Vampires: Los Muertos | |
---|---|
Directed by | Tommy Lee Wallace |
Written by | Tommy Lee Wallace |
Produced by |
|
Starring | |
Cinematography | Henner Hofmann |
Edited by | Charles Bornstein |
Music by | Brian Tyler |
Distributed by | Destination Films |
Release date |
|
Running time | 90 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Vampires: Los Muertos is a 2002 American direct-to-video Western horror film written and directed by Tommy Lee Wallace and starring Jon Bon Jovi as a vampire hunter. A sequel to the 1998 film Vampires , it was produced by John Carpenter (who directed the original film). Vampires: Los Muertos introduces new characters, and the only reference to the previous film is the mention of Father Adam Guiteau from the original film, who has since died, as well as the legendary Béziers Cross, which was unsuccessfully used in the first film to perform a ritual that enables vampires to survive daylight.
The film was followed by a sequel, Vampires: The Turning (2005).
A man on the streets searches for a prostitute, and when he finds one, he threatens her with a razor blade. Derek Bliss steps in and points an odd-looking gun at his left temple. The man backs away, and the prostitute thanks Derek and asks if she can do anything for him. He shoots her with three stakes, as she was a vampire. Derek drags her to an abandoned car lot and watches the body catch fire in the sunlight while filming it on camera.
When he gets back to his hotel room, the Van Helsing Group leader calls him and informs him that he has a new job. He goes down to Mexico to a monastery where a group of vampire-hunting priests are staying. He has a strange vision, and one of the priests concludes that the vampires may be linking up with him.
That night, Una, a vampire princess, and her fledglings attack and feed upon a man. The next day, Derek goes looking for people on a list he has been given. Unfortunately, most of them are dead or crazy, and the last living ones are killed. Derek goes to a coffee shop and asks for a man named Jesse. He tells Derek to wait while he finishes up something. Derek then meets a young woman named Zoey, and he grows suspicious when she asks him if he works in the "undead" business. He leaves to go to the bathroom, and finds out that Zoey is a vampire by using a special lens, lamenting the fact as he thinks she's cute. In the split second it takes him to throw a paper towel in the trash, Una comes in, slashes the throats of every customer, and kidnaps Jesse.
When Derek comes out and sees that Zoey has also fled, he concludes that she must have done it. The next day, he pulls over when he sees her on the side of the road in daylight. They argue; Zoey tells him about special pills she takes to fight off her vampire side. She got bit accidentally by a vampire during a one-night stand. She has a vision of a monastery, and Derek realizes that it is the one where he just left. They drive back and find all but one priest slaughtered. Father Rodrigo tells them that Una is seeking the legendary Béziers Cross, the same cross used unsuccessfully in the first film used to perform a ritual that will enable vampires to walk in daylight and be invulnerable and shows them something a fellow priest was working on in his spare time: a huge van complete with all the necessary vampire-slaying tools. Derek hears a noise in the trees, and finds a teenager that he had met before. His name is Sancho, and he has a permission slip from his mother, stating he can go on the vampire hunt with Derek.
The group meet up with another hunter, Ray Collins from Memphis, and go after Una. Una seduces Ray and convinces him to leave Zoey's pills where she can get them. When they reach the village where the vampires are hiding out, they are welcomed because they want the vampires killed. Una, now able to walk in daylight, goes out and kidnaps Zoey. Derek aims the gun at Sancho and says he must have given the pills to Una. However, a villager realizes that Ray did it, and shoots him before Derek shoots Sancho. Derek and the gang go after Zoey to rescue her, at the cost of leaving Rodrigo to properly perform the ritual. They go back to a clinic, where Zoey's vampire blood is exchanged for human blood; as her pills were all used, this method is the only way to suppress her vampire side for a time. Derek knows how to save Rodrigo; the vampire blood is pumped into his body.
The team goes after Rodrigo and find out that he was not a real priest. Una is not daunted, and she responds by lighting a fire beneath his feet. Derek saves Rodrigo, and goes after Una. They almost kill her, but she escapes when the cord which was dragging her into the sunlight snaps. She catches Derek, but Derek then grabs what is left of the cord. Before they reach the sunlight, Derek shoots her head off with a shotgun and sends it flying into the sun, where it catches fire. Her body turns into stone with a black beating heart in the chest. Derek drives a stake into the heart. Sancho and Rodrigo decide to stay in the village, and Derek and Zoey drive away in the sunset to resupply on pills.
Vampires: Los Muertos was released straight-to-home video on September 25, 2002, though it did play theatrically in Mexico and Japan, where the first film had been very successful. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 20% based on reviews from 5 critics. [1] David Nusair of Reel Film Reviews gave it 2.5 out of 4, and wrote: "Vampires: Los Muertos is far more entertaining than it has any right to be, mostly due to Wallace's inventive direction and Bon Jovi's engaging lead performance." [2]
I Am Legend is a 1954 post-apocalyptic horror novel by American writer Richard Matheson that was influential in the modern development of zombie and vampire literature and in popularizing the concept of a worldwide apocalypse due to disease. The novel was a success and was adapted into the films The Last Man on Earth (1964), The Omega Man (1971), and I Am Legend (2007). It was also an inspiration for George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead (1968).
John Francis Bongiovi Jr., known professionally as Jon Bon Jovi, is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, and actor. He is best known as the founder and frontman of the rock band Bon Jovi, which was formed in 1983. He has released 15 studio albums with his band as well as two solo albums.
