Charles Band and his crew at Full Moon Pictures take a break from the killer puppets and bloodthirsty action figure movies to put out one of the most admirable vampire pics in years. Director Ted Nicolaou (who would go on to do the sequels and a couple of Full Moon's crappier releases) brings us the tale of Radu, a modern day vampire who makes his home in, where else, Prejnar, Transylvania... whose peasants seem to be just as trapped in the days of Vlad the Impaler as they were in the days of, well, Vlad the Impaler! Radu's apparently been on a leave of absence as of late, but has returned to his little backwards country to claim his family throne and rule over the God fearing plebeians as he sees fit. To do so he'll have to bump off his father, the extremely old (and wrinkled-like-a-nutsac) King Vladislav... who happens to be played by Phantasm's Angus Scrimm! Mr. Scrimm's appearance lasts all of 3 minutes though as Radu and his demonic imps, the Subspecies, kill the old fart and lay claim to his artifact, the family jewel, the Bloodstone. The Bloodstone is a fancy and shiny little trinket that not only sustains it's long-in-the-tooth (literally) owner with an endless supply of life giving blood (or a reasonable facsimile thereof), but also allows him/her/it to roam about freely in the sun's harsh radiation. Not bad for a cheap, plastic little prop!

Elsewhere in the nation still trapped in the Dark Ages, two typical American college students (provided you go to college on the sound stage of a softcore porn), Michele and Lillian, finally arrive at their vacation destination and meet up with their Transylvanian pen pal Mara, whom they're going to be staying with... three young women spending Spring Break together... if there's a single beer, string of Mardi Gras beads or French balcony in a hundred mile radius, I expect to be seeing some girl-on-girl-on-girl action damn it! While Mara shows her new lovers around the countryside, the trio stumble upon the dank halls of, you guessed it, Castle Vladislav. Despite local feigned ignorance of the subspectacular castle's existence (if it doesn't exist, then why would people tell them never to go there?), our trio investigates further, leaving Scooby and the Mystery Machine behind. Our heroines also bump into Stefan, Transylvania's only GQ model and dashing young zoologist... and likely the ONLY dashing young zoologist anyone is likely to see this side of the Discovery Channel. Obviously the ladies get moist in the shorts over their hunky new amigo, but what they don't know is that Stefan's also a Vladislav, namely Radu's not-so-evil brother! :::dramatic soap opera reverb::: I think it's quite obvious who got the looks in the family... Radu... oh come on, like you didn't see that lame ass one-liner coming a mile away?! Oh wait, I haven't really described Radu to you yet.

Okay, first of all, as I stated, Stefan looks like he waltzed off the pages of a Calvin Klein underwear ad. The kind of guy chicks ride their fingers while thinking about and who men hate because chicks dig him so much... and who's probably gay, as most straight men don't have the ego to support the kind of "tormented sex symbol" look he's got. As for his brother Radu, he looks like he was skull fucked by a giant prehistoric mosquito ala "The Flintstones" and had every ounce of blood and meat drained from his cheek. He's got long fangs, sunken eyes, ratty dirty blond hair and 12 inch fingers. You've heard of 9 inch nails, well, Radu's got foot long digits! Normally you'd think he'd be a hit with the ladies, until you realize he DOES have some of those 9 inch nails to boot... I'll give the womenfolk a moment to get the terrifying thoughts of vaginal savaging from their heads... okay. As if Radu didn't have it bad enough getting beaten to shit by a mob of peasants wielding ugly sticks (that's a metaphor, not to be taken literally mind you), he's also got this brutal drooling problem! It's like he's got one of those massive retainers, only without the benefit of straightening his teeth out and just the side effect of a non-stop stream of sticky fluid oozing from his gullet! If he could get a woman to tongue wrestle with him, she'd fucking drown! I don't like the odds of seeing any Radu Juniors in this or any other lifetime. So, if you were a college slut looking for some European penis, which brother would you bend over and spread for? The "artist" (i.e. the tormented but cute one) or the beast? Oh, and no, kissing Radu won't turn him into a prince either, no matter how much furniture sings and dances or how much Angela Landsbury makes with the make out music. "Tale as old as time" my hairy ebon ass!

