Vampire films

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Of the various fictional monsters to be depicted in movies throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, the vampire has been one of the most popular. Vampires have been a film staple since the silent days, so much so that the depiction of vampires in popular culture is strongly based upon their depiction in movies throughout the years.

The Vampire (film) (1913, directed by Robert G. Vignola), also co-written by Vignola, is the earliest vampire film. The landmark Nosferatu (1922 Germany, directed by Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau) was an unlicensed version of Dracula based so closely on Bram Stoker's Dracula, the estate sued and won, with all copies being destroyed. (It would be painstakingly restored in 1994 by a team of European scholars from the five surviving prints.) By 2005, Dracula had been the subject of more films than any other fictional character.

The treatment of vampires has been kaleidoscopic. It has been comedic, including Old Dracula (1974 UK, directed by Clive Donner) featuring David Niven as a lovelorn Drac, Love at First Bite (1979 USA) featuring George Hamilton and Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1995 USA, directed by Mel Brooks) with Canadian Leslie Nielsen giving it a comic twist, to absurd, with Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948).

Vampirism has changed from embodied evil in Dracula to a kind of virus in David Cronenberg's Rabid (1976 Canada) and Red-Blooded American Girl (1990 Canada, directed by David Blyth). It got a science fiction spin in The Last Man on Earth (Italy 1964, directed by Ubaldo Ragona) and The Omega Man (1971 USA, directed by Boris Sagal), both based on Richard Matheson's novel I Am Legend (writing as Logan Swanson), the product of a biological war. Race has not been excluded, either, as exemplified by the blaxploitation picture Blacula (1972 USA, directed by William Crain) and several sequels.

Roman Polanski made his own vampire movie with The Fearless Vampire Killers too.

Killing vampires has changed, too. Where Abraham Van Helsing relied on a stake through the heart, in Vampire$ (1997 USA, directed by John Carpenter), Jack Crow (James Woods) has a heavily-armed squad of vampire hunters, and in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992 USA, directed by Fran Rubel Kuzui), writer Joss Whedon (who created TV's Buffy the Vampire Slayer and spinoff Angel) attached The Slayer, Buffy Summers (Kristy Swanson in the film, Sarah Michelle Gellar in the TV series), to a network of Watchers and mystically endowed her with superhuman powers.

Murnau's Nosferatu featured a vampire (portrayed by Max Schrek) that was ancient-looking and ugly, similar to the vampires of European folklore. The vampire was transformed from a creature of disgust and fear into an object of lust, in such films as Camilla (released as La Maldicion De Los Karnstein, 1963), Daughters of Darkness (released as Children Of The Night, 1971), Dracula (1979), and Once Bitten (1985), for just a few examples. Delphine Seyrig, Frank Langella, or Lauren Hutton could hardly be called ugly. Even X-rated films (such as 1978’s Dracula Sucks and 1999's Hot Vampire Nights) have used vampire themes.

In 2002, Shadow of the Vampire (2000 UK/USA/Luxembourg, directed by E. Elias Merhige) starred Willem Dafoe as leading man Max Schrek, playing an actual vampire, and John Malkovich as a harassed Murnau. Dafoe's character is the ugly, disgusting creature of the original Nosferatu.

A 1998 UK television drama called Ultraviolet centres around vampires and a fictional British governmental agency which both keeps their existence secret and seeks to destroy them.

In 2006, the TV show Supernatural occasionally sees the two brothers meeting vampires. Their father's mentor was a vampire hunter, and was killed by "old friends". Sam and Dean hunt down the vampires as they have in their possession a gun which could kill the thing they're really after.

Contents

[edit] Dracula and his legacy

By far, the most well-known and popular vampire in the movies is Dracula. An amazing number of movies have been filmed over the years depicting the evil count, some of which are ranked among the greatest depictions of vampires on film. Dracula has over 160 film representations making him the most frequently portrayed character in horror films; he has the second-highest number of movie appearances overall, following only Sherlock Holmes.[citation needed]

[edit] Other Vampires on movies and television

  • The Return of Count Yorga (1971).

[edit] Other media

Video game series featuring vampires primarily use Dracula or Dracula-inspired characters. Konami's Castlevania series is the longest running series which uses the Dracula legend, though its writers have made their own alterations to the legend. An exception to this trend is the Legacy of Kain video game series, which features vampires set in an entirely fictional world called Nosgoth.

Other vampires seen in games include:

  • The Elder Scrolls game series involves vampires created by demon lord. They have all the typical attributes, but some (though not all) can walk in sunlight if they have fed on a victim.
  • In the tabletop wargame Warhammer Fantasy: Vampire Counts are one of the playable forces.
  • Role-playing games such as Vampire: The Masquerade (1992), in which the participants play the roles of fictional vampires (for specifics, see vampires in the World of Darkness).
  • The Darkstalkers (1994) fighting game series (known as Vampire Savior in Japan) features a vampire along with other mythological and horror-themed characters.
  • Shadowrun features vampires whose existence is explained by a resurgence of the Human Meta-Human Vampiric Virus. As such, the afflicted are not undead, but instead are still alive but radically changed by the retrovirus. They normally do not suffer from the supernatural limitations such as crosses, but still are vulnerable to sunlight.
  • The Sims 2: Nightlife, the second expansion pack for popular series The Sims 2, introduces vampires to the game. These vampires in this game follow many fictional conventions, such sleeping in ornate coffins, wearing gothic clothing, and being able to transform into bats. Vampirism can be spread between game characters through biting. If caught outside during the day, a Sim Vampire's will soon die.
  • The video game series Castlevania establishes a new origin for Dracula and chronicles the never ending struggle between him and the Belmont clan of vampire hunters stretching from the 11th century all the way to the 21st century.
  • The video game series Shadow Hearts have four known vampires (Three playable) in the games (though hardly stereotypical).
  • The video game series Boktai revolves around the Vampire Hunter Django. However, even though the games sometimes equalize the terms of Vampire and Immortal, there are only a few true vampires in the games, such as the Count of Groundsoaking Blood.
  • The scrolling shooter Embodiment of Scarlet Devil features two vampire sisters as the final boss and the extra stage boss. The older of the two, Remilia Scarlet, became playable in two later games of the Touhou Project.

In addition to gaming, vampires populate other popular media such as graphic novels, comics, theater, and musicals:

  • The stage play (Love & Darkness) by Vancouver Island Playwright David Elendune depicts the Nephilim as a race of vampires - ie the resulting offspring of fallen angels and the daughters of man.

[edit] References

  • Christopher Frayling (1992) Vampyres: Lord Byron to Count Dracula (1992) ISBN 0-571-16792-6
  • Freeland, Cynthia A. (2000) The Naked and the Undead: Evil and the Appeal of Horror. Westview Press.
  • Holte, James Craig. (1997) Dracula in the Dark: The Dracula Film Adaptations. Greenwood Press.
  • Leatherdale, C. (1993) Dracula: The Novel and the Legend. Desert Island Books.
  • Melton, J. Gordon. (1999) The Vampire Book: The Encyclopedia of the Undead. Visible Ink Press.

[edit] External links

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