Vampires is a 1998 American neo-Western action horror film directed and scored by John Carpenter and starring James Woods. It was adapted from the novel Vampire$ by John Steakley.
Moon Child is a 2003 Japanese science fantasy horror action film starring Gackt, Hyde, and Leehom Wang. It was released on April 19 in Japan, and screened on May 13 at the Cannes Film Festival and on April 12, 2004, at Philadelphia Film Festival. In November 2023 for its 20th anniversary it was re-screened nationwide in Japan. The movie's story is adaptation of Gackt's original story related to his "Moon Saga" concept. Although the original story is about a vampire and his friends, it "reverses the concept of marginalised Asians living illegally in Japan to that of a group of marginalised Japanese renegades hiding out in a fictional futuristic city on the Asian mainland, named Maleppa, following Japan's economic collapse in the opening decades of the 21st Century".
Vamp is a 1986 American black comedy horror film directed by Richard Wenk, co-written by Wenk and Donald P. Borchers, and starring Grace Jones and Chris Makepeace.
Fright Night Part 2 is a 1988 American supernatural horror film directed by Tommy Lee Wallace, the sequel to the 1985 film Fright Night. Roddy McDowall and William Ragsdale reprise their roles as Charley Brewster and Peter Vincent, alongside new cast members Traci Lind, Julie Carmen and Jon Gries. Composer Brad Fiedel also returned with another distinct synthesizer score.
Innocent Blood is a 1992 American black comedy horror film directed by John Landis and written by Michael Wolk. The film stars Anne Parillaud as a beautiful French vampire who finds herself pitted against a gang of mobsters led by Salvatore Macelli who eventually becomes a vampire and schemes to build a criminal syndicate of vampires.
Vampire's Kiss is a 1989 American black comedy horror film directed by Robert Bierman and written by Joseph Minion. Starring Nicolas Cage, María Conchita Alonso, Jennifer Beals, and Elizabeth Ashley, the film tells the story of a literary agent who falls in love with a vampire. The film later developed a cult following largely due to Cage's "scorched-earth acting", which has become a source of many Internet memes.
Dracula II: Ascension is a 2003 direct-to-video American-Romanian vampire film, directed by Patrick Lussier. It stars Jason Scott Lee, Stephen Billington and Diane Neal. Filmed entirely in Romania by Castel Film Studios, the film is the sequel to Dracula 2000. It was released direct-to-video on June 7, 2003.
Sookie Stackhouse is a fictional character and protagonist of The Southern Vampire Mysteries book series, written by Charlaine Harris. In HBO's television adaptation, True Blood, Sookie is portrayed by Anna Paquin.
Wayne Isham is an American film director and music video director who has directed films and music videos of many popular artists.
I Bought a Vampire Motorcycle is a 1990 British comedy horror film about a motorcycle possessed by an evil spirit, which rides by itself and kills people, particularly members of a particular motorcycle gang. It stars Neil Morrissey as the bike's owner, Michael Elphick as a police inspector and Anthony Daniels as a priest who attempts to exorcise the bike's evil spirit.
Tara Mae Thornton is a fictional character in Charlaine Harris' The Southern Vampire Mysteries and its television adaptation, HBO's True Blood.
Jason Stackhouse is a fictional character from The Southern Vampire Mysteries book series by author Charlaine Harris. Introduced in the first novel, Dead Until Dark, Jason is Sookie Stackhouse's older brother and a road crew supervisor for Bon Temps, Louisiana.
Priest is a 2011 American action horror film directed by Scott Stewart and stars Paul Bettany as the title character. It is loosely based on the Korean comic of the same name by Hyung Min-woo, in turn inspired by the computer game Blood by Monolith Productions. Set in an alternate universe where humanity and vampires have warred for centuries, after the last Vampire War, a veteran Warrior Priest lives in obscurity until his niece is kidnapped by vampires.
Taboo is an American mystery thriller film directed by Max Makowski, written by Chris Fisher, and starring Nick Stahl, Eddie Kaye Thomas, January Jones, Amber Benson, Derek Hamilton, and Lori Heuring. It was released by Columbia Tristar Home Videos on January 14, 2002.
Zoey Francis Chaya Thompson Deutch is an American actress. The younger daughter of director Howard Deutch and actress-director Lea Thompson, Deutch made her acting debut in television during the early 2010s, with roles on Disney Channel's The Suite Life on Deck (2010–2011) and CW's Ringer (2011–2012).
The Vampire is a 1957 American horror film produced by Arthur Gardner and Jules V. Levy, directed by Paul Landres, and starring John Beal and Colleen Gray. Its plot follows a San Francisco physician who inadvertently ingests pills laced with the blood of vampire bats, leading him to take on vampiric qualities. Like 1956's The Werewolf, it offered a science fiction take on a traditionally supernatural creature, although the films were produced by different production companies.
Afflicted is a 2013 Canadian found footage horror film written and directed by Derek Lee and Clif Prowse. Their feature film directorial debut, it had its world premiere on September 9, 2013 at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it won a special jury citation for Best Canadian First Feature Film. Lee and Prowse star as two friends whose goal to film themselves traveling the world is cut short when one of them contracts a mysterious disease.
Daylight's End is a 2016 American action horror film directed by William Kaufman and written by Chad Law. It stars Johnny Strong as a drifter in post-apocalyptic Texas who agrees to help survivors, played by Lance Henriksen, Louis Mandylor, and Hakeem Kae-Kazim, escape to safety. Mixed martial arts fighter Krzysztof Soszynski plays the leader of vampire-like creatures that attempt to kill them.