The comedy team of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer should be commended for their unwavering attempt to destroy the spoof comedy entirely. Sure, they aided the Wayans brothers in creating the first Scary Movie film (which is decent spoof film) but in 2006 they started their campaign with Date Movie and continued right through Epic Movie, Meet the Spartans, Disaster Movie, and now Vampires Suck. Did they succeed? And did it take the recent loss of Leslie Nielsen to have us be reminded that spoofs where once a glorious and enjoyable thing.
Well, while their previous efforts (I’m cringing at the idea that any “effort” was placed into making their films) where bloated with endless pop culture references that were dated before being made, Vampires Suck mostly just runs on one, the Twilight series. Yes, there is still a parade of references made, mostly to reality TV shows such as Keeping up with the Kardashians and Jersey Shore, but they mainly stick with vampire and werewolf gags that have either been done already or are simply too weak and witless to even register as a complete joke.
I’ll confess, over the course of the film I had about 3-4 genuine laughs. Mind you, at least 2 of those were mostly attributed to the song “my panties” by magicwandos, which is a spiritual parody of a gloomy Radiohead tune, and the preferred listening of our heroine Becca as she goes into a full teenage pout.
The real shame of these films is more than just that they’re gags are lame, its that all them are so boring. I can’t even enjoy them on an ironic level. Yes, I realise I’m writing more of a blanket evaluation of all their most recent films and not just Vampires Suck, but they do deserve to be seen as one lump of…well…take a thesaurus to the word “feces” and I leave it in your hands.
Video
Widescreen 1.85:1. Edward has a disco ball sparkling where his penis should be, tee hee. And now there’s girls fighting in green jello for no reason, ho ho. Hey look! That dude from Hangover is acting midly gay with other vampires, skippidy doo da! And all of it is visually clean and clear…woo…hoo.
Audio
Dolby Digital English 5.1 and Dolby Surround French. From what I could hear over my groans, the score and dialogue are decently mixed. I could not get immersed in this film, but that’s not the sound people’s fault….they’re just trying to make a living y’know?
Special Features
Deleted Scenes: One out of five of these actually gave me a chuckle, that’s 20%, which works out to a MASSIVELY bigger amount than what the actual film offered.
Gag Reel: Some bloopers. Nothing out of the ordinary. Lame really.
Sneak Peaks: Trailers for much better films and tv shows.
The theatrical and an “UNRATED” version of the film are offered on the same disc. I reviewed the Unrated, and I can’t imagine it made any real difference to how I felt.
Final Thoughts
My reactions to the films of Freidberg and Seltzer started as boredom, which turned to dismay, and finally settled on rage! Every time I ask myself “Surely this will be the last crappy film these wannabes are allowed to make” I give myself the same answer each time: “I wouldn’t get my hopes up…and don’t call me Shirley!” (RIP Leslie, barely gone and we need you back again badly).
