{"id":8602,"date":"2024-11-27T13:40:03","date_gmt":"2024-11-27T18:40:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=8602"},"modified":"2024-11-27T13:40:03","modified_gmt":"2024-11-27T18:40:03","slug":"vampire-hookers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/11\/27\/vampire-hookers\/","title":{"rendered":"Vampire Hookers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Vampire Hookers <\/strong>(1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Caprican Films\/Horror-Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 88 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence, sex, nudity, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Cirio H. Santiago\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Howard R. Cohen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Jaime Mendoza-Nava\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: John Araojo and Carding Remias\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 21, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: John Carradine, Bruce Fairbairn, Trey Wilson, Karen Stride, Lenka Novak, Katie Dolan, Lex Winter, Leo Martinez, Vic Diaz.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *<\/p>\n

\u00a0The title Vampire Hookers<\/strong> carries with it the promise of great bad movie fun. Well, it\u2019s bad alright. I\u2019m not so sure about the great part. As for it being fun, it depends on the viewer. Like art, fun is subjective. What is it they say about trash, treasure and one man? If you ask me, I think Vampire Hookers<\/strong> belongs in the trash category. It\u2019s badly made even for a cheesy exploitation movie. It\u2019s a horror-comedy that succeeds as neither one. Worst of all, it\u2019s boring. Yet I\u2019m not ready to dismiss it altogether.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Filipino exploitation flick, directed by the late, great Cirio H. Santiago (TNT Jackson, Stryker), stars John Carradine as a Shakespeare-quoting vampire pimp who operates out of a crypt in a cemetery in Manila. You know right away what you\u2019re in for with Vampire Hookers<\/strong> by the pre-credits scene in which the aging actor channels Bela Lugosi in Glen or Glenda by delivering an incoherent monologue* directly to the camera. Sadly, he doesn\u2019t get to say \u201cPULL ZE STRINGS!\u201d like the drug-addled Hungarian actor infamously did in Edward D. Wood\u2019s zany 1953 camp classic.<\/p>\n

\u00a0After the credits, we meet our two \u201cheroes\u201d, Tom (Fairbairn, Nightstick) and Terry (Wilson, Raising Arizona), a pair of sailors on leave in Manila. I put heroes in quotes because these guys are idiots who would be more at home in a Weekend Pass-style comedy than a horror movie. We follow them as they navigate nightlife in Manila looking to get laid. At one point, they end up in a bar where the girls aren\u2019t exactly girls. Luckily, they run into their CO (Winter), a (slightly) less idiotic sort riding around with a cabbie, Julio (Martinez, Enter the Ninja), who knows a bar where they might get some satisfaction. Not bloody likely, but it\u2019s likely to get bloody. Sorry not sorry, bad joke.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Unfortunately for Tom and Jerry… I mean, Terry, it\u2019s their CO who leaves with the prostitute who catches all six of their eyes, Cherish (Stride). Fortunately for T&T, she\u2019s one of the three girls who work for the vampire pimp Richmond Reed (Carradine\u2019s birth name). She takes the CO to her place at the cemetery where she and her co-workers Suzy (Novak) and Marcy (Dolan) make short work of him. It\u2019s the girls\u2019 job to lure American men to their secret lair. It seems that Reed prefers domestic over imported- or is it the other way around?- when it comes to blood. ANYWAY, this is where we say bye-bye to Mr. Lucky Not Lucky.<\/p>\n

\u00a0A week later, Tom and Terry go searching for their missing friend. They learn of his whereabouts from Julio who takes them to the cemetery where Tom ends up as a captive in the vampires\u2019 lair. It\u2019s up to Terry, who\u2019s terrified of cemeteries, to rescue his pal before he\u2019s turned into a creature of the night.<\/p>\n

\u00a0At the center of the terrible Vampire Hookers<\/strong>, there\u2019s a terrific campy performance from Carradine, an actor whose filmography runs the gamut from the sublime (The Grapes of Wrath) to the ridiculous (Billy the Kid vs. Dracula) and a whole lot in between. He brings the only note of class to this otherwise crass attempt to lure in viewers with the promise of a bloodsucking sexfest. He walks around in a white suit, quoting the Bard and other poets while drinking (literal) Bloody Marys. At one point, he laments how in 200 years nobody has come up with something other than vodka that mixes well with blood. From the looks of things, I\u2019d say Carradine was hitting the bottle before, between and after takes. Only a drunk would try to deliver a Shakespearean performance in a dumb, low-budget exploitation movie like Vampire Hookers<\/strong>. I kept thinking of Peter O\u2019Toole\u2019s character in My Favorite Year for some odd reason.<\/p>\n

\u00a0As for the rest of the acting, it\u2019s horrible. Fairbairn and Wilson act like they\u2019re in a totally different kind of movie. Their misadventures are supposed to be funny, but they\u2019re not. You look at these guys and it makes you wonder if the Navy has a lax policy when it comes to IQ. I guess it doesn\u2019t matter since intelligence doesn\u2019t appear to play a role in any aspect of Vampire Hookers<\/strong>. That is especially true of Pavo (Diaz), the Renfield character. He\u2019s one big fart joke. He farts A LOT! This is who Reed entrusts to watch over him and his brides while they slumber by day? Oh, PUH-LEEZE!<\/p>\n

\u00a0When a movie is called Vampire Hookers<\/strong>, it\u2019s only natural to expect two things: (1) bloody vampire violence and (2) hot vampire sex. The movie doesn\u2019t deliver on either front. There\u2019s precious little blood aside from the Bloody Marys. There\u2019s one extended sex scene that lasts about six or seven minutes. It gets boring by the second minute. Several shots are used more than once. You see some boobs but that\u2019s about it. For the most part, Vampire Hookers<\/strong> is a huge tease.<\/p>\n

\u00a0What\u2019s sad is that Vampire Hookers<\/strong> could have been an exploitation classic with its impressive (as it pertains to its genre) pedigree. In his career, Santiago directed around 100 exploitation movies. In addition to the titles I mentioned above, he also made The Muthers, Death Force, Caged Fury and Wheels of Fire. He obviously knows what he\u2019s doing. The screenplay is the work of Howard R. Cohen, best known for writing and directing Saturday the 14th<\/sup> and Space Raiders. To its credit, it does have a dementedly catchy theme song that plays over the end credits. It doesn\u2019t really help. By all means, Vampire Hookers<\/strong> should have been a gas, gas, gas. Instead, it\u2019s like somebody passed gas, gas, gas. It stinks. HA! I bet you thought I was going to say it sucks, didn\u2019t you?<\/p>\n

*= Carradine\u2019s monologue comes from a poem. I don\u2019t know the name of it or the poet. If anybody knows, please let me know.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Vampire Hookers (1978)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Caprican Films\/Horror-Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 88 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence, sex, nudity, language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Cirio H. Santiago\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Howard R. Cohen\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Jaime Mendoza-Nava\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: John Araojo and Carding Remias\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: July 21, 1978 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: John Carradine, Bruce Fairbairn, Trey Wilson, Karen Stride, Lenka Novak, Katie Dolan, Lex Winter, Leo Martinez, Vic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9380,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-b-movies","category-horror"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/Vampire-Hookers-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8602"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9382,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8602\/revisions\/9382"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}