Fist of the Vampire   Starring: Brian Heffron, Darian Cane and Brian Anthony Brain Damage Films RRP: £2.99 BDF007 Certificate: 18 Available 12 October 2009

In the 1970s a violent attack is witnessed on a young woman. The man who saw the horrifying spectacle manages to make it home, but his family is attacked and killed, aside from a young boy who is placed in a cupboard to hide. Switch to the present day, and Detective Lee Southward chases-down a nest of vampires and kills them. Finding himself transferred to another area, he is placed undercover to infiltrate an illegal cage-fighting and gambling racket - which turns out to be run by the same group of vampires from the seventies. Simply attempting to bring them to justice isn't good enough for Lee; the boy from the cupboard has a personal interest in the case which goes far beyond his job...

I really wanted to like this film because, however minute it might be, I have seen a steady progress in quality of entertainment since watching these budget horror releases from Brain Damage.

Fist of the Vampire is written and directed by Len Kabasinski, the creator of the recently reviewed Curse of the Wolf, and it groups together much of the same cast. This time there is a real attempt to make a worthy film, as opposed to Curse which possessed little cohesion or professionalism. But does it work? Yes and no.

This movie is around eighty percent fighting, and if it isn't it seems like it. They are much better choreographed than in Curse, but at times in an attempt to appear tough and cool the actors simply look disinterested in the proceedings. There is an obvious attempt to make a Tarantino-style film here, with sprayed gunfire, fantasy-realistic violence and loud music. It even carries the Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez-style of retro-dating by putting in film scratches and jumps. It's utilised here to depict the seventies, as if all films from that period suffered in this manner.

Just a couple more things. Again, poor sound quality ruins a pretty good metal soundtrack, and also affects the balance - making some moments too quiet and others shockingly loud. Dialogue dubbing is obvious in places too, as ambient noise is picked up from one character's speech but not the person next to them. Also, some scenes are extremely dark, and I'm not talking about the atmosphere!

4

Ty Power