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.
Ghost Stories was a short lived short horror story series in the same vain as The Twilight Zone. It aired on the Fox Family Channel in the United States in 1998.
In this story a horror fanatic who works at a video store ditches a girl who's interested in him when his favorite movie star invites him to be in one of her films.
Female Vampire Factor: The movie star in this film is Mindy McCobb played by Kim Cristo.
McCobb represents the late night B-movie scream queens of the 80's and 90's. Joey who is her biggest fan is no longer affected by horror movies and cynically judges how bad they are when she appears at the store one night and invites him to come to the set of her new film where she's the monster this time and not the victim. Joey agrees, forgetting he had made a date with his co-worker earlier.
Once on the set he struggles with the concept of acting especially when his role requires him to be afraid of Mindy who he is madly in love with.
Things eventually change when during one of the takes things get a little too real. The films victim he's supposed to find fictionally dead is actually dead and Mindy who is supposed to be playing a vampire seems to actually be one and is now chasing him around the studio.
The story ends with Joey running around with the dexterity of a drunken toddler tying to escape the studio with the camera eventually pulling back to show that his attempted escape is being shown on the television at the video store he worked at with the girl he ditched and a customer commenting on how corny the film is.
Final Opinion: The "scream queen actress who played in vampire movies is actually one in real life" story is one that didn't get used enough but the few times it did it always worked (Fright Night 2, Blonde Heaven). This is no different. I can definitely recommend this episode for female vamp fans even if there is no fangs.
The Gist: After being bitten by a snake a woman transforms into a blood sucking vampire.
Clarification: I had to go to the IMDB plot summery for that. This is a very artsy film full of camera tricks, screen filters and nothing plot wise is actually spelled out. Basically a woman is doing a video diary the whole movie explaining what's going on with her which is followed by scenes of her doing stuff with no dialogue or explanation till her next days diary and even then it's not very clear what's happening. Basically an over thought out music video or late 90's playboy strip tease video would be the best comparison I can make.
Selling Point: Generally the "Doing stuff" portion is either in lingerie, sexy club wear or nothing at all.
Female Vampire Factor: Your vampire in this film is played by British actress Melanie Denholme
So if you're going to watch a confusing film where the lead actress spends much of it in sexy clothes you can do much worse. Not much else I can add to this that wasn't said above as the film really doesn't have much substance to it. In the film she is either talking into a camera or in artistically edited scenes where she's doing things like taking a bath, walking around her home, getting dressed or undressed and by the movies end feeding on people she's seduced into her home (an assumption based on the clothing as very little of this film takes place outside of her home so you only see the feeding and nothing that leads to it).
Speaking of the feeding, she does have fangs but as seen on the box art they are the piranha style and not your traditional vampire fangs.
This is one point where the artsy style of the film does help as the weird vision and filters do make them sexier than they otherwise would be.
In the end I would say it's better than other British indy horror movies that are like this since they attempt a sexy horror movie without trying to over-saturate it with side plot like many of the others of this genre do.
but considering how bad some of those were that's not saying much. I give the film a Vampire Beauty Rating of 3 out of 5.
The Gist: An aspiring singer(Teri Copley) finds out her father has passed away and goes to Transylvania along with a vampire hunter and the nephew of a librarian for the funeral and will reading.
Clarification: So this is a horror film parody. Marissa (the aspiring singer) gets to Transylvania just to find out her uncle is a Dracula like vampire as is her "cousins" and their goal is to inherit the castle and specifically take possession of an evil book hidden in it but Marissa being the closest living relative is in their way. Also in their way is the fact that the executor of the will is Victor Von Helsing - a vampire hunter.
Basically the film is full of 80's horror movie references though the vampire portions are pretty much lifted from Hammer Horror's Dracula franchise. Though a full on vampire film it does find a way to fit in parodies of nearly every horror movie monster of the 1980's like Freddie Krueger, Jason Vorhees, Leatherface and Pin Head.
The comedy in the film is pretty much based on breaking the 3rd wall with most jokes involving the characters recognizing the various horror movie cliches like the eerie music in various scenes, convenient thunder and lighting and jump scare tactics. Also Marissa's boyfriend Dexter (Steve Altman) breaks out into song partway through the film which is about breaking out into song. The humor is funny for it's time but is very dated to audiences not familier with horror movies pre 1990 won't get it.