Though a vampire and not in possession of the Bloodstone, Stefan doesn't seem to be very vulnerable to sunlight, or at least not often. Though that's beside the point, brother Radu has taken an interest in these three young pieces of ass and makes his first move on them the following night, feeding on one of the blonds while she sleeps (either Mara or Lillian, I'm not sure which. All I know is that she was blond... what do you expect from me, names and dates?! Maybe next time you'll be expecting to see full bios on the heroines, including marital status, number of traffic tickets, turn-ons and the biggest dick they've ever sucked?! People are so damn demanding anymore. Oh, something I neglected to mention about he neck biting brothers. Not only are they polar opposites on the surface, but they have demeanors that are just as incompatible. As you can expect, the fiercely ugly Radu doesn't like humans, not just because Playgirl Magazine will never vote him Best Hung Stud In History (I'm sure that prestigious award went to Copernicus), but because he views them as lowly dogs that are fit for nothing but meat for the vampire hierarchy. However, this made Radu the black bat of the family (though now that I've written that out it makes no sense... I should stop snorting Kool-Aid when I'm writing reviews) as both his father and his brother Stefan were stalwart supporters of a world where vampires and humans can co-exist in the brotherhood of blah blah blah. Well, might makes right, so if Stefan doesn't defeat Radu, he'll likely be making a bid for global holocaust in some form or another. I just hope he doesn't poison the world's supply of string cheese, or I'm fucked royally... well, my human half.

Determined to put an end to his renegade brother once and for all and put a lethal finish to their sibling rivalry, Stefan and his friend, the owner of the inn at which the girls are staying, stock up on Buffy merchandise, like rosary beads, wooden stakes and cheap silver jewelry that says "Buffy" and "Angel" on them. I'm of course joking about that last part in case those of you unable to adapt to the overwhelming sensation of sarcasm weren't able to decipher that yourselves. One of the cool parts of this film is the rosary beads, which Stefan and the inn keeper don't just use for protection, but as anti-vampire bird shot! You think getting shot in the ass stings (provided you've ever been shot in the ass), try it as a vampire with a handful of them beads! It's like sitting on a pile of flaming tacks!... so I've heard. Meanwhile, on the relationship front, Michele and Stef start to fall madly in love with each, fulfilling the standard vampire plot point of "we come from two very different worlds and I might accidentally eat you if I'm sleepwalking" obstacle. He doesn't tell her his dark secret though, until she walks in on Rad eating out Lillian... from the neck of course. While Stef finally 'fesses up to Michele, Rad escapes and makes a bee line to Mara, kidnapping her from a local village festival and taking her back to his place for wine, some Barry White and a little molestation from his little clay demon friends. It's really not as bad as it sounds, I mean I had a girlfriend who used to play with herself using my action figures and it was quite the turn on. Of course I was 10 and she was 24 at the time, but that's a matter for the courts to decide.

Not as concerned with Mara's whereabouts as they probably should be, Michele and her new friends bury Lilian's drained body, which Rad just digs up later and goes necro on... though she's only HALF dead (being a vampire now), so I guess it's not TOTAL necro... meaning it won't sell as well in Germany... After turning Lil into his newest bride, Rad stops over and picks up Michele too, taking her back to his pad for likely the same purposes as he had with Mara. That Radu, such a "playa", haha! While in the castle, Michele finds Mara and frees her from her bondage... only to discover that not only has she been molested by tiny monsters, but she's also a vampire now. No big surprise here. Next on Radu's list of "People I Have To Take Against Their Will" is Stefan, whom he plans to subdue and force to watch, as he sinks his teeth into Michele's supple neck and transforms her into a monster like him. Okay, though Radu obviously has no control over his own horrible appearance, he DOES have control over how his victims look? Mara and Lilian came out just fine: your standard long, blond haired goddesses with big, sumptuous breast and luscious red lips. Two standard Brides of Dracula. However, Radu threatens that Michele, when he turns her into a vampire, will be horrible and ugly and Stefan will never lust for her again. I don't know much about fashion stuff, but maybe the ladies (or the really flamboyant gay guys) out there can help me with why brunettes would make disgusting vampires that not even Ron Jeremy would impale on his "stake"? Is it some kind of fashion faux pas that only Cathy Ireland can help with?

