This strangely thoughtful and resonant nickel'n'dime late 80's fright film represents the rarest and oddest of low-budget bloodsucker sub-genres: the wistfully reflective existential vampire picture. Seriously, it's a beautifully affecting and poetic work of shamefully neglected art that's deserving of greater recognition and appraisal than it's thus far elicited.
The extremely novel and compelling story centers on dejected, suicidal stripper Jodi (the delicately pretty and winsome Starr Andreeff, a very capable and under-appreciated actress who was often wasted in such useless piffle as "The Terror Within" and "Ghoulies II") who one fateful night encounters and strikes up an uneasy rapport with a lonely, angst-ridden, but sympathetic vampire (the handsome, sulky Cyril O'Reilly). The curious, misanthropic vampire wants the deeply troubled Jodi to engage in intimate conversation with him prior to putting the severely tormented woman out of her misery by killing her at dawn.
Skillfully directed with remarkable grace and understatement by the always stylish and intriguing Katt Shea Ruben (who also helmed the splendidly lurid "Stripped to Kill" and the harsh, gritty "Streets" before going upscale with the slicker, but less distinctive mainstream items "Poison Ivy" and "Carrie 2: The Rage"), with a probing, audacious and insightful script by Katt and Tom Ruben (the latter also cameos as a punk cab driver), a hauntingly regretful, melancholy and brooding nighttime gloom-doom mood, and sterling acting by the two exceptional leads (Andreeff in particular gives an achingly vulnerable, strikingly vivid, and ultimately quite endearing performance), "Dance of the Damned" stands out as a real breath-of-fresh-air indie sleeper and a courageous, highly imaginative and unusually sensitive departure from standard, more visceral and traditional 80's cinematic takes on vampirism ("Fright Night," "The Lost Boys," et al). The expected grisly shocks, fancy special effects and garden variety humans vs. monsters premise are nowhere to be found here; instead this movie bravely offers a touching, absorbing and penetrating rumination on the numerous facets of the human condition, including the pain and anguish of being an ineffectual parent, the emotional scars wrought by child abuse, the awesome loneliness of leading a hermit-like existence, the duality of being a stripper (they do have considerable power over the mostly male patrons they disrobe for, but unfortunately said dudes tend to see them strictly as vapid sex objects), and conventional society's awful inability to easily accept and tolerate those luckless individuals who deviate in one way or another from a rigid and repressive collective norm. Marred only by a somewhat annoyingly ambiguous conclusion, this otherwise flawless masterwork qualifies as essential viewing for adventurous horror movie buffs with a penchant for something off-beat, inspired and way out of the ordinary.
The extremely novel and compelling story centers on dejected, suicidal stripper Jodi (the delicately pretty and winsome Starr Andreeff, a very capable and under-appreciated actress who was often wasted in such useless piffle as "The Terror Within" and "Ghoulies II") who one fateful night encounters and strikes up an uneasy rapport with a lonely, angst-ridden, but sympathetic vampire (the handsome, sulky Cyril O'Reilly). The curious, misanthropic vampire wants the deeply troubled Jodi to engage in intimate conversation with him prior to putting the severely tormented woman out of her misery by killing her at dawn.
Skillfully directed with remarkable grace and understatement by the always stylish and intriguing Katt Shea Ruben (who also helmed the splendidly lurid "Stripped to Kill" and the harsh, gritty "Streets" before going upscale with the slicker, but less distinctive mainstream items "Poison Ivy" and "Carrie 2: The Rage"), with a probing, audacious and insightful script by Katt and Tom Ruben (the latter also cameos as a punk cab driver), a hauntingly regretful, melancholy and brooding nighttime gloom-doom mood, and sterling acting by the two exceptional leads (Andreeff in particular gives an achingly vulnerable, strikingly vivid, and ultimately quite endearing performance), "Dance of the Damned" stands out as a real breath-of-fresh-air indie sleeper and a courageous, highly imaginative and unusually sensitive departure from standard, more visceral and traditional 80's cinematic takes on vampirism ("Fright Night," "The Lost Boys," et al). The expected grisly shocks, fancy special effects and garden variety humans vs. monsters premise are nowhere to be found here; instead this movie bravely offers a touching, absorbing and penetrating rumination on the numerous facets of the human condition, including the pain and anguish of being an ineffectual parent, the emotional scars wrought by child abuse, the awesome loneliness of leading a hermit-like existence, the duality of being a stripper (they do have considerable power over the mostly male patrons they disrobe for, but unfortunately said dudes tend to see them strictly as vapid sex objects), and conventional society's awful inability to easily accept and tolerate those luckless individuals who deviate in one way or another from a rigid and repressive collective norm. Marred only by a somewhat annoyingly ambiguous conclusion, this otherwise flawless masterwork qualifies as essential viewing for adventurous horror movie buffs with a penchant for something off-beat, inspired and way out of the ordinary.