Film Reviews

Vampires Suck

• Rating:
• Director: Adam Seltzer, Jason Freidberg.
• Starring: Jenn Proske, Matt Lanter, Diedrich Bader, Chris Riggi.
• Details: US / 82mins (12A).

It's official. I'm ashamed of myself. Regular readers of Entertainment.ie have probably come across myself and Mike's damning reviews (and that's being kind) of Messrs. Seltzer and Freidberg's previous offerings (Disaster Movie, Epic Movie, Meet The Spartans, etc) but there are a few giggles in Vampires Suck, a parody of the Twilight movies. Not a lot, but a few. This time out they've settled on an actual plot rather than a series of painfully unfunny sight gags of celebrities and pop culture references, and the result, although still not anywhere near what can be deemed good, is an improvement. Taking Twilight and New Moon as the basis for the jokes, Seltzer and Freidberg delight in poking fun at the sexual subtext and angsty teen attitudes synonymous with the series. Writing on the nose, spelling out the nuances of the Twilight movies, needs a deft touch but lines like 'Twilight blatantly plays out the fantasies of teenage girls' is just far too obvious. The characters' names highlight the differences of the gag-hit ratio - Bella Swan is now Becca Crane (an obvious, easy and unfunny joke) and Edward Cullen is now Edward Sullen (obvious and easy, yes, but funny too). Vampires Suck veers from the embarrassingly unfunny (so unfunny it would put you in a bad mood) to the surprisingly decent. There are the expected lazy pop culture references: Tiger Woods, Taylor Swift, Jersey Shore, Lady Gaga, Alice In Wonderland and Buffy (we know it's Buffy because she's got a T-shirt that says 'Buffy' on it) all pop up but thankfully there are severely trimmed back this time out. The Jacob/wolf gags are Seltzer/Freidberg at their worst (he turns into a chihuahua at one point) and the less said about the 'It's Raining Men' scene the better. Where the directors strike gold is in newcomer Jenn Proske who nails Kristen Stewart's breathy um-eh-oh-umh-ugh mopey mannerisms to a T. Comedian Diedrich Bader (Office Space), as Becca's father, weighs in with some chuckles too. They've also condensed the overlong running time of both movies into a coherent and slim 82 minutes (which is some doing) and with its gloomy greys manage to make Vampires Suck actually look like the series. Maybe Seltzer and Freidberg were lulling everyone into a false sense of security - Ha! We're crap, but we're not as crap as you thought! - but Vampires Suck is the not vomiting-inducing, blood-boiling, march on Hollywood-inspiring 'comedy' we're used to from the pair. It's still bad, though - crap-plus-one is still crap. If you want to see a real parody, give your money to Black Dynamite instead.

Review by Gavin Burke