10 minutes. At the head of the film, we meet Elysia (Rachel Donahue), a human who is in a relationship with vampire Molly (Chloe Carroll). Elysia narrates for us.

As we first see them, they are together, Molly the more sexually dominant, it appears. Her fangs bared and she moves towards the neck. She doesn’t bite, however. Rather she pricks the neck with a finger sheath and then drinks the blood. Why? To prevent turning? Possibly, though the short never says. With blood welling from her mouth she goes to kiss Elysia, making blood play part of their sexuality (later we also see a bandage rack that may be for victims or them, but the bed certainly has handcuffs attached).

the lovers

We then see an elderly man, Henry (Robert D. Heath Jr.), dying. He is, Elysia informs us, Molly’s son. He, like Elysia, never wanted to turn and Molly respected his wishes but she takes his death hard and she wants a child. Presumably Henry was born before she was turned and so Molly’s solution is to kidnap a child, Ryan (Wesley Holloway). Elysia is concerned, obviously it is a crime but more she is worried for Ryan’s safety in case Molly slips. The introduction of Ryan changes the relationship and makes Elysia see Molly in a different light…

blood at mouth

This was a well-rounded little short that managed to cram emotional buy-in within the ten-minute running time. The central relationship was well thought out and, of course, queered the film. However, a reading of the film might also be anti-lgbt – I don’t think that was what the filmmakers set out to achieve but nevertheless it could be interpreted that way. There is also a domestic abuse commentary that can be read into it. These various readings add layers to a well-made short.

The imdb page is here.

Honourable mention: Soul Reaper

I’m rather glad I’m not reviewing Bob Pipe’s 2019 Brit horror flick because I would have to be horrible about it. It is a cabin in the woods flick that wants to be Cabin in the Woods, if the film were somewhat less self-aware and the operation was run by local yokel’s rather than an international cabal.

Drawn out to a cabin in the woods by Charlie (Asher Green), for his (mixed-gender) stag do, the 9 invitees (2 of whom vanish before both the credits and the others arrive) are drawn from the States in the main. There is a moment in a local pub before they get there that highlights one of the big problems with the film, (ok more than one, but I refer to) the atrocious lack of lighting that leaves the scenes terribly dark. That and the awful dialogue. There is a self-aware moment mentioning the Slaughtered Lamb but little else in the scene to offer credit for.

fang moment

Anyway, several members of the gang are drugged on the first night and suffer hallucinations, before waking with sigils carved in their foreheads. During this one of them, Mike (Alexander Tol), sees fellow attendee Mona (Katrin Larissa Kasper) dancing sexily before him (whilst we see she is on the floor also drugged) until the hallucinated Mona produces fangs and bites him. It’s a blink and miss it moment. In the same sequence we see another attendee Steve (James Groom) suddenly be in a nightclub. Apparently he is then surrounded by zombie sailors – but I got that from the credits as the scene was too dark to make out what surrounded him.

A blink and miss it moment in a very missable film.

The imdb page is here.

On DVD @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Everybloody’s End – review

Director: Claudio Lattanzi

Release date: 2019

Contains spoilers

This Italian movie’s title is somewhat clunky and I think works better with the original title Crucified – however, the Blu-Ray I have uses the clunkier name. The film actually doesn’t reveal its vampire connection openly until towards the end, despite a feed early on, but this is a vampire apocalypse film… it is also a Dracula related piece.

below throat

The film starts with the setting sun and a woman crossing a field. This is, it is later revealed, a flash back in time. She seems to be wearing a nightdress with corset over it and a robe. She is also being followed by a scarred man in hat and long coat. She reaches a building but is grabbed by him, he rips at her clothes to reveal a tattoo and then stabs her with a blade and takes a railway spike and hammers it into her just below the throat…

post-apocalyptic

The credits roll and after we are “in another era, in another place”. That place is apocalyptic, with broken buildings, skyscrapers in part skeletal (though lights are still functioning in places). In a room Steiner (Giovanni Lombardo Radice, City of the Living Dead & the Reverend) is researching using books and his laptop. Lisa (Marina Loi) comes into the room and Steiner suggests he’s getting close. He’s searching for a location and he thinks he has found it… where, perhaps, he might find the source of the evil that has befallen the world.

