Blood & Donuts

In 1994, in Toronto, the vampire Boya (Gordon Currie) awakens from his twenty-five years of sleep in a basement hit by a golf ball. He takes a cab to the local cemetery, retrieves his belongings from a grave and lodges in a low budget hotel nearby an all-night donut shop. Boya does not drink human blood anymore but rats and pigeons blood instead. While in the donut shop, Boya befriends and protects the taxi driver Earl (Justin Louis), who is having trouble with two criminals, and falls in love for the waitress Molly (Helene Clarkson). Meanwhile, his former passion of 1969, Rita (Fiona Reid), who misses her lost youth, is trying to locate him.

"Blood & Donuts" is a weird vampire movie, but also with a great potential of cult-movie. The unusual story is completely different from most of the films of vampire; actually it is a tale of loneliness, friendship, love and self-sacrifice. Goya is probably more human than any other character in spite of being a vampire. This is a typical very low budget movie that works, supported by magnificent story, screenplay, direction, performances, cinematography, special effects and music score. Actually the cinematography is top-notch and the music score is fantastic. I noted in IMDb that the excellent and unknown Helene Clarkson apparently interrupted her career in 1996. I regret only the terrible spelling mistakes in the subtitles in Portuguese of the Brazilian DVD released by Lider Distributor. Last but not the least, wait until the very last scene in the end of the credits. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "Sangue de Vampiro" ("Vampire's Blood")

It's not every day you see something original and clever done with the vampire genre, but this does it and then some. This is a unique, low-key, low-gore, charming little movie. Gordon Currie is very likable (and *real* easy on the eyes!) as Boya, the vampire who went into hibernation in 1969 and crawls out to face a grimy world of small-time mobsters, cheap donuts and a bitter ex-girlfriend who's waited 25 years for his return. Determined not to prey on people, Boya runs through dozens of rats and pigeons while forming shy friendships with a nervous cabbie and a smart, ironic donut waitress. The character has such fundamental sweetness and sincerity that he's impossible not to like, reticent and embarrassed about his vampirism but quickly bringing his undead powers to bear when his new friends need help, and quietly mourning the short lifespans of humankind (a theme often blared loudly in vampire films but gentle and subtle here). Much more about people, friendship and self-sacrifice than your average vampire film, and a nice change.

Don't care much if you like it, already saw one post that ripped it. But the bottom line is I can't get this movie out of my head. Great music score, great story line. I undertand it's a B movie, but that's okay! I was just plain entertained. First time I watched it was midnight on the Sci-Fi channel. Kept my finger on the power off button on the remote for the first 20 minutes, but couldn't bring myself to kill the movie. I was sucked in for this zaney ride into Boya's life and times. What a ride! I really cared about him, I felt his pain, I liked the guy. Someone I could be friends with. Buy the movie...watch the movie...be the movie.

If your tired of watching the same-old vampire gore flick, this is for you. This is for the vampire-movie connoisseur. There are no fantastic special effects, no expensive actors, no real gore scenes. There is "Canadian" humour, which may or not work with our American cousins (or even on some Canadians).

Blood & Donuts features not a classy, good-looking, or powerful vampire. Boya Zsekely is a weak, quirky, and emotional vampire. <That's all I'm going to say about the actual film, since I don't want to ruin it for those of you who haven't watched it yet>

Look for our brilliant Canadian director David Cronenberg in ninth acting position. I love this man as a director, as an actor...I love this man as a director <LOL>. Actually, he fits this film like a glove.

This film is not for everyone. <My wife hated it, but she hates most of my 90+ vampire movies> This movie is a great "B" movie.

I liked this movie, it's not your typical vampire horror movie where all the vampire does is go around feeding on the blood of strangers where this movie is about a vampire that looks as if he is trying to look like a sexy vampire but instead with his hair in almost dreads and homeless shabby clothes, dried up skin and ticking strange facial expressions I can't tell if he's supposed to be a human or beast. He looks as if he's spent too many days in the sun and has almost dried up and came back to life again. He meets up with this waitress at a donut shop that looks almost like him, a across between man and beast with scary eyebrows. The best scene is when he's taking a bath and decides to have sex with her in her sleep. He see's her on a regular basis and forgets about another lady that he also had an affair with decades ago. He finds a friend, a taxi driver who almost get's beat up and the man moves in with him and finds out that he's a vampire. The story continues where the vampire is afraid of dying and this is why he continues to life all these years. The vampire plays a sympathetic character as we feel emotionally sorry for him as he drags himself and others into his personal life. I would watch this movie but beware of the fact that it's not your typical blood, flesh and gut's vampire movie but if your with a date and you have popcorn, rent this one, you'll enjoy it.