But, before Radu can complete the task and make Michele one of the creatures of the night (you know, a prostitute), the inn keeper busts in like a Romanian Charles Bronson and starts whoopin' vampire ass! Blowing away Bride of Radu number one (Lilian or Mara, not sure which, they both look alike, especially as the undead) and freeing the love birds, he proves that Stallone's got nothing on him! Well, the Stallone from such cinematic excrement as Cobra , Over The Top and Stop, Or My Mom Will Shoot! of course... you can't rub Stop, Or My Mom Will Shoot! in his face enough! Just thinking about Estelle Getty makes me hard!... errr, I mean... it makes me laugh... piss off... Bride of Radu number 2 winds up impaled with a big iron chandelier (not the best thing to have hanging from the ceiling of an area where people tend to congregate, unless you're talking about the Senate House), which kills her for some reason, as I was never sure if being crushed by a spikey, decorative, wrought iron light fixture would kill a vampire. But, obviously that querry's been resolved. As for Radu, after he and brother Stefan clash swords like a scene out of The Count Of Monte Cristo (provided F.W. Murnau was directing), Radu suffers the most overkill of vampire screen deaths, impaled on a FLAMING wooden stake and BEHEADED for good measure! That's Stefan, the Burt Gummer of Transylvania.

Following Rad's goodbye, his attractive sibling claims the Bloodstone and he and Michele go off to screw in his coffin, unable to avoid it any longer. Michele, afraid of losing what mediocre good looks she has, asks Stef to turn her into one of the beautiful vampires like him, instead of a rat faced drool monkey like Radu, who's already infected her, so she'll be living off of gore either way. While they make their union "official", we return our focus to Radu's severed head, as the Subspecies gather around it... and he opens his eyes and grins! Okay, I have plenty of respect for Christopher Lee, Bela Lugosi, John Carradine and maybe even a smidgen for George Hamilton for Love At First Bite (something funny about a guy legendary for his tanned, leather-like hide playing history's most pigmentless man aside from the Invisible Man), but Radu is the fucking MAN! He dies one death that's equal to three in the LEAST, and he ends with a grin! Now, if he could speak without hissing so damn much, he might possibly be the coolest damn bloodsucker of all time. Well, either way, he definitely beats out Dennis Miller, that's for sure.

Subspecies comes under ridicule by many people who expect it to either be John Carpenter's Vampires or Dracula 2000, most recently I discovered as being a reviewer on The Internet Movie Database, who was confused as to why the vampires could walk around in daylight and complained that the story was hard to follow... they also recommended John Carpenter's Vampires to anyone who liked Subspecies. To this person I recommend returning to your Scream and Halloween marathons and leave the low budget stuff to the connoisseurs. Of all the 'B' vampire flicks to grace the video store shelves in the past decade, Subspecies stands tall above the majority, utilizing real Romanian filming locations and a better-than-average cast for a Direct-to-Video feature and bringing about a successful macro-budget bloodsucker pic.

But, despite my praises, as with all movies (and nipples) there are a few things that could've used a little tweaking. One thing that was a constant thorn in my scrotum throughout the film was the use of light that seemed to have no logical source. Every time someone is running through the forest at night, there's the classic "looks like somebody parked just past the treeline shining their high beams toward the scene" lighting technique. Though I know it would be pitch black and unengaging if there wasn't any light, all I ask is for a more sensible approach to where exactly the light source is placed... or at least tone down the fucking intensity so it doesn't blind the actors. I had this same problem for the scenes when Radu emerges from his unholy day bed (i.e. his casket) and there's this big beam of illumination from behind it. Does he have an extra-strength night light back there so he doesn't trip over his little Subspecies creatures when he has to take a piss in the middle of the night or grab a glass of plasma?! My only other real dislike for the film was Radu's horribly raspy voice. I don't know if it was because of actor Anders Hove or if that's just something Chuck Band wrote for the character, but at times it's plain impossible to understand him! Is it supposed to be a horrible accent, or is his mouth just so full of viscous, syrupy fluids that he can't talk right!? Well that's it for my Subspecies review. The three sequels (as of this review) didn't quite live up to the original, not that any really ever do. They're still better than most Full Moon fair though, so check 'em out if you've got $1 to spare... or you happen across them on the Sci-Fi Channel. There's also a spin-off called The Vampire Journals, making Subspecies one of Full Moon's most lucrative series... and without the appearance of any puppets or Tim Thomerson!

Sequels: Bloodstone: Subspecies II ; Bloodlust: Suspsecies III ; Subspecies IV: Bloodstorm

If You Liked This Flick, Check Out: The Vampire Journals or Dracula 2000