John Carpenter's Vampires [Blu-ray]

One of the very BEST vampire movies ever made. John Carpenter knows how to keep the suspense going. This and From Dusk till Dawn are excellent movies.

John Carpenter's Vampires is not a good movie. It's a fun popcorn movie, but it's bad, and very dated to the late 90s. Very mild spoilers are necessary to explain some caveats. The setup: In comic book fashion, vampire hunters stalk the American Southwest hunting down packs of undead. They drink, they curse, they crack jokes. Things quickly go south when the master vampire tracks down our hunters. It's up to Jack Crow, the Catholic Church's chosen hunter, to set things right - even if it means going against the Church. The plot is bog standard stuff, but the comedy of our perverted hunters interacting with their priest cohorts makes for an interesting twist on the formula. What's good: I personally like James Woods as Jack Crow. He's gross, he's funny, he treats his role with the appropriate mix of grim seriousness and levity. Daniel Baldwin as Montoya does an amazing job at being a total scumbag who's nonetheless always there for Jack. Sheryl Lee steals the show as Katrina, a prostitute who is bitten by the master and forms a psychic bond which may help our hunters track down the master. Tim Guinee also puts in a good turn as Father Adam Guiteau, the slightly nebbish replacement priest for our crew. Together they form a very memorable crew. Some of the action scenes - in particular the method they use to drag vampires out of their nests - is very neat and builds good tension. What's not good: This is a movie starring anti-heroes, and they really come across as scumbags, so it can be had to root for them. While that can be a cool concept, it does go a few hits too far. Some of Montoya's rough handling of Katrina makes sense given that she's been bitten by a vampire, but it does go too far. Montoya is still beating Katrina even as it becomes clear he's developing feelings for her, and a late-movie turn where they even love each other just feels icky. Crow is still threatening to murder his priest far past the point where it's really even helpful to his cause, and the priest begins to trust Crow rather than being permanently scarred. A low-rent production with an only-okay script doesn't help. You start to realize this movie is filmed in the Southwest because deserts are cheap to film in and don't require permits. The master enemy is totally generic, his performance does nothing, and the "vampire vision" looks like a 90s nu-metal video replete with soundtrack. So our heroes are scumbags, our villain is almost a placeholder, and there's a music video scene where vampires climb out of the dirt to 90s nu-metal. This can have audiences laughing or groaning rather than getting excited. Overall: As a dumb popcorn action movie, Vampires works for me. I like the idea of scumbag anti-heroes being hired by the Catholic Church to root out vampires. It's a great spin on the idea that it takes a monster to kill a monster. But the scumbag factor is a little too high so I don't like the characters, the production is too cheap, and the late 90s music video portions are not going to win anyone over. I still watch it every few years, especially for the performances, but it's overall nowhere near Carpenter's masterpieces. Most people agree they'd rather watch Ghosts of Mars - another stinker - but I'm a little partial to Vampires just because of the lead performances.

James Woods absolutely steals this underrated 90s Horror Classic. Blu-Ray looks & sounds amazing. ● exactly as described & arrived on time ●

I love this movie I love James woods. Vampire movies are awesome too this is a good one. Glad I could buy it on Blu-ray

great

A magnificent take on the Vampire mythology. John Carpenter is without a doubt my favorite director and in true Carpenter fashion he takes an established idea and spins it into a somewhat dark comedy that gives any other bloodsucker film a true run for it's money. One of the highlights of this film is James Woods, who is perfectly cast as the grizzled old gunslinger and it works so well because he is not a hero. If he wasn't such a recognizable figure I think Woods would completely disappear into this character. Woods has always had a kind of distant-likable aura about him and that makes the movie work because he is not pretty boy avenger he is just a regular Joe with a job to do. Valek was a damn good villain. He truly is a bad guy and not some lovestruck-guilt ridden immortal who longs for his mortality, he is a vicious killer and shows no mercy to anyone in his pursuit of the black cross.That kind of villain is getting more rare in cinema every year. If your Carpenter fan, buy this! If your a Vampire fan, buy this! If your James Woods fan, buy this! If you can then grab the Blu Ray, great transfer and the sound is a true stand-out. :)

Perfect family movie for family movie night.

Entertaining action vampire flick with good masks and gore from end of John Carpenter directing career about commando of guys fighting against vampires. Action scenes are good, but when we watch the surviving characters interacting and waiting between another attacks, it's not so good. Dialogues are sometimes very dumb and duo of heroes practically bully the priest and poor Sheryl Lee most of the time which is very toxic and bothering experience. James Woods enjoys his action character very much (it's obviously serious actor fun vacation role) and it's good for the movie. Picture quality and sound is good in this 4K release and there is enough bonus materials to enjoy the informations after movie is over. Not one of Carpenter's best, but if you need action vampire flick, it's waiting for your needs.

PLOT... Recovering from an ambush that killed his entire team, a vengeful vampire slayer must retrieve an ancient Catholic relic that should it be acquired by vampires will allow them to walk in sunlight. This is yet another fantastic horror in John Carpenter's long list of awesome movies over the years, he tackles the vampire genre in his own way and gives us a cool classic horror, all the Carpenter touches are here, including a great music score, the cast is all good, James Woods and Daniel Baldwin lead the way and Sheryl Lee is sexy eye candy, there is plenty of bloody gore and violence, vampires on fire and some nudity, plenty of cool vampire slaying action, most part its good old school practical effects too which look great. This is certainly one of the coolest and fun vampire movies from over the years and don't take itself too seriously like some, make sure you check this out especially as it now looks so great on Blu-ray. HD picture on the Blu-ray is great (certainly an improvement over the DVD version) Features are good with a commentary by Carpenter, a making of (23-mins total) isolated score, trailer, Carpenter interview (38-mins) REGION FREE ABC, DVD is region free 0 too, 108-mins, 1998. Blu-ray is limited to 7000 copies and comes with DVD movie too and 20 page booklet. English language only.

ich habe mir die DVD gekauft, da ich in dem Film im Kino war und er mir gut gefallen hat. Zuerst hatte ich ihn als Video Kassette .Die Video Player gibt es nicht mehr .Natürlich die Version ab 18 Jahre.

Con la película no tengo problema porque la estaba cazando desde hace años y por fin pude comprarla. El problema es que vino con el disco suelto y se rayó un poco por una falta de cuidado al empacarla para el envio Solo pediría un poco mas de cuidado para los envios

Un altro grande film del maestro Carpenter. Ottimo blu ray sia audio che video. Ottimi effetti speciali, e bella storia. Qui siamo davanti ad un buon "horror" rispetto agli altri suoi film più " psicologici e di suspence" che siamo abituati a vedere dal maestro. Compratelo vi divertirete

Loved it