Selling Point: See Female Vampire Factor
Female Vampire Factor: Since the film is a parody of Hammer Horrors Dracula films you get a few female vamps in the film. Most of which are played by recognizable (by 1980's standards) scream queens. One scene sees Von Helsing on a date with scream Queen and former Vampirella model Brinke Stevens
Also you have the Brides of Dracula but in this case they're portrayed as Lord Orlocks daughters Pattie (Monique Gabrielle), Laverne (Vinette Cecelia) and Maxine (Toni Naples)
While two of them are barely scene Pattie (or Patricia as she prefers) is one of the main antagonists of the film thus gets lots of screen time as her goal is to sink her fangs into Von Helsing. That's a major positive considering Gabrielle was a former Penthouse pet and super hot.
So basically every good vampire scene in the movie involves Gabrielle and she does eventually get her man.
In the end you have a very dated but still somewhat funny vampire parody that gives you quite a few things to look forward to. I give it a Vampire Beauty Rating of 4 out of 5.
The Gist: Three nerds from the midwest take off for Hollywood for a life of stardom but end up in over their heads when they head to a a vampire run brothel on their first night.
Clarification: This film by Fred Olen Ray is one of those old school "USA Up All Night" classics that is EXTREMELY hard to find now a days (if you find a copy jump on it IMMEDIATELY). It's 80's B movie magic at it's finest, full of bad puns and R rated humor to the point that it's so bad that you have to like it. Especially Eddie Deezen as super nerd "Kyle" who is probably the only one in the world to end up in a bed with a hot girl in lingerie and try to run and that's long before she breaks out with the fangs.
Selling Point: It's a movie that consists of naked women with fangs and tons of sex humor which is always a great combo.
Female Vampire Factor: This film gets a Vampire Beauty Rating of 5 out of 5. The movie is all about how hot they are. As a matter of fact the only non hot thing about them is what happens to them when they touch holy water. That's definitely not pretty at all. Otherwise it's 80+ minutes of hot fanged women in lingerie with goofy comedy in between.
Vampiress Cast
Britt Ekland (Madamme Cassandra)
AKA the hot blonde bond girl from "The Man With the Golden Gun", a much older (but still hot) Ekland plays the owner of the brothel and head vampire of the group. Most of her air time consists of her attempting to make bad puns regarding her dislike of the "Beverly Hills Cops" and directing the girls.
Jillian Kesner (Claudia)
The sexy late actresses character Claudia is the one who handles clients who are into a much rougher version of having a good time. She's very much a dominatrix just without the whips and chains and ball gags (all the girls at the bordello dress very classy). She's one of the first vamps to vamp out on screen and unfortunately for her she's also the first the hunters encounter to take out (and it isn't pretty what happens to her either).
Debra Lamb (Jessica)
Jessica is the glamor of the group. When she ends up in the bedroom with one of the nerds named Russell all he wants out of her is to take sexy pictures of her in and out of her lingerie. She's also really into talking dirty as she explains to Kyle while he's vampire hunting how all she wants to do is bite his neck, drink his vital juices and make him her sex slave for all eternity (before groping him and giving him the old "is there a stake in your pocket or are you glad to see me" line).
Michelle Bauer (Kristina)
Scream Queen Bauer who has appeared as a vampire in a few other films after this including 1995's Blonde Heaven (which for reasons beyond me has since been renamed "Morgana" for it's DVD release) was the vampire originally assigned to have sex with then drain movie protagonist Kyle. Because Kyle is loyal to his girlfriend he wants nothing to do with her and ends up escaping. She almost gets her hands on Kyle through hypnosis (or as True Blood would call it "glamoring") but he came prepared with a cross on his boxer shorts. I can't say Kyle won out in that case if going out also meant he was going to get a happy ending.
Brigitte Burdine (Molly)
The late actress who spent her last years of her life as a casting director for popular video games played the midwest girlfriend that Kyle was so loyal too. Eventually she gets worried about Kyle and heads to L.A. to find out what's going on with him. When she gets their the only one she finds is Brock (Tim Conway Jr.) has has already been turned into a vampire by the girls in the bordello who then volunteers to help her look for Kyle. The next time we see her is at the end of the movie where Kyle believes that everything has gone back to normal after killing the head vampire until you see that Brock and Molly both now have fangs and are going after him.