Steiner and Lisa

Black clad, face shrouded men enter the building – these are the exterminators, men searching for patient zero and killing anyone and everyone just in case. Steiner tells Lisa to save herself and mentions being able to contact by cell phone (which are also still working). We flick away to a scene of a feed, though as we only see the eyes of the biter and the hair of the bitten it is only with knowledge that this a vampire film that you’d associate it with a feed necessarily. Lisa tries to escape but the exterminators catch her eventually and we see an iron nail about to be hammered into her throat.

Rossa and Nera

At a junkyard full of cars a woman, Rossa (Tania Orlandi), sneaks trying to avoid the exterminators. Said killers radio in to suggest they have located an infected… They eventually catch her and determine to “have some fun” before killing her. A second woman, Nera (Veronica Urban), emerges from the shadows (wearing a cops uniform) and shoots the exterminators (incidentally they must have been the last of her bullets as the gun isn’t fired again). She apologies that she had to use Rossa as bait. They leave and it is morning before they find a building to hold up in. The building has charred remains in and, all too late, they realise a group of exterminators has entered the building but they manage to hide. Eventually they head out and find a bunker below an abandoned warehouse.

Cinzia Monreale as Bionda

Also in there is Steiner and eventually they find another woman, Bionda (Cinzia Monreale), who was also a cop though Nera didn’t know her, and finally Michael (Lorenzo Lepori), a doctor. All the women claim to have been drawn there by dreams. The exterminators are also closing in. So, as we get to the finale, we are expressly told that vampires are the issue and Steiner is actually a Van Helsing and descended from the scarred man we saw at the beginning. The film returns to that original scene to show the woman reveal fangs and claws. The tattoo she bore marked her as a bride of Dracula.

vampire

There isn’t much more lore to offer, though we do get psychic attacks made by a vampire, and we don’t see a plague’s worth of vampires. The exterior establishing holocaust shots look really good but the interior sets are limited and we could have done with some more variety and some more character building. The film certainly doesn’t outstay its welcome at 75 minutes but a bit more time going into the players would have been appreciated. That said the film drips with melodrama, and that melodrama works well. I was rather taken with this despite limitations 6 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On DVD @ Amazon UK

Death Drop Gorgeous – review

Directors: Michael J. Ahern, Christopher Dalpe & Brandon Perras

Release date: 2020

Contains spoilers

If you go out to find information about Death Drop Gorgeous you will see it described as a slasher (it is) and a giallo (in as much as the face-unseen killer wears black gloves, I suppose, plus some interesting lighting at the end of the film) but it's not really described as a vampire movie. Well, the trailer mentions a vampire killer, to be fair, as bodies are drained of blood, but it almost feels like I’m spoiling and betraying a trust reviewing it as a vampire film.

bloody nails

But the thing is, it is a vampire film in the Bathory mode and, long before Michael Myers stalked the neighbourhood, before proto-slasher films such as Peeping Tom (1960), there were films such as I Vampiri in which murders occur in order to use blood to make the ‘vampire’ younger. This is the central plot point of this film.

murder weapon in hand

The film is set around the Providence gay community and the primary location is a drag club. My understanding is that much of the cast were drawn from non-actors but, despite trying to layer the camp on a little too deliberately in places, this works really well. It opens with a young man trying to get in the bar and being kicked out. He has received a message (via dating app Pounder) and meets up with the date in a parked-up car. The unseen date offers him lines of (what looks like) coke, which he sniffs but his nose starts bleeding. He manages to get out of the car but can’t get far. He is stabbed repeatedly with a screwdriver.

Brian and Dwayne

Dwayne (Wayne Gonsalves) has returned to Providence after his B&B enterprise and relationship failed. He goes to the club to ask owner Tony (Brandon Perras) for his old job back. Tony tries to get him selling drugs, when he refuses Tony offers him shifts on a Tuesday night. Dwayne is staying with friend Brian (Christopher Dalpe) who drags him out for the night to see new drag sensation Janet Fitness (Matthew Pidge), whilst Brian meets with a Pounder date (Tradd Sanderson). The date doesn’t go so well – the date tells Brian that he only dates men who act like men (Dalpe does lay the camp on thick through his performance) and, looking at Dwayne, adds that he doesn’t date blacks either – this throwaway line felt like a barbed comment aimed by the filmmakers at certain attitudes they may have come across.

