Slayer

A film that deserves to be thrown into the bowls of hell, Slayer takes what we know about vampires and turns it upside down into the crap stain of cinema. How can this thing even exist? I swear, just watching a few minutes of this...film... is enough to put you in a diabetic coma.

Okay, so the basic plot to Slayer is that a bunch of soldiers encounter vampires in the tropics and naturally battle them to the death. It's kinda like "Dog Soldiers" except far more stupid. At least "Dog Soldiers" was pretty cool for a low-budget film but this looks like it has been done with much less money and effort. On top of that, it breaks so many traditional rules to vampires that it insults the blood-sucking genre. The vampires are ridiculous and a select few are incredibly annoying. The terrible acting doesn't help that much either, even coming from the likes of Casper Van Dien.

This movie makes "Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus" look like a masterpiece (a more interesting one at that) and "Dracula 3000" more dignified. I'll add insult to injury by not giving Slayer any remote bit of credit or rating. Yeah, that's how bad it really is. Every copy of this must be destroyed, erased from existence. By NOT watching this, you'll save yourself a few hours of your precious life. Slayer, the parasite of the world of cinema. Thank you and good night!

It would be easy to list those ways in which we are warned, well before watching, that this is surely going to be a lackluster mess. It would be easy because there are a great many of them. Instead of focusing on that, let's just cut to the chase, and talk about things like the glaring CGI of muzzle flashes from the soldiers' firearms, or the script that quickly comes off as dubious, halfhearted, and no more than perfunctory. There's Kevin VanHook's middling direction, and action sequences that are, shall we say, variable in their strength (though some aren't half bad!). There are some recognizable names and faces appearing in this TV movie, but neither they nor any others on hand are specifically being required to act - though at least they're having a good time? Ludek Drizhal's music is the most purposefully bland pablum I've heard in a film in quite a while, and that some cues play to the light humor that's peppered throughout is A Choice. Practical effects and special makeup look great; on a reported total production budget of $2 million, the same won't necessarily be said of instances of digital effects. But we knew all this before we ever pressed play on 'Slayer,' so if we don't like the viewing experience, we have no one but ourselves to blame.

Dialogue is generally painfully blunt and exact, and often simply bad; with exceptions in both directions, the scene writing is mostly only rudimentarily serviceable. We do at least have a complete, cohesive story on our hands; how compelling it is constitutes another matter. In fairness, there are actually some genuinely good ideas scattered around; then again, some ideas are not so great. But hey, it's not like anyone involved had any illusions about what they were making - schlock this mediocre doesn't happen by accident. That does beg the question of who might actually enjoy this, what merit this held in the eyes of those who participated, and how the Sci Fi Channel could have ever seen fit to greenlight it in the first place. It's not significantly fun or thrilling; what gap could a consciously low-grade production possibly fill? I don't have the answers to these questions. I just know that the picture offers little more than the most baseline level of diversion that any conglomeration of light and sound does. VanHook and his cast and crew succeeded in making an almost perfectly tiresome, dull, unexciting feature. But to what end? If someone does manage to extract meaningful entertainment here then I'm glad for them; I just don't know how they do it. Watch 'Slayer' if you want, but I just can't offer a major reason why you should.

There's a limit to what you expect from a Sci-Fi channel film given the budgets they have to work with. That said, this film kept me happily entertained from start to finish. The casting for the most part was excellent as was the locales where this was shot. Kevin Grevioux (Grieves) deserves special mention for an outstanding performance. His low pitched voice, size, and natural acting ability were well suited to this role. Ditto for Joyce Giraud (Estrella) although she had a much smaller / limiting part. Look, it's a vampire film. You've got to suspend your sense of disbelief a bit even to want to watch the thing. Once you've done that however, this film rocks!

An interesting outing in the genre but for me Slayer felt a bit too long. If the movie lasted just one hour, the whole thing would have come out as a more satisfactory viewing experience in my opinion. The plot plods along in order to take the film to the required standard running time of 85-90 min. I understand this, but I had to fast forward some scenes in the end just to be able to finish the film in one sitting.

Ever since Starship Troopers was released I have been rather partial to Casper Van Dien. Here he is kind of 'reprising' his role of captain Johnny Rico but in the jungle and with vampires. Nice.

The fight scenes are ok. Vampires get to kill enough soldiers and everything looks decently enough choreographed. I guess the vampires could have fared better with some weapons but... The spin on the origin and motivations of these vampires are a nice addition to the plot and Danny Trejo, Ray Park (Star Wars' Darth Maul) and Lynda Carter (Wonder Woman in the original TV series) are great additions in supporting roles. If only Trejo would have been given more screen time and a greater role in the story.

By the way, if you ever buy the dvd just go quickly for the 'Play' icon. The dvd main menu sequences might give you away some major plot points!!

I was searching for the elusive video nastie "The Slayer," when I came across this.

You have to suspend you knowledge of vampires, because these act more like zombies, except they just bite like vampires, but they are out during the day. Confused? Well, let that go and enjoy the fun.

Don't look for great dialog - they're soldiers and dialog is that of a typical war movie. Funny dialog it has, especially from Jennifer O'Dell. Lots of fighting and killing and blood - and a great monster!

There are some interesting things in this movie. Wooden stakes instead of bayonets on the rifles, decapitations, a really hot vampire (Joyce Giraud - Miss Puerto Rico Universe 1998), Lynda Carter ("Wonder Woman") as a Colonel, Danny Trejo (Halloween, Planet terror, The Devil's Rejects), Tony Plana ("Ugly Betty")

And, of course, the whole problem came about because of corporate greed. The destruction of the rain forest disturbed their habit. Isn't capitalism great? Great scenery in Puerto Rico.