GothieMouse

I love vampire movies, and I love sci-fi movies. So when I saw this at the rental store, I thought "Why not?" After watching this all I thought was "Why?" This movie was a complete waste of time- poor acting, and a horrible script. The movie takes place in space, where these prospectors come across another ship floating dead in space. Soon after they discover the "cargo" which is mostly sand filled coffins are actually what? freeze-dried vampires from the "Planet Transylvania?" Can we get more ridiculous? Yes we can! Among the powdered vamps (just add blood) is Orlock (I assume this is "Dracula") whom, even though he supposedly comes from "Planet Transylvania" and this is the year 3000 for some reason he still is wearing the classic Bella Lugosi-style outfit. Against him is Capt. Abraham Van Helsing (name sound familiar?) yep a descendant of the legendary Prof. Van Helsing from the original Dracula story. After character 187 gets bitten and goes vampire and throws a few verbally sexual comments at the beautiful, but no-nonsense Aurora Ash (who is actually a robot- fitting because I'm sure there are "artificial parts" there) it's decided the best way to destroy the vampires is to fly the ship into a star (which halfway through this I was ready to throw this movie into a fire myself, but it was a rental) during which time Aurora decides to go back to her original programming as a pleasure bot and give the long suffering Humvee a final hoorah and "go out with a bang" Which the movie ends as though the writer just gave up and said "The ship blows up" rather than continue with this career- destroying script. Now, let's take a look at the actors and their performances

Casper Van Dien .... Capt. Abraham Van Helsing- Not a totally bad performance, but the character is pretty forgettable

Erika Eleniak .... Aurora Ash- her performance was much like a Penthouse Actress- you can tell she was not cast for her acting ability, but for 2 really great credits on her "resume'"

Coolio .... 187- Many Hip-Hop artists crossover to become fine actors (Will Smith, LL Cool J) but it doesn't look like Coolio is going to be joining those ranks based on his performance here, despite his character being right up his alley- a strung out, horny nutcase. Way too corny to be taken seriously

Alexandra Kamp-Groeneveld .... Mina Murry- Probably the most forgettable of characters, not a bad performance, but she was killed early on (she was the lucky one)

Grant Swanby .... Arthur "The Professor" Holmwood- what's a B-movie sci-fi flick without an annoying wise-cracking geek? he fit the bill here- I cheered when his character finally bought the farm

Langley Kirkwood .... Orlock- Totally forgettable performance- The main villain, but the only thing scary about him was his lines

Tommy 'Tiny' Lister .... Humvee- ZEUS!!! Plays a real strong, real dumb guy- perfect role for Lister, and he did it well. Not my favorite actor, but the only believable character in the whole movie.

Udo Kier .... Capt. Varna- Probably the biggest name in this movie, and pretty much all you see of him is his face on a video monitor droning on in his captain's log as boring as a bad social studies teacher. It's good that his character is almost non-existent, hopefully his career will survive All in all, don't waste your time with this one- aside from the decent deep space special effects, there is no redeeming qualities in this movie. Leave it on the shelf and move on.

This is Madonna's film debut according to the DVD cover- And if she was the only one to ever be involved in film again, justice was almost served. This movie is terrible- from the talentless acting, a worthless script, horrible sound, and poor quality of the film in general, you will definitely want your hour back (which is how long this movie really is, although it seems like eternity) There is only one somewhat cool part of this whole movie, and that is the song at the climax. The 20 year-old Madonna shows a bit of flesh, but who hasn't seen her breasts by now? As magnificent as they may be, it's hardly worth sitting through this- skip right to the end, enjoy the song, and save yourself the other 55 minutes of suffering through the rest of the movie