[3]
I love John Carpenter. I’d even go so far as to say he’s one of my favorite directors. But only up through 1988’s They Live. For some reason, nothing Carpenter has done in the ’90s or beyond connects with me. Vampires is part of that disappointing ’90s lot. It stars James Woods as a too-cool-for-school vampire slayer out for vengeance after some old-ass vampire (boring Thomas Ian Griffith) kills his whole vamp-busting crew. Together with his last remaining teammate (boring Daniel Baldwin), a young priest (boring Tim Guinee), and a bitten girl with a psychic link to the head vampire (a wide-eyed and always-convulsing Sheryl Lee), he hunts down Griffith before the bloodsucker can get his claws on an ancient reliquary that will allow him to slay by day as well as night.
Vampires hits the ground running with Woods’s team in action, shooting spears into vampires and dragging them out into sunlight for some nice pyrotechnics. The mechanics of their job is cool, and that’s all that’s cool about the movie. My biggest problem is that the film never properly introduces its characters, and never gives the audience a reason to care about them. Woods tries way too hard to be funny and cool, and hits the mark only about ten percent of the time. His relationships with his co-stars are non-existent to anemic at best. Sheryl Lee (Twin Peaks) has far and away the most interesting character and gives the only remotely interesting performance, but she’s sidelined for most of the movie, treated as a plot device more than a full-fledged character.
I know this film has its fans, and it brings me no joy to hate on John Carpenter. But I just don’t get this one. I guess it’s not for me. Just like the vampires they hunt, there is zero life in any of these main characters and no compelling reason to watch them do their jobs. Vampires is dull, dull, dull — it was almost torture to finish this movie because I was so incredibly bored by it.
With Maximilian Schell, Mark Boone Junior, Gregory Sierra, and a monotonous score (by Carpenter) that does the film no favors.