Diário de um Vampiro

I have seen a lot of vampire flicks in my day. This was on the edge of being a good story. I love the Victorian flair of the inside of the mansion, the four poster beds, etc. That's apparently where the budget ended.

The master vampire, Ash is the only real actor in the film. His lines are delivered believably. The only time our hero, Zachary actually acts is when Sofia catches him drinking blood from the psychofant and screams her name and throws himself at the door.

The one thing that really brought the film down a notch was the deadpan monologue from Zachary. It was clumsily read, with no feeling, no passion. Granted, Zach was a depressed vampire.. but you can be passionately depressed.

I think it would have been better to have had a third party read the monologue. Perhaps someone found the 'Vampire Journal' and was reading it... with a bit more pizzaz than it's writer.

Watch the film, rescue the elements that are good and marvel at them. There is some good camera work, their corpses reconstituting themselves every evening was a nice touch, knowing the master was a once a vampire hunter... nice.

If you like gothic vampire movies, then Full Moon Entertainment's Vampire Journals (1997) is for you. This 92 minutes gem is actually for sale at video stores (many Full Moon Videos are not available) because they now distribute for themselves! This is another chapter of the Subspecies series and is directed by the same director, Ted Nicolaou. The story continues when Ash, an understudy of Radu, becomes more powerful and vicious as his master and the vampire-hunter must destroy him. The special effects are much more advanced in this chapter and you can actually see the vampire's "shadow morph" travel. This, like the other parts, was filmed in Romania and has a very ancient "feel" to it. The story is great, as is the filming. What else could we expect from our favorite company but another "must-have?" As always, a Video Zone is included.

Underrated Director Ted Nicolau, a Full Moon entertainment veteran, made a step forward in his vampire universe with this movie that sadly has been overlooked as time goes by. "Vampire Journals" is probably the best movie produced by Full Moon, and easily ranks among the best vampire movies ever.

The movie tells the story of Zachary (played by David Gunn), a vampire who has vowed to exterminate as many of his specie as he can since his life as one of the undead has given him nothing but tragedies. In his hunting, he finds Ash (Jonathon Morris), a vampire master who controls a club and loves the music. Things get complicated when both of them fall in love with a beautiful pianist named Sofia (Kirsten Cerre).

The most remarkable feature of the movie, is the perfect combination of camera-work, edition and music to create a Gothic feeling that remains through the movie, making it look as a beautiful canvas despite its low budget. Every visual aspect of the movie is of a supernatural beauty, as if the locations were a character too.

Ted Nicolau creates a superb movie that improves in all aspects what he had already accomplished with his other vampire movies, the "Subspecies" series. The SFX are great for the budget and never seem out of place, the movie retains that Gothic surreal feeling without sacrificing anything.

The acting is really good, although nothing special. David Gunn carries the film with grace but is Jonathon Morris who steals the show as the vampire Ash. Worth to mention is the performance of the beautiful Ilinca Goia, who in her limited screen time captures the attention of the viewer not only with her looks, but her performance as well.

Of course, nothing is perfect, the movie keeps that "low-budget" feeling that most of the 90s Full Moon movies carried, but is admirable the effort of Nicolau to make the most of what he got. Also, the script feels too short, leaving the audience wanting to see more of this marvelous Gothic universe. Indeed, the movie demands a prequel and a sequel in order to have the story fully developed.

To summarize, this movie was a pleasant surprise, as it is a worthy addition to every fan of the vampire sub-genre. An outstanding effort by director Ted Nicolau. Best Full Moon picture ever. 8.5/10

As a vampire movie fan, I recommend this movie to all of those goth and erotic vampire fans (the movie shows less flesh than "Embrace of the vampire" for example, see my comment about "Embrace of the vampire" and other vampire movies to judge better between this movies).

Quite, it's no vampire action flick and you will see not much nudity in the movie, but the movie has got some story to tell. You will watch a movie with lots of vampire mystery and magic with a good cast and a well chosen soundtrack which will take you on a brilliant 90 minute surreal ride to Prague.

Impressions:

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Overall: surreal, mysterios, erotic, fascinating, romantic

Gore/Splatter: no splatter, nice amount of "violence" and blood.

Nudity: some

Fangs: Jep, look nice (I write this because I hate those vampire movies which show no fangs), some nice blood sucking too

Cast: good actors, all unknown for what I know

Soundtrack: nice one, more the classic music type!

DVD: fullscreen, good picture, good sound, uncut

Who should not watch? I think it's not good for people that poke fun on the action vampire type (like "Blade"). There is no minor action in the movie. If you hate pianos and get the creeps by the words "classic music", "erotic horror" or "dialogue".

To judge better if you are not sure watching the film, I'll give you my favourite vampire flicks:

Action & gory vampire movies:

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Blade

John Carpenter's Vampires

Modern Vampires (tip!)



The more romantic movies:

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Bram Stoker's Dracula

Vampire Journals

Embrace of the vampire

The trash movies (I dig them a lot):

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From dusk til dawn2

From dusk til dawn1

From dusk til dawn3

Blood for Dracula (Andy Warhol movie with a young Udo Kier, very bloody and sarcastic, lots of gore and nudity)

Vampire Happening (my 60ies trash tip)

Don't forget the Hammer films!!!!

Please write me a line if you found my comment useful. Vampire movie fans are welcome =[

I found Vampire Journals to be the quality of a late 60s early 70s horror film. After watching it for the third or fourth time I discovered that I understood the plot line very well. For those who are into vampire films this is your movie, but if you are just passing by the horror section of your local video store and you think you would like to see this film I suggest watching Dracula first then come back to this movie, only then you would understand this film.