Very Cool!!!

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

This movie essentially begins with a man named "Dr. Matt Campbell" (Wood Romoff) being discovered in his laboratory by a delivery boy and in need of serious medical attention. Upon being notified "Dr. Paul Beecher" (John Beal) immediately rushes to the house but Matt dies only a couple of minutes later. However, before he dies Matt mumbles something totally incoherent and gives Paul a small bottle of pills in the process. Not long afterward, Dr. Beecher develops a migraine and accidentally takes the pills Matt gave him by mistake. The next day Dr. Beecher gets a call that a woman named "Marion Wilkins" (Ann Staunton) is extremely sick and this prompts him to go to her house right away. However, upon attempting to examine her she becomes extremely agitated by his presence before suddenly dying of an apparent heart attack. It's at this time that Paul discovers two bite marks on her neck--and it isn't long before more people begin to die of the same thing. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was a different type of vampire film which bore a definite affinity to the "Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde" scenario. That being said, it didn't quite have the same character one might expect of a traditional vampire film but even so it was still entertaining to a degree and for that reason I have rated it accordingly. Average.

Straightforward, no-nonsense vampire film that is played with skill by a cast of good actors. John Beal (who many viewers probably have never heard of) was a highly respected, experienced actor who plays this strong lead role just fine. He even gives his character some sympathetic edges.Colleen Gray is excellent eye candy, and the immortal sci-fi actor Kenneth Tobey is on hand (as he should be) in a believable performance as the Sheriff.This is a wide-screen presentation and there is a good DVD available with first-rate picture quality. Limited production budget does not detract here. This is a well-paced tightly done monster film that features genuine, sudden menace as the monster prowls the night. This is not just cheap 1950's monster schlock. It is a legit effort- it's the real deal.

I continued my winter horror film viewings today with 'The Vampire'. A more descriptive name for it might have been 'Dr. Jeykll and The Vampire' or 'The Vampire Virus'. I'm kidding of course, yet it does borrow heavily from the Jeykll and Hyde story. Here a kindly small town Dr. accidentally takes an experimental drug. He becomes addicted to it. Each night at about 11PM it causes him to change into a hideous creature with a taste for blood. I thoroughly enjoyed this one. It's right down my alley. The kind of movie that must have been shown on double features at 50s drive-ins. I can imagine it playing with 'Frankenstein's Daughter' on the marquee. Teenage boys probably loved it cause their girl would want to be hugged tight during the show. These horror films have a special place with me, they bring back childhood memories. I was too young to have seen it at theaters during its first run. It was the sort of movie I'd watch on the late night horror shows in the 60s and early 70s. Yet, I some how missed ever catching this gem. It's the type of late night movie my mom would complain "You're going to have nightmares if you watch that !". Of course I would watch it anyway if I could. The feature monster had silly yet scary makeup that looks like the boogeyman kids imagine in the bedroom closet. Kenneth Tobey gets a chance to once again hunt down the monster like he did in 'The Thing'. He makes a good no nonsense type tough-guy any self respecting monster should hide from on site. My only regret was we didn't wait till after dark to watch it. That would have been more fun than an afternoon viewing. If you are a fan of 50s drive-in horror films, and I sure am, you should love this. I give it a 6 out of 10 rating.

(There are Spoilers)Delivering a package to the very overworked Dr. Campball's , Wood Romoff, lab Tommy the delivery boy, Brad Morrow, finds the doctor unconscious and on the brink of death. Running to get help Tommy gets the towns kindly and understanding doctor Beecher,John Beal, and he sadly declarers Dr. Campbell dead from a sudden heart-attack.While in the late Dr. Campbell's laboratory Dr. Beecher fools around with his latest experiment with regressing his subjects, bats and mice's, and unknowingly picks up a bottle of the doctor's regression pills. Back home suffering for brain-twisting migraines Dr. Beecher is given his headache pills by his 12 years old daughter Besty,Lydia Reed, as he suffers his latest attack and she gives her dad the wrong bottle; the regression instead of the headache pills that in fact was the cause of Dr. Campball's sudden death. It soon becomes apparent, to everyone but Dr. Beecher, that he's becoming a changed man. Changing from a man who was kind loving and caring to a violent savage who craves for human blood attacking his victims and infecting them with capillary disintegration after he bites them, but doesn't suck out their blood, in the neck.More like a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde type of movie then anything that has to with with a vampire like it's title indicates "The Vampire" has poor and confused Dr. Beecher run around town killing people wherever his regression pills start to lose their effect on him. Needing his regression pills to keep him from going insane and becoming homicidal, as well as dead like Dr. Campbell, the doctor is torn between a rock and a hard place in walking the thin red line of sanity and insanity that the regression pills put him on.Soon the local cop Sheriff Buck Donnelly, Kenneth Tobey, starts to get suspicious of just what Dr. Beecher is all about, this after a number of his patients and associates end up dead. Dr. Beecher himself finally realizes that theirs something very wrong upstairs, in his troubled head, and in is own crazy way tries to correct it; by killing himself.Dr. Beecher is caught in the act at his doctors office by his nurse Carol Butler (Coleen Gray), who's very much in love with her widower and handsome boss, as he's trying to stick himself with a syringe loaded with a fatal solution of deadly chemicals. Both embarrassed and outraged at being exposed for the nut-case that he is, the doctor wanted to die with his secret life kept secret, he goes totally bananas, like the crazed doctor in the similar movie "the Neanderthal Man", chasing Carol outside into the woods in his attempt to murder her. Sheriff Donnally who by now had Dr. Beecher's number, in that he's the one who's been murdering people in town, rushes to the scene in order to both save Carol from Dr. Beecher and the doctor from himself by having him put away, in a mental institution, to be studied and, if possible, cured.Not wanting to be taken alive, being what he is what does he have to live for anyway, Dr. Beecher puts up a furious fight and just when it seems that he got the better of the brave but totally helpless lawman Sheriff Donnelly's assistant Sgt. Ryan, Herb Vigran, shows up and puts an end to Dr. Beechers reign of terror by emptying his gun into him.