The Hunger (1983)
First for today, we have The Hunger starring David Bowie,
Catherine Denevue, and Susan Sarandon. It was based on the novel, The Hunger,
from 1981. In it, Bowie and Denevue play two ancient vampires that live off the
nightlife in New York City. They keep their victims to a minimum , i.e. throw
them into a furnace! When John (Bowie) starts to waste away, he tracks down a doctor,
Sarah (Sarandon), to see if she could help him keep his youth. Let’s just say
that things don’t work out for John. After John’s gone, Miriam (Denevue) ends
up setting her sights on making Sarah a new thrall.
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| If the Merovingian or Monica Bellucci show up to this party, I'm out. |
I really didn’t know what to expect with this movie. I knew
I would be getting something interesting with the intro that let’s you know
that “Bela Legosi’s Dead.” It and David Bowie are probably the most memorable
things from this movie. The story’s quite interesting with how it handles
vampires itself. They can go out in the day and, they can age. Other than the
hunger for blood, they’re pretty normal for rich white folk. The acting here is
pretty good especially with David Bowie, who doesn’t act often. The first half
of the film is quite good.
Where the movie starts to fall off for me is in the latter
half though. I’m not spoiling much, but John doesn’t stay around too long, so
Miriam starts throwing her charms on Sarah. It pretty much turns into an erotic
love story and a really rushed one at that. It’s like someone turned on the
fast forward button, or someone decided that it was better to have two naked
ladies take up screen time. It was probably both. As we rushed on to the end, I
started to care less and less. I will say that the ending was a bit twisty.
Overall, this was interesting, but it lost itself after the first half.
Horror of Dracula
Next up is a classic from Hammer Films. For those who don’t know, Hammer Films were remaking the classic monster films like Frankenstein, the Mummy, and today’s pick, Dracula. They were adding a modern flair to the genre and I think it worked. In Horror of Dracula, Johnathan Harker travels to Klauesenburg to find and kill Count Dracula. When he fails in his mission, Dracula travels to London in order to wreak havoc on Harker’s family. The only one who can stop him is Dr. Van Helsing. Van Helsing enlists the help of John’s almost brother-in-law, Arthur (Michael Gough), to help put Dracula to bed.
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| Okay, anything can work? Fingers as well? |
Now this was fun. I really enjoyed this one. Outside of a
couple of movies, I haven’t seen much of Hammer’s horror films. I have enjoyed
what I’ve seen though, and Horror of Dracula is no different. I can see why
Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee are up there with the best horror icons.
While Lee’s Dracula isn’t as talkative nor suave as Bela Legosi’s Dracula, he
definitely brings the threat factor! He’s definitely brings “Hide yo’ kids,
hide yo’ wife, and hide yo’ husband” vibes, man. Peter Cushing also had his
A-game on as Van Helsing. He’s probably my favorite rendition of that
character.
The story is pretty good even though it apparently didn’t
adapt the original novel all that well. Heck, I bet the Universal version did
that too. You end up seeing the effect Dracula has on Harker’s family as he
terrorizes them. Oh yeah, who knew that Michael Gough (Alfred from the 1990’s
Batman films) liked to hang around dudes in black cloaks? The setting was good
though not as creepy. I guess that happens when color gets added to these
movies. The costumes were good as well. I don’t really have many bad things to
say about it other than Drac’s lack of words. This was a good one.
Vampyr
Next up, we go even farther back into the past to Germany this time. Vampyr was released in 1932 and is pretty much a sound film edited into a silent film. This was actually one of the first movies I saw on HBO Max last year. I like the classics, okay? Anyway, the movie is about Allan Gray, a young man who has an interest in the occult. He stops in the village of Courtempierre and finds a bunch of strange sightings. He eventually finds out that the town is under the curse of an old vampire (or Vampyr). He does his best to rid the village of the vampire and save its latest victim from dying.
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| (Looks at screen bewildered) |
This was a weird film, but I don’t know if I could call it a
pretty good one. It does have its pluses though. The whole thing has an eerie,
ethereal feel to it. When Gray first comes to the town, he experiences a
crapton of just weird stuff. The scene that wigs me out the most is this one
scene where a guy is sitting and his shadow just gets up and does stuff. Of
course, the weirdness doesn’t stop there. Gray ends up falling into some sort
of dream-sleep and ends up seeing himself being entombed in a coffin.
The story itself is fine though told in a weird way. It gets
a bit confusing from time to time. It can also be a bit of a slog, though this
was in the hey-day of movies. Apparently, this movie wasn’t well-received at
the time, and I can kinda see why. Still, the atmosphere and weirdness kept me
interested. Overall, it’s an interesting movie that tries different things.
Classic horror-heads, it is a watch.
Robo Vampire
Finally, I had to end this pretty good time with the bad one
of the group. No, this isn’t the movie where Robocop gets turned into a vampire
and reigns bloody hell on Detroit because that would be fun! No, we have a
movie that mashes Robocop, Rambo 2, a few kung fu movies, and Dracula into a
bowl. The end result is a pretty horrid movie. In “RoboDude,” drug smugglers
are using Chinese Vampires to help with their growing empire. Narcotics officer
Tom Wilde ends up getting killed during one of their raids… and then is suddenly
made into an android robot who could give Robocop a run for his money. Oh yeah,
the leader of the Chinese vampires also has to deal with a ghost witch who’s in
love one of the Chinese vampires! Then (from a completely unrelated movie no
less!) we have some agents trying to save one of the narcotic officers from
another drug lord.
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| If you think the main plot is weird, the hostage plot involves a village of innocents being slaughtered. |
I mostly know of the director, Godfrey Ho, from a reviewer
called the Cinema Snob. The dude would literally cut and paste movies together,
and you can definitely tell here. While we got Robo Warriror (ain’t that some
other movie) doing his thing, we have a hostage situation going on that is
barely tied to the wildness. At least this thing is in the “so bad, it’s good” category.
It’s so unintentionally funny. The Chinese Vampire Priest also cracked me up
with all that he was doing. I highly doubt Chinese vampire trainers do all the
wacky stuff he did. In the end, this a watchful dud. I first found this on
Amazon Prime and watched for some reason. It’s now on Tubi if you’re that
interested.
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| Yes, somehow "Kung Fu Larry" fits into this plot of drugs, vampires, and scantily clad ghosts! |
…………………………………………
Unless anything pops up, this might be my last post for the
month. I never know these days. The blog muse comes and goes. As for these
films, at least three of them are worth watching. Robo Vampire may not be one
of them though. Also, just know that there’s some nudity in The Hunger and Robo
Vampire. Anyway, that’s all I got for today, so peace, God Bless, and be careful
out there. Also, know that there are actual vampires out there. Who do you
think is behind student loans?
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