Wayne Gonsalves as Dwayne

Dwayne does, slightly, get aggro with him, deliberately bumping into him (I’ll come back to this) but the date then goes off and (via Pounder) arranges a hook-up for a casual blowjob. The directions lead him to a house and down the bulkhead into a cellar. The plastic sheeting should have been a warning sign but he spots a glory hole and uses it. After some fellatio, things stop and we see, on the other side of the wall, a meat grinder being brought to bear on his bits – yup, it’s a fairly gratuitous and excruciating penectomy before he is killed also.

Michael McAdam as Gloria Hole

Goth drag queen Tragedi (Complete Destruction) who cleans at the club finds, with a glorious air of ennui, the first victim in a dumpster. Tony calls cop Detective O’Hara (Michael J. Ahern), whose new partner Detective Barry (Sean Murphy) is a little shocked when O’Hara takes a bribe to move the body so it isn’t connected to the club. Meanwhile Gloria Hole (Michael McAdam), who used to be the top drag act, has been relegated to Tuesday night slots and calling bingo and is resentful of the new acts as well as wanting to get her dues. Of course, the killer is still out there and, in targeting gay men, seems to be connected to the club.

news report

This was great fun, though it was perhaps a tad too long and certain scenes were perhaps unnecessary – the scene of Dwayne on his night off getting into a fight after the guy he was with was revealed to be openly fickle seemed to serve little purpose other than to than prove Dwayne had some physical fight in him – something his moment with the racist in the club had shown anyway. That said, the Dwayne character almost missed simply because he was such a ray of hope amongst a sea of catty characters, and so showing the harder edge to him was perhaps needed. The deliberate layering of camp, mostly round the Brian character, might have missed but he was so endearing that the character worked. Most fantastic was Michael McAdam whose character channelled Bette Davis’ Baby Jane.

blood bath

Watch out for the spoilers ahead… As for the vampirism, well we do get bathing in blood and the results are seen to be making the killer younger, at least through other character reactions. It is also implied that they gain enhanced strength, able to pick someone up by the neck. Long nails, especially soaked in gore, look for the world like an undead’s talons. We even get a version of staking, with a nativity scene star, plus a suggestion of immortality. Mostly, however, we get a variety of killings, in keeping with the slasher mentality, all committed for the blood (or 'rejuvenating twink blood' as it is described). For the most part the effects are pretty darn well done for a low budget production. 6.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

From the Pages of Bram Stoker's 'Dracula': Harker - Review

Author: Tony Lee

Artwork: Neil van Antwerpen & Peter-David Douglas

First published: TPB 2009

Contains spoilers

The blurb: The first graphical 'sequel' to Dracula ever to be endorsed by a member of the Stoker family! Six months after Dracula dies, A ghostly vision informs the Harkers that their work is not yet done - and the Count's last surviving bride returns to London to gain revenge - and use Mina's unborn baby as a new host for Dracula! Featuring introductions from Dacre Stoker, Ian Holt and Leslie S. Klinger, this story includes every major character from the original - alive AND dead!

The review: The title is a mouthful, although the rerelease in 2017 shortened this to Harker, this is a sequel to Dracula in graphic novel form. Before I look at the graphic itself, I want to touch on the forewords mentioned in the blurb – and point out that the one by Elizabeth Miller is missing. They were a mixed bunch. Miller’s was as you would expect, which is great. Klinger’s own release, the New Annotated Dracula, was very good but in it he ran with the announced conceit that he was annotating as though the novel were fact – all well and good but continuing that conceit into the forward for an independent comic book seemed a tad off – bearing in mind that many readers would not know where the conceit came from. Ian Holt’s piece (actually at the back of the volume, along with Dacre Stoker’s and thus not really forewords/introductions) irked when he said of their jointly written sequel “our prime directive was to always be true to Bram’s story, characters and themes.” To understand how much poppycock this is see my review of said sequel. It must be said that this graphic novel is perhaps truer to the original than Holt’s, my thoughts on the guest commentators does not alter my view of the actual graphic.

detail

So, the comic itself is set shortly after the action in Dracula and the crew of light try to regain their lives. However, the first character we see returning posthumously from the novel is Quincy, whose spectral self visits Harker to say that the forces of Dracula move against them. There was a bride (unseen in the novel though twin sister of Countess Dolingen of Gratz from Dracula’s Guest who, in turn, is said to have killed Van Helsing’s son) and she seeks to resurrect Dracula by using Mina’s unborn child. Mina, for her part, regains the scar on her forehead from the communion host and is haunted by Dracula’s spirit, causing her to see him in dreams and when awake. To help with her machinations, Countess Dracule resurrects the corpse of Renfield – undead but not vampire, his broken neck set in a brace to keep his head steady and upright and looking as corpselike as he should.

