The Video Vacuum

A Chinese doctor goes into a bar that happens to be a haven for vampires.  He gets seduced by a sexy vampire chick who bites him on his crotch.  Seemingly unfazed by her kinkiness, he goes back to his job as if nothing has happened.  Pretty soon, he stops eating sushi, starts wearing sunglasses and begins salivating like Pavlov’s dog while in the operating room.  By the time he starts flying around his apartment, he finally has to face facts that he’s becoming a vampire.  Even though he craves blood, he chooses not to take human lives and convinces his two klutzy friends to steal bloody cotton swabs from the operating room, which he uses as tea bags.  When the vampire chick’s pimp says the good doctor has “ginseng blood”, he has her track him down so he can drain him dry personally.  The doctor and vamp fall in love and in the end; they join forces to battle the vampiric pimp.  

The Chinese people have never been known as comic geniuses (unless your name is Jackie Chan that is), so you can probably guess that the “comedy” in this flick is pretty unbearable.  (Although I will admit the scene where a vampire gets a raging hard on was pretty funny.)  The horror aspects of the film are equally slipshod, but this isn’t nearly as bad as some Hong Kong horror comedies I’ve seen.  There is also one truly great scene in which a sword goes through a pair of tits SIDEWAYS that has to be seen to be believed.  (I’ve heard of stabbing vampires through the chest, but this is just plain ridiculous.)  These moments of inspiration are few and far between, but there are enough of them to keep you watching. 

The bottom line is that this flick plays like a Hong Kong version of Once Bitten (or maybe My Best Friend is a Vampire), except that the guy is a doctor instead of a teenage virgin.  If that thing is your cup of ginseng, then by all means check it out.  It was fitfully amusing enough to hold my attention, but it won’t be anything you haven't seen before.  Except for the previously mentioned titty stabbing scene.  That was pretty good.    

The opening scene of this Greek lensed exploitation number is strong.  A guy wearing a ski mask sneaks up on a couple necking in the woods and he shoots the man and rapes the woman.  Then the plot begins.  A swarthy scumbag marries a rich woman for the money then hires the deranged serial killer/rapist to murder his wife so he can be with his sexy mistress.  The murderer and the lothario go back and forth double and triple crossing each other until the police finally show up to gun the dirty sons of bitches down.   

While this flick is kinda kinky, it never truly reached a substantial sleaze factor like I was hoping it would.  Although the film never cut loose and lived up to the promise of the opening scene, it still featured some chick getting their blouse ripped off every five minutes are so, so you really can’t complain too much.  The ample nudity on display will definitely keep your attention, but you’ll need to down a lot of cold ones just in order to keep your mind off of the gratuitous Greek folk dancing that inexplicably pads the film’s running time.  Otherwise, this grungy Gyro is filled with enough bare skinned beauties to make it worth a look.  The score sounds like a butchering of Paint It Black, but it’s pretty cool and there’s a great theme song called “Now” that I highly recommend you putting on your Ipod “now”. 

Death Kiss earns Cool Points for: 

3 rape/murders.  5 points apiece.  (+15)

23 breasts.  1 point apiece.  (+23)

1 explosion.  (+5)

Great score.  (+5)

Excellent theme song, “Now”.  (Sample lyric:  “I want it now, don’t be a child, I want it now!”)  (+5)

We also have to give it up for the screenwriting as there are several memorable lines.   The killer gets some juicy dialogue such as:  “Do not be frightened of death.  It’s a beautiful dreamless sleep!”, as well as “I can’t treat death as a joke, it’s much too important to me!”  But it’s a lovelorn doctor gets the movie’s cheesiest line when he says; “They say physician heal thyself, but I know there will never be a way to cure myself of loving you!”  5 points apiece.  (+15)

Unfortunately, we have to knock points off for: 

The gratuitous Greek folk dancing.  (-25)

And we have to deduct a few points because it was made in Greece after all, and we know what those people invented don’t we? (-5)

Despite these major handicaps, Death Kiss still manages to rack up 38 Cool Points and still gets my vote for The Best Greek Erotic Thriller of 1976.

** ½.  9 Beers are recommended in order to make for a four star movie experience. 

AKA:  He Murdered His Wife.  AKA:  The Rape Killer.