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| Images courtesy of Cleopatra Entertainment |
Jack of all trades writer-director-producer-editor-composer-cinematographer
Michael Stasko of Things to Do and The Bird Men has been around
since the early 2000s and yet only really seems to be making his biggest mark
now with Cleopatra Entertainment’s release of the playfully silly sci-fi faux-1950s
romp Vampire Zombies…From Space!
Ordinarily whenever the moniker Cleopatra Entertainment comes up I get a
little worried and seeing the cover art for this one which also included cameo
appearances by Judith O’Dea from the original Night of the Living Dead and
Troma president Lloyd Kaufman as the aptly named ‘the masturbator’ didn’t ease
my concerns. Thankfully however once
diving into this black-and-white period piece filled with intentional nods to
Ed Wood, Jr. and particularly Plan 9 from Outer Space, the finished
product is something like Destroy All Humans by way of Hundreds of
Beavers. For essentially being a
no-budget green-screener with intentionally hokey-looking visual effects
including bats and spaceships with monofilament wires suspending them, this
proved to be way more fun than it had any right to be!
In 1947, a young girl named Mary witnesses her mother’s over-the-top
gory death which also proves to be where Dracula (Craig Gloster) has reemerged
to claim her life. A decade later, now
an adult Mary (Jessica Antovski) is still haunted by images from the night of
her mom’s murder and soon after strange things begin afflicting her town
including but not limited to her parents vanishing and more characters turning
up dead. Meanwhile transfer Detective
Wallace (Rashaun Baldeo) and his drunken hard nosed boss Chief Clarke (Andrew
Bee) start picking up clues in the area pointing towards something as
outlandish as an army of vampire bat aliens from outer space coming to Earth to
unleash an armada of zombified humans to take over the world. Yeah, it plays on the idea of this plotline
being ridiculous and met with skepticism.
Only a chain-smoking greaser named Wayne (Oliver Georgiou) seems to know
how to fight back these undead monsters.
Meanwhile Dracula conducts a space meeting with fellow comrades Vampira
(Judith O’Dea), Nosferatu (David Liebe Hart) and even Francis Ford Coppola’s
Dracula (Martin Ouellette). From here,
it is an effects heavy green screen romp that should wear out its welcome early
on but winds up getting better by the minute.
Spoken of the same breath as The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra
with emphasis on the black-and-white regional B-movie that tossed in
everything but the kitchen sink while riffing on 1950s tropes and cliches right
down to the greaser and the flask guzzling cop, Vampire Zombies…From Space! is
a microbudget beer-and-pizza flick with a difference. Tapping into cornball 50s fears and hokum
while also playing on The War of the Worlds and The Day the Earth
Stood Still, it’s a lofi charmer that shouldn’t work nearly as well as it
does. With good lighting and
cinematography, generally good ensemble performances including the
aforementioned cameos from regional horror icons and tons of pretty well rendered
green screen effects, Vampire Zombies…From Space! neither loses its
momentum nor wears out its welcome particularly near the grand guignol finale reminiscent
of the pandemonium unleashed in Chuck Russell’s remake of The Blob.
An inspired little number and easily my favorite title to
come out of the Cleopatra Entertainment machine of the year, Vampire Zombies…From
Space! should collapse under its own weight as canned digital camp, but
somehow it winds up working anyway and then some. One of a handful of Cleopatra Entertainment
titles I can see myself revisiting more often than not over the years,
particularly at parties with friends, this love letter to 1950s science fiction
both good and wonderfully bad is almost celebratory in its adoration for the
lore, camp and charm generated by the subgenre.
While yes a spoof of B-movies which have their own regional virtues and
surprises ahead, as an homage this was a solid one and out of a handful of
Cleopatra Entertainment titles I feel comfortable sharing with family and
friends. Whatever Stasko is up to next,
he seems to have found his niche here with this tongue-in-cheek homage to 1950s
space horror flicks.
--Andrew Kotwicki
