Fist of the Vampire

I am genuinely astounded at how bad this film is: The script, if you can call it that, is just awful.

The furniture in my house would have been more convincing than the 'actors' in this film; I honestly have seen better acting at a pre-school nativity play! The (not so) special effects would have been more convincing if they had drawn on the actors with a crayon.

The fight scenes are just plain dull, which is a shame as it looks to have some fairly talented martial artists in the cast.

Len Kabasinski needs to understand the concept of "take two" I have thought long and hard to try and find at least one redeeming quality of this film and the best that I can come up with is that it makes the work of Uwe Boll look good...

If only there was a mark lower that 1 star I could award. Just please don't waste your time or money on this film, you have been warned.

Well, on the positive side I learned two things about vampires that I never knew before. (1) Besides drinking blood vampires also chew and swallow flesh. Until now I'd thought that only zombies did. (2) when stabbed, fatally choked, or exposed to sufficient sunlight, vampires catch fire. My advice to young people is to make your first date with anyone in the sunlight. While not surprised by the amount of beatings that vampires can take, I was amazed by how much damage human martial arts men and women can sustain without being seriously hindered. Also, though this is also true in many crime and Western movies, how severe beatings leave them unbruised. On the negative side, the dozens of martial arts dances (or whatever one calls them) were boring from the start and remained so. Such movies as the Calendar Girl, Cop, Killer? series demonstrate that this need not be so. The camera work was extremely jerky. So was the music, and often it didn't seem to "fit" what was going on. I'm a bit puzzled why a policewoman would wear stiletto heels when sneaking through a window into a dangerous building, but at least her doing so made it easier to recognize her in the subsequent muddy photography. I was amazed by the number of bullets that ordinary-seeming hand guns can hold. As is also common in crime movies and Westerns, their users also tend to be amazingly poor shots. Mercifully, the actors used the f-word rarely, though (less mercifully) most often in connection with maternal incest.

Want my advice? Avoid this film at all costs. I, in all honesty, wanted to like this movie. It looked at first glance like a Fight Club/Blade crossover, and how wrong I was...

I've heard of low budgets, but this must have been REALLY LOW. I mean, they used special effects for most of the blood, when it would have been a lot better to use stage blood. Because the effects are officially the worst I have ever seen, and need I remind you that this was made in 2007? Muzzle flashes, are also poorly added, as is fire and smoke.

The acting is just terrible, especially in one scene. The fighting and action scenes (actually the reason I watched this movie) were slow and unengaging, and the (terrible) CGI was un-necassarily added and only served to degrade them further.

Nothing that happens can save this film from being one of the poorest decisions I have ever made. Action fans will be disappointed at the sheer awfulness of this movie. Vampire fans will be disappointed at the actors chosen to be the neck-biters. This film promises so much but delivers NOTHING! Just steer clear my friends. Well clear.

Killer Wolf gain has hit a home run with their latest film "Fist of the Vampire" Those who have read my blogs or reviews know that I personally love the films they put out in Killer Wolf Films and this one was no exception. Once again this is what I love about independent horror films and what I loathe about most Hollywood ones. Len and his crew put together films for one purpose only.....to entertain you. It's not about making a art house flick or getting on Sundance Channel but in making sure the audience had a good time watching their movie. Fist combines really scary vampires with a dash of Fight Club mixed in for good measure. Being an exceptional martial artist Len populates his films with many other exceptional fighters. Brian Anthony plays a DEA agent who infiltrates the illegal underworld fighting den run by Brian "Blue Meanie" Heffron, Len (credited as Leon South ) and Darian Caine. Unfortunately for him it isn't just about illegal gambling and drugs but the folks who run the ring are in fact vampires. The film was shot with great cinematography and really good acting to boot. Killer Wolf fans will get a kick out of seeing Rene Porada in her first bad girl role as well as Brenna Lee Roth. If you are fan of Killer Wolf this movie will exceed you expectations and if you have never seen one check it out. You won't be disappointed.

I watched "Fist of the Vampire" last night, and it's not a 10 but it's certainly not a 1. So, I have to wonder about the ratings I'm seeing here. Were they made by people who need to watch more movies so they have something to measure against? Or were they made by users who were being disingenuous?

The screener I saw had some problems with sound mixing (much of the dialogue was muddled while the foley artist's "meaty thwacks" during the fight scenes came across with crystal clarity), the fight scenes were well filmed but under-rehearsed (they all screamed "choreographed" to me) and there were many places where just a few seconds trimmed here and would have the difference between a scene going on for too long and it being just right.

Oh, and they used that animated bullet waaaaay too much at the beginning of the film. It was a neat effect the first time, but it got less impressive as it was repeated.

However, the acting was better than what I've come to expect from films at this level, the use of CGI and blue-screen effects was also pretty decent (even if I still don't know what all those sparks during the final showdown between Reno and Lee were all about), and the story was pretty solid and flowed nicely. There were no surprises in it, but it chugged along at a good pace.

"Fist of the Vampire" is a low 5 on my scale, and I wish I could understand what inspires such love or hatred that would cause someone to rate it a 10 or a 1.