Vampires (1998)

You won't be disappointed!

It's complicated... I really like the directing, acting and writing but, there are issues with the way it's shot that I just can't deny. As much as I love the storytelling and the fantastic performance but, there are also certain scenes that didn't need to exist.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Vampires is good 90s vampire film a good soundtrack better good acting a lot of action l like this one

The master of horror brought to us a vampiric masterclass of a movie. A really astonishing vampire movie, not the glowly sensitive "sexy" twight vampire, but true vampires that just wants to suck every single drop of human blood they can get their teeth on. Losely based on a book of the same name "Vampires" follows the story of Jack Crow and Tony Montoya, two slayers working under the catholic church, even if they work for priests there's nothing holy about Crow , a man thet will literally kick a padre's ass if he needs to. Obviously there's a nemesis for our protagonists, in this case Valek it's his name and this 600 year old bloodsucker is scary, i will give him that much. As allways in John Carpenter film there's a kick ass soudtrack (which i listen to this day) that gives the movie a western, action and horror vibe to the viewer. And the perfomances... James Woods carrys the movie on his own, Baldwin does an ok job i guess, Tim Guinne probably had his best on screen appereance perfomance of his career as a young priest and he nails it, and we even have the great Maximilian Schell wich is reason alone to adore the film. Small part but every single sentence spoken by him is acting gold. And for the Twin Peaks fans we have "Laura Palmer" herself. I'm a gigantic Carpenter fan so don't take it from me see it for yourself but i dont' care i'm giving it 10/10 stars. Yes it's that good!

John Carpenter's fondness of Westerns is well established, all the way back to his first prominent flick "Assault on Precinct 13" being a modern re-working of "Rio Bravo" with John Wayne. I think Carpenter is one of the best American directors, up on a level with Scorsese and a few others (and usually working with a much lower budget) but for some reason he doesn't get critical respect in this country, probably due to the genre he works in (I suspect that's also why Stephen King is not generally regarded as one of the best American novelists). I've also been a huge fan of James Woods since "The Onion Field," so to have them working together is a dream for me. "Vampires" had me right from the get go with Woods and his crew planning their raid on the "nest" ---I don't think there's anyone better than Carpenter at setting up scenes and building suspense, he's not afraid to give it the running time it needs—unlike a lot of younger directors who came from music videos and want everything fast and choppy. After most of the characters are killed off early on, the survivors track down the bad guy like in "The Searchers" also with John Wayne---in this case the "sheriff" and his "deputy" and the "floozy." Carpenter gets the best career performances out of two actors who are not my favorites—Daniel Baldwin and Sheryl Lee—although those two have the best scene in the film, i.e. the first one in the hotel room. I have mixed feelings about Thomas Ian Griffith as the "master"---I'd only ever seen him once before, in "Excessive Force," and liked him, but I thought he came a little too close to the "stereotyped European bloodsucker" that the Woods character himself had derided, but I imagine Griffith played it the way Carpenter wanted it. I loved having the devious Cardinal turn out to be a "bad guy," but that's just me and my issues with Catholicism in general. The plot with tracking down the "black cross" got just a bit unwieldy at times, but Carpenter keeps things humming along until the climax, after which in classic Western tradition the Woods character lets the two new vampires go their way for "old time's sake" but warns he'll have to kill them if they cross paths in future, then Woods and his new sidekick ride off (without horses) into the sunset (or sunrise, rather) for more adventures. …So after multiple viewings I really can't see why anyone wouldn't enjoy this flick unless they were just pre-determined not to; reportedly this was the project that led Carpenter to decide to stay in the business, and I'm sure glad he did…. Woods' line to the young priest in one scene---"Did you get a little wood just now, Padre?" ---should be in a collection of classic movie bon mots, along with "You gotta be f---in' kidding" from Carpenter's version "The Thing"--maybe someone should do a short film of just clips from Carpenter's oeuvre.....

Unknown to the rest of the world, a group of men have been organized by the Catholic Church to hunt and kill vampires. The leader of this group is a man named "Jack Crow" (James Woods) and he is as tough and non-relenting as they come. As it so happens, however, after one particularly successful event in New Mexico in which 9 vampires are killed while nesting together an abandoned house, the group convenes at a motel that night to celebrate. What they don't realize is that the master vampire by the name of "Jan Valek" (Thomas Ian Griffith) has found out where they are and he is in a very vengeful mood. To make things even more perilous for them is the fact that there is a traitor within their ranks who is working with Jan Valek for alternative reasons. Now rather than divulge any more I will just say that, even though the film starts out rather pretentiously, the action soon kicks in quite nicely which results in a pretty good vampire movie all things considered. Admittedly, there are some scenes which seem to focus more on gore over suspense or horror, but the overall plot and acting make up for it in the long run. Above average.