Whilst the plot is quite contrived in the way it pulls characters back, it does work in that comic book way but, importantly, the actions of the primary human characters feel right. The lore perhaps misses in a couple of places. Dracula’s spirit, visible only to Mina, basks in the sunlight of a morning saying he has not been able to do so for centuries – of course this is wrong and Dracula was quite able to bask in sunlight (albeit without access to supernatural powers).

The art is ok. It has quite a muted colour scheme and I didn’t dislike it but it didn’t wow me either. However, I rather liked this as a whole package. It is fairly short, so whilst it has some interesting ideas it could have been more. There was room for expansion within it, which would have served it well. 6.5 out of 10.

In Paperback @ Amazon US

In Paperback @ Amazon UK

Short Film: The First Taste

Viewed at the 2020 IVFAF. This was a 2018 short film directed by Amanda Violetto and Kai Pacifico Eng that came in at just under the nine-minute mark. It played with embarrassment around sexuality quite nicely within that short time frame and, of course, was vampire themed.

As the film starts, we meet Lucien (Jan Rajmont) who is carrying a wine glass – though the liquid seems too thick to be red wine. He hands the glass to his mother, Isadora (Daisy Kosmider). He sits by her, biting nervously on his nails, which leads his mother to remark about how many germs are on his hands.

with mother

He does retort, but for the viewer it is his mother who sounds both nagging and domineering. She puts his “hysteria” down to nervousness about the next day. He feels he is being thrown to the wolves; he can’t just go around killing who he likes. Her advice is to go for the sweetest smelling girl – it is a case of pheromones. In the conversation we discover their surname is Bathory. However, when in bed and watching a cowboy movie we see him indulging in onanism whilst biting his own arm and sucking the blood.

meeting Issac

It was a nice way to telegraph to us about his sexual preference. Mother, the next day, can’t remain positive and suggests he not wear his hair the way it is as it is too feminine. With mother’s words ringing in his ears, he spots a girl (Iveta Elizabeth Lit) but his attempt to draw her attention (reaching a book she can’t get to, but silently, and then paying for it whilst offering “creepy stalker vibe”) fails. Sat alone on a park bench he is approached by Isaac (Nikita Pronin) and they begin to hit it off… but what would mother say?

self-biting

The answer is embedded below, and this makes for an amusing look at parental pressure on sexuality and the pressure expectation and unsupportive posturing causes, with a vampire twist that implies that for some parents their child’s sexuality is a bigger issue than them being a killer. At the time of writing I couldn’t find an IMDb page.

The First Taste - FAMU International 2018 from Amanda Violetto on Vimeo.

Revisited: Terrified – review

Director: Demián Rugna

Release date: 2018

Contains spoilers

This Argentinean film was looked at by me a couple of years ago as a Vamp or Not? under its Spanish title Aterrados. Be warned that the link to the previous article will lead to full spoilers as I explore whether the film has a vampire element – suffice it to say, for this review, that there very much is both vampiric beings and the restless dead involved. However, with the UK Blu-Ray release upon us I thought it was a good time to revisit the film as a review (just to note that the stills are from the previous review and not illustrative of the Blu-Ray’s print).

the restless child

This is part a psychic investigation film, which then throws several elements into the fray with a sort of haunting element, a restless dead element (with a child corpse that just will not stay in his grave), interdimensional entities and a dose of body horror element at the end of the film. The latter was really interesting and we were beginning to verge on Clive Barker territory (as I mention in the previous article). Perhaps the shame is that such a direction wasn’t exploited but I suspect that was as much budgetary restraints as anything, with the film offering a few moments of body horror but sparing with that use.

