Transylmania (2009)

I saw the trailer for Transylmania last year and, being a sucker for vampire movies of any kind thought that it looked like it might be worth a look. And I'm conflicted. Really conflict.

I'm going to waste your time by beating around the bush here--the movie sucks. It really sucks. And yet...I enjoyed it. Maybe it was the mood I was in, or my expectations were just low enough to find it amusing, but if taken in small pieces, there's some okay stuff there. The jokes are lame, the acting uniformly crapacious, and the script is all over the place--seldom in a good way. But somewhere around the latter two thirds of the movie the ratio of dreck to watchable reverses itself, and the last 20 minutes of so are quite good.

It's obvious that the writers love both vampire movies and teenage sex comedies and know their stuff. The problem is that they can't resist cramming every single convention and cliche they could think of into the 90 mins. There's a reason why Hammer films never made teen comedies, and a reason why the hacks responsible for Date Movie -style "comedy" never made sophisticated gothic dramas.

These guys tried to do both and the result is never funny enough to be the first or classy enough to be the second. There are about 2 actual laugh out loud moments (both too graphically tasteless to make it to the trailer, where all the otherwise watchable footage went) and some nicely atmospheric set pieces, but the aforementioned crappy acting and paper-thin characters manage to undermine those potentially brighter moments.

Bottom line: if there's nothing on TV and you are watching this movie without having had to pay anything for the dubious privilege, then you might not loathe yourself too much for enjoying it. Otherwise, stay away