Vegas Vampires DVD: Review By Dodd

Fred Williamson has had quite the interesting career. After playing football for the Kansas City Chiefs (shameless plug for my home team), Williamson joined the pantheon of icons affiliated with blaxploitation and urban cinema. His relevance in the 1970's was even brought back in nostalgic flashback flicks such as Original Gangsters and Starsky and Hutch. So what is next for the ball-player/actor? Directing! To sweeten the deal, Williamson has ventured into the horror genre with the straight-to-video flick Vegas Vampires. How does the Hammer hold up in the director's chair? Let's just say that, like the characters in the film, it sucks.

Vegas Vampires is a hyperlink drama of sorts by introducing a wide array of characters that all have a reason to go to Las Vegas. There is a hardened detective (Tiny Lister) who is privately hired to travel to Sin City to find the daughter of a wealthy hot shot. There is also his partner (Glenn Plummer) and competitor (Daniel Baldwin) on the force. The array of characters also includes a pair of love birds who travel to Vegas to get hitched. What none of these people expect is to stumble upon a sect of bloodthirsty vampires waiting hungrily in the city where dreams come true and secrets stay buried.

Let me first say that I am a sucker for horror flicks. I even volunteer to rate straight-to-video fare with hopes of discovering an underrated and splattery gem. When I stumbled upon the screener copy for Vegas Vampires, I had high hopes. Fred Williamson is in the director's chair, while urban cinema staples such as Richard Roundtree and Tiny "Zeus" Lister are in front of the camera. Despite my expectations for an entertaining hybrid of hip-hop and horror, this film served as a reminder that an hour and a half of my free time has been stolen from me.

I truly appreciate it when small-time directors try to throw together a horror film. Sometimes underdogs will come through with something truly original. Therefore, it saddens me to see Fred Williamson create something so effortless. Considering the fact that Williamson is famous and has connections, I expected an honest homage to his roots in the entertainment industry. While he managed to wrangle some prominent cast members (I do mean Shaft!), he flat-out fails as a director. Where Williamson is trying to go with this film is beyond me, but I don't think Vegas Vampires is intended to be an intentional exercise in camp. It is almost as if Williamson took the print for Vampire in Brooklyn, flushed it down the toilet, fished it out of the sewer, and threw it on the reel. What we get from this film are fragments (or scenes) of sub-par acting from its performers. We also get a display of visual effects that make some student films look like WETA masterpieces. Somewhere in at the heart of this film is the story of vampires, but it was difficult to keep my finger on it. When the head vampire is wearing a black cape, flamboyant eye shadow, and face powder, I do not see a vampire movie; instead I see amateur filmmakers improvising on a shoestring budget and failing miserably.

The DVD for this film should include special features, but the screener copy that I received does not have any. Without getting to see these features, I have no choice but to lay down a zero.

Widescreen. The direction of this film is certainly its weakest point. There should be a new rule in Hollywood forbidding Williamson from directing a film again. The man may know how to handle pigskin, but he can't manage a camera.

Dolby Digital 2.0. The film comes equipped with a hip-hop soundtrack, but it isn't exactly memorable. Despite appearances from K-Ci and JoJo, the music doesn't really push this movie along.

Standard DVD keep case. The front cover shows its cast members with Tiny Lister front and center. I suppose promoting everyone's favorite antagonist from the Friday films is more effective than touting Daniel Baldwin.

The idea behind Vegas Vampires is promising, but I need to be frank. This is a huge waste of time that is not even funny-bad. There are plenty of great vampire movies out there to see instead of this. Even having your children put on a stage play about vampires in your basement will be more satisfying than this. At least any random child can out-perform some of these stale actors. This is not one to buy or rent.

Questions? Comments? Just want to talk movies? Drop me a line at dodd@movieweb.com