Elvira Onetto as Albreck

The film has a genuinely creepy edge, although because it is an investigation (to a degree, the paranormal investigators are fairly certain in and of themselves as to what they’ll find) that a second watch isn’t as captivating as the first but it is still worthwhile. The film is relatively short (at 85 minutes) and there was certainly scope for the film to have been longer and not outstay its welcome. The acting is competent throughout, but the characters could have been fleshed out much more – two of the three paranormal investigators are absolutely paper-thin – however, even without well drawn characters for the most part, the atmosphere is maintained well.

brutal opening

Less exciting was the actual Blu-Ray package. The film is there in a nice print, both in original Spanish and English dub. The English subtitles are SDH – whilst I applaud and support including SDH subs to make the film more accessible for the Deaf and hard of hearing, it should not be beyond wit and wisdom to also include standard subtitles for those who don’t need to be told when (for example) ominous music comes on – load both types onto the disc. There are absolutely no other extras and this is a shame as this is a film that is begging for a director’s commentary to explore his thinking.

Nevertheless, the film is the main event and this is still a very worthwhile horror film and one that certainly falls in the vampire realm – just not your standard Hollywood undead. 7 out of 10 is for the film.

The imdb page is here.

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon US

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon UK

Fascination: The Celluloid Dreams of Jean Rollin – review

Author: David Hinds

Publication date: 2016

The blurb: May 1968. Parisian streets are awash with violence and public unrest. In a small cinema, a surreal vampire film causes a riot: The audience smashes up the auditorium, tear out the seats, and chase the film's director onto the street with violent intent. This is the premiere screening of Jean Rollin's feature debut, The Rape of the Vampire.

An outsider of French cinema, Rollin's films are unique and dreamlike. They offer tales of mystery and nostalgia - of love, childhood, obsolescence and seductive female vampires with a thirst for blood and sex. Rollin made strange, evocative and deeply personal horror films. But he was also at the heart of the French pornographic revolution after the abolishment of censorship (discovering porn queen Brigitte Lahaie, later to star in many of his films).

Funding his own projects, Rollin defiantly made the films he wanted to make and in so doing created a fantastique genre unlike any other. Films like The Nude Vampire, The Living Dead Girl, Fascination and The Grapes of Death are now celebrated as the work of an auteur, one who confounds preconceived notions of what constitutes 'Eurotrash' cinema.

This book is devoted to the director and all his films, across all genres. Written with full co-operation from Jean Rollin, shortly before his death in 2010, it contains exclusive interviews and archive material.

The review: The easiest way to describe this volume is that it is author David Hinds love letter to the works of Jean Rollin and that is evident all the way through. The book opens with several essays on Rollin and his work and is then followed (for the vast proportion of the book) with a look at his films in the form of a survey, I guess. The personal ones are looked at first, a large proportion of which featured vampires, then his commercially tackled films worked at under pseudonyms for a paycheck (not in as much detail), and finally a saunter through the hardcore films he directed (many of which are now lost to the mists of time and were of little importance as films to the auteur). The end of the book transcribes an interview with Rollin conducted in person and another with producer Lionel Wallmann conducted through correspondence.

Now I do like Rollin’s oeuvre but I couldn’t call myself an expert so, when it comes to facts I have to put my trust in Hinds. Unfortunately, there is at least one glaring error when writing about The Nude Vampire he mentions “the Castel Twins, who would appear in Rollin’s next film, Le Frisson des Vampires”. Not so, whilst Marie-Pierre Castel appeared in both films, Catherine Castel appeared in the former but not the latter. Perhaps a simple slip… but when looking at the latter film he puts “the servant girls played by the Castel twins”. As suggested Marie-Pierre did play one of the servant girls but against Kuelan Herce and the author even includes a screenshot from the film of Castel and Herce together. It is a sloppy moment and makes one worry if there are other sloppy moments that went unnoticed? I am trusting not.

Having said that, reference works about Rollin are uncommon and one can feel the love for the auteur’s output in the chatty style. There are a couple of references but not a large number and the bibliography is of Rollin’s output. There is no index but, as most of the volume is a survey of his work, then this is probably not as necessary than it would be in some reference works. With my reservation, outlined above, notwithstanding this is important as it fills a gap in the market. 7 out of 10.

In Paperback @ Amazon US

In Paperback @ Amazon UK

Creepshow: Sibling Rivalry (S2 Ep3) – review

Director: Rusty Cundieff

First aired: 2021

Contains spoilers

From the modern reimagining of Creepshow comes this story that was in season 2 episode 3 paired with the story the Right Snuff.

This one was a bit of a comedy segment but worked really well for it. It also had a spectacular vampire mouth.

