VAMPIRE KIDS (1991)

[Guest Atomic Mystery Monster]

VAMPIRE KIDS is rather bizarre horror/comedy (with more comedy than horror). The premise is that a tour group gets stranded on a deserted island that has an abandoned WWII Japanese outpost on it (and Chinese hopping vampires). Said outpost has a vampirized Japanese general emtombed in a wall, who gets partially free when one of the castaways takes a diamond that was being used to seal in the vampire's power. For reasons that are never really delved into, the general is able to control a bunch of little hopping vampires and sends them out in order to get blood for him so he can get enough power to break free from the wall.

Their first attempt fails because a bunch of the castaways ate "poisonous tomatoes" that made them temporarily blind and insane with rage, leading to a bizarre sequence in which they chase and beat the hell out of the vampire kids. The other attempts fail mostly because none of the kids want to suck any blood (The poorly translated subtitles weren't any help in explaining why). Mainwhile, the general manages to get some blood...

If you feel like importing a DVD of this, keep in mind that the movie focuses on the on the castaways and comedy than it does on the hopping vampires. I know there are people out there who can't stand bizarre Hong Kong comedies and I suspect that if you fall into that category, then you'll hate this movie. I'm a bit of a special case since I get more humor out of the fact that certain jokes were attempted (Like, say, a woman with big breasts getting dropped face-first on the beach and leaving two giant holes in the ground when she gets picked up), rather than finding humor in the joke itself. It's far from being a masterpiece, but it might be worth your while if you can find a copy that doesn't cost much.

The widescreen (probably non anamorphic) DVD by Mei Ah looks pretty good; judging by the print quality, I'm guessing that this was a direct port of the transfer used for Mei Ah's laserdisc of the movie. You get your choice of Cantonese or Mandarin soundtracks, subtitles (I think they were "Traditional", "Simplified", "English", and "None"), and a "databank" that includes a film synopsis (the same one that's on the DVD case) and a credits list. I should point out that the English subtitles aren't translated well and sometimes lapse into "Engrish" or "flubtitles".