Review by E.C. McMullen Jr.
IT HELPS TIP JAR VAMPIRE FILMS - 2000 by Colin Odell and Michelle Le Blanc USA Release: Oct. 1, 2008 Pocket Essentials $9.95 US ISBN: 1-84243280-X

Horror fans, Thriller fans. Richard Matheson once liked to think of himself as a Terror fan (he meant in the emotional, fiction sense) and so did Boris Karloff (Boris would also accept Thriller, Alex). The thing about us is, we get in debates. We love Horror Thriller and we have no problem testing our mental mettle against each other. But sooner or later someone calls us on it and, just like the gamesters at a Scrabble contest, someone has to whip out a book of facts or leave the table, defeated.

So what a handy book VAMPIRE FILMS is for crushing your opponents!

With this pocket sized tome you can quickly reference a wide variety of Vampire films. Universal and Hammer you say? Pshaw! Authors Colin Odell and Michelle Le Blanc are just getting started!

Chapter titles range from Vamping All Over The World (Chapter 7, page 75) to Off Beat Indies (Chapter 9, page 91) to Sci Fi Suckers (Chapter 11, page 115) and more.

Nearly all of the entries range somewhere between a spoiler movie review and "The Big Picture", and by that I mean social commentary. If you're looking for a strict, categorical, by-the-numbers, reference manual, look elsewhere. VAMPIRE FILMS is pretty much laid out the way you would expect someone to write it if they were right in front of you, enthusing over the latest movie.

VAMPIRE FILMS also takes a much needed world view of Vampires.

For example, the musty F. Murnau tradition of vampires being destroyed by sunlight gets scant attention outside of the U.S.

While all cinematic Vampires are mostly creatures of the night who sleep during the day, its merely because they are nocturnal - like bats. Bram Stoker's vampires, from Drac to his brides, had no difficulty with sunlight. Vampires in their myriad forms prior to Nosferatu, had little issue with the day. And when someone tries to have a scifi vampire, made via genetics or a handy virus, explode in the sunlight, the eggheads in the audience will laugh derisively and mock the director at conventions.

In short, there are a wide range of suckers, and while most are blood suckers, VAMPIRE FILMS covers the other kinds too, ranging from emotion sucking vampires (THE WISDOM OF CROCODILES) to youth slurping vampires (CAPTAIN KRONOS), to other kinds of sucking, slurping vampires (yes, Jess Franco movies make it here. But what? No SPERMULA?).

I also like how Colin and Michelle are in complete agreement with me regarding many of the vampire movies I've reviewed here at Feo Amante's Horror Thriller. For example: the UNDERWORLD movies (which were up to UNDERWORLD: EVOLUTION at the time of publication).

In short, for a very compact little book that can fit in a coat pocket, there is an awful lot of information. And if you are the kind of person that bets money on whether you are right or wrong about a subject, the handy VAMPIRE FILMS is a wise investment.

Four BookWyrms.

This review copyright 2009 E.C.McMullen Jr.

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