But Satires Shouldn’t

By Fearless Young Orphan Vampires Suck (2010) Directed by Jason Friedberg, Aaron Seltzer

As much fun as it is to see spoofs of popular franchises, there’s also a drawback when the series itself has the questionable quality of the Twilight saga. What do I mean by that? We’ll get to it in just a second. But first, remember I watched the whole saga and found it entertaining in a twisted way, especially since I forced myself into a kind of role-playing viewing as a “person who has never heard of Twilight before,” so I could watch it as a tale of mental illness, which works perfectly well. Let’s be honest, though. I don’t live in a vacuum and I know exactly what the Twilight series means to various demographics – because for like seven years, they wouldn’t shut up about it. Back to the question at hand. What do I mean by “questionable quality”? Only this: this is a vastly overblown and overrated saga which, nevertheless, is still made up of five reasonably entertaining films (of decreasing quality) if you like watching sort-of ridiculous, strangely performed, angsty romantic movies. I was all right with the whole silly affair, but of course, I love to watch so-bad-they’re-good movies.

Which leaves us with the problem of this spoof: there is little audience (or need) for such a thing. The people who truly love the Twilight saga won’t find Vampires Suck particularly funny because it’s too cynical. And because it’s not particularly funny, period. The people who hate the Twilight saga won’t find it particularly funny because the Twilight saga serves perfectly well as its own parody. Everything you need for comedy is included right there in the Twilight movies themselves. There is little that Vampires Suck offers that we all hadn’t already seen for ourselves in the original material. Yes, in the saga, the acting is puzzling or downright awful. Yes, the werewolves and vampires are silly. Yes, the characters are dimensionless and sometimes unwittingly horrifying. Is this really the best that Vampires Suck can offer by way of observation? This is not to say that there aren’t some sparkly little gems of funny in this film, just that there aren’t enough of them by a long shot.

Vampires Suck encapsulates the plots of both Twilight and New Moon – have you seen them? If not, tough. I’m not going through it all again. Read my essays. In a nutshell, introverted weirdo Becca Crane moves to the town of Sporks to live with her sheriff father, and falls in love with Edward Sullen (that’s a great name, by the way), the big-haired vampire of such powerful girl-seducing pheromones.

Then lots of angsty romantic bullshit goes down, and in this instance, it goes down with all the bullshit being heavily underlined by what is usually clumsy spoofing: Jacob scratches behind his ear with his foot (get it? He’s just like a DOG!) or turns into a Chihuahua when he “transforms,” or Becca’s dad lets Becca beat Sparkly, indeed! the crap out of him to teach her self-defense, a scene that goes on far too long. There are a few nice, subtle gags (like a song Becca listens to which is apparently called “I’m So Sad”), a really hilarious moment when the werewolf troupe performs a passionate dance number, and some spot-on commentary, particularly from Becca when she mutters something dry about her character’s perplexing personality.

In fact, Jenn Proske, who stars as Becca Crane, is actually the funniest, best reason to see the film. She does a spooky and dead-on impression of Kristen Stewart’s oddball Bella Swann, hitches and shudders included, and has the speech mannerisms down. She also gets some of the funniest lines – but be aware, they usually come on the sly and when you’re not expecting them. I believe that her portrayal of a dour, unhappy girl is the very reason why she’s so funny in this spoof, because it makes the things she says sound all the more wry and cynical. She also has the best running gag: she is a horny, kinky little minx and wants Edward badly, right now. Bella Swann never bothered to be so forward about her desires – or at least, she didn’t have the latex- and-neon lingerie. I thought Proske was excellent in the role, and deserved a better vehicle.

Her counterpart Edward Sullen (Matt Lanter) is not quite as good, but he’s still pretty enjoyable. He’s got the tormented (or as Vampires Suck calls it, “constipated”) look of the eternally seventeen, lovelorn vampire who has been castrated of sex drive or personality so that he can be a somehow-dangerous-nevertheless-nonthreatening dream boy. Lanter portrays Edward as kind of a pained idiot, a good choice. And finally, in the role of Jacob White the buff werewolf, Chris Riggi has the wolf’s share of bad lines and sight gags, poor guy, but he is a dead ringer for the part and seems to be a good sport.

So on to the Fangs Score. Now this is a puzzle. This is the spoof of movies that were not really “vampire” movies in themselves, but romances that used vampires as a euphemism. Of course that could be said for a lot of vampire movies I guess. Actually Vampires Suck jumps onto the vampire bandwagon a little more enthusiastically, making puns and things. If the movie were consistently funny I’d give it 8/10 Fangs, but it’s unfunny by and large and fails to really parody the Twilight franchise with any new or biting (haha!) satire except on occasion when a smart line slips through. It does no better at poking fun at Twilight than Twilight does when inadvertently poking fun at itself. We’ll give it 5/10 Fangs.