So it starts with teen Lola (Maddie Nichols) in with school counsellor Mrs Porter (Molly Ringwald), who she is telling a story to. Her air is vapid, her language filled with Teen speak and it is so well done. She is trying to convince Mrs Porter that her brother, Andrew (Andrew Brodeur) is trying to kill her – though the counsellor is less than convinced. Lola's nsfw side-bars are fantastic (for instance asking whether she can get pregnant by giving a handy – and later describing the finale to that activity). She does talk about a sleepover with her friend Grace (Ja'ness Tate) and waking to discover Grace trying to kiss her – sexual assault says Mrs Porter – a misunderstanding suggests Lola.

vampire's mouth

She tells how Andrew tied her up in the basement – but she broke the ties (which leads to the conclusion that she is making up tales) and his research into medieval weaponry. It isn’t much of a spoiler to say that she has been turned into a vampire but doesn’t remember and when Andrew (axe in hand) confronts her the memories come back (she ate mom and dad). In that flashback scene we see the fantastic mouth, with her top teeth fanged but her bottom jaw extending down with a set of barbs and, later, a rather long demonic forked tongue.

Maddie Nichols as Lola

I spoilt that part of the story, so I won’t spoil how the story is resolved but it is great fun, an excellent use of a small amount of story time to make a great fun vignette. However, it hinges on Maddie Nichols and she was just a revelation. Her portrayal of teen speak was fab and her comic timing was even better. She carried the segment and is a young actress to look out for, on the strength of this. 7 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US via shudder

On Demand @ Amazon UK via Shudder

Quartz Vein – review

Director: Jared Masters

Release date: 2021

Contains spoilers

Writer/director/star Jared Masters has, according to IMDb has made a slew of low budget B movies and from what I can gather crowdfunded this one. But prodigious output is not an indication of quality and this suffers much through ambition (a sci-fi set in the near post-apocalyptic future is not going to be the easiest to film) but also through poor storytelling.

It is one of those moments where I feel cruel – but the film is its own worst enemy. But first let’s cover off the vampire aspect. From the DVD cover we get; “2047. After the humanitarian disaster, one gold miner, Eon Pax, must risk it all to save the girl. Enslaved by a wicked mutant race of gold-injecting vampires…” the blurb goes on but that’s the key, along with the tagline “Sustained by blood, immortalized by gold”.

cloaked mutant

So we start with a girl (Elizabeth Rath) running down a hillside. She is stalked by a cowled and cloaked figure. Intercepted she asks what it wants, she is an anonymous untagged seeking asylum. I assume then it is the same girl we see captured and in a rag bikini (or a clone thereof – clones are mentioned often). Elsewhere a car pulls up (looking rather well kept given it is, in 2047, a museum piece). Out of the car comes Eon Pax (Jared Masters).

Jared Masters as Pax

He is a gold prospector (variously pickaxing into a cliff face, panning for gold or even metal detecting as the whim takes him). He has a pet fly (!) and is looking for gold for evil leader of the mutants Gargoya (also Jared Masters). There then occur a series of encounters such as the one with a mutant who he kills, or with Beba (Dawson Boese) a mechanic who fixes his car and is then stung by wasps, passes out and is injected by Pax with something that will sort her out in an hour but she comes round apparently days later having been left unconscious in the desert, and also with ne’er-do-well Lippy McGhee (James F Gregory) who loses a series of dice games against Pax and so eventually steals his car.

Stealthia and Gargoya

In the meantime, he is getting dreams to follow a quartz vein and rescue a cloned girl held by Gargoya and his minion Stealthia (also Elizabeth Rath). This leads to him running around the same few tunnels and also going into (a remarkably intact) LA in order to stop a ritual where she will be sacrificed. Its all a bit of a mess to be honest, as far as stories go. We do get a vampire bite or two, however, so it’s definitely a vampire sci-fi flick.

bitten

The costumes seem to be Halloween costumes and your continuity is blown when you show a stream, then a close shot of koi carp (in a pool one assumes) and then cut back to the clearly fish empty stream and have the hero fire into the (now invisible) mass of fish to, obviously, miss. Acting is flat and dialogue over-preposterous. On the other hand you can tell that Masters believed in what he was doing and that has to count for something – in this case it counts for about 2 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On DVD @ Amazon US

On DVD @ Amazon UK