Bloodsucking Bastards (2015)
If the film's title Bloodsucking Bastards hasn't given you a clue as to what to expect here then maybe the tagline 'Work it sucks the life out of you' will. Yep, this a vampire comedy horror billed as 'Office Space meets Shaun of the Dead'. By comparing itself to two cult flicks where laughs are high sets an awfully high precedent for director Brian James Connell's movie. It is a level that it fails to reach but that doesn't mean that his premise, where the bosses are literally sucking the staff dry in order to improve a company's performance, is without any charm or fun along the way.
It's initially difficult to warm to our lead character Evan (Fran Kranz). He's no Shaun, as in Shaun of the Dead. Sure Shaun is put upon at work, has a slobby best mate and girlfriend issues, but his circumstances are more or believable, and therefore more relatable. Evan is too much of a victim. for the most part, so it's no easy to emphasis with him.
Evan has messed up with HR director Amanda (Emma Fitzpatrick), with whom he is romantically entangled, or was until he responded badly to her saying she loved him one evening. Evan finds solace in believing that a forthcoming promotion to Sales Manager will be his only to find it offered to a company outsider. The outsider is smarmy, slimy, slick Max (Pedro Pascal), an old rival of Evan's. No sooner has Max made himself known co-workers start disappearing and/or change into a more aggressive persona with Evan's colleagues slow to pick up on the changes.
Obviously filmed on a budget, but filmed and played with enthusiasm and glee, Bloodsucking Bastards overcomes its shaky start - it takes awhile to warm to the characters - and never overplays the vampire angle with puny related puns. Some visual panache is called for rather than the static camera-work on offer and it's also slow in finding its feet. The screenwriters clearly enjoyed dispensing the earlier 'witty' and crude insults, failing to realise that their script works better with the lighter asides - such as colleagues asking what the character Dave actually does each day at work aside from going around telling people they owe him money.
Fran Kranz (Evan) will be familiar to genre fans as the stoner from the overrated The Cabin in the Woods however the real stars in Bloodsucking Bastards are Joey Kern, as Evan's laid-back best friend Tim and David F. Park as Dave who seems to have no real function in their workplace. Things get suitably bloody come the climax and the earlier reservations are completely forgotten. Bloodsucking Bastards plays like Shaun of the Dead, albeit with vampires and not zombies, and whilst it's not in the same league is does pick up halfway through and becomes a lot of fun.
Check out more of my reviews at www.mybloodyreviews.com
If the film's title Bloodsucking Bastards hasn't given you a clue as to what to expect here then maybe the tagline 'Work it sucks the life out of you' will. Yep, this a vampire comedy horror billed as 'Office Space meets Shaun of the Dead'. By comparing itself to two cult flicks where laughs are high sets an awfully high precedent for director Brian James Connell's movie. It is a level that it fails to reach but that doesn't mean that his premise, where the bosses are literally sucking the staff dry in order to improve a company's performance, is without any charm or fun along the way.
It's initially difficult to warm to our lead character Evan (Fran Kranz). He's no Shaun, as in Shaun of the Dead. Sure Shaun is put upon at work, has a slobby best mate and girlfriend issues, but his circumstances are more or believable, and therefore more relatable. Evan is too much of a victim. for the most part, so it's no easy to emphasis with him.
Evan has messed up with HR director Amanda (Emma Fitzpatrick), with whom he is romantically entangled, or was until he responded badly to her saying she loved him one evening. Evan finds solace in believing that a forthcoming promotion to Sales Manager will be his only to find it offered to a company outsider. The outsider is smarmy, slimy, slick Max (Pedro Pascal), an old rival of Evan's. No sooner has Max made himself known co-workers start disappearing and/or change into a more aggressive persona with Evan's colleagues slow to pick up on the changes.
Obviously filmed on a budget, but filmed and played with enthusiasm and glee, Bloodsucking Bastards overcomes its shaky start - it takes awhile to warm to the characters - and never overplays the vampire angle with puny related puns. Some visual panache is called for rather than the static camera-work on offer and it's also slow in finding its feet. The screenwriters clearly enjoyed dispensing the earlier 'witty' and crude insults, failing to realise that their script works better with the lighter asides - such as colleagues asking what the character Dave actually does each day at work aside from going around telling people they owe him money.
Fran Kranz (Evan) will be familiar to genre fans as the stoner from the overrated The Cabin in the Woods however the real stars in Bloodsucking Bastards are Joey Kern, as Evan's laid-back best friend Tim and David F. Park as Dave who seems to have no real function in their workplace. Things get suitably bloody come the climax and the earlier reservations are completely forgotten. Bloodsucking Bastards plays like Shaun of the Dead, albeit with vampires and not zombies, and whilst it's not in the same league is does pick up halfway through and becomes a lot of fun.
Check out more of my reviews at www.mybloodyreviews.com