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Razor Blade Smile

Razor Blade Smile

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Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Sex, Blood, and Rock 'n' Roll
Review: About a week ago I was sitting in the Washington, DC bar Asylum in the checkered Adams Morgan neighborhood. Sitting there with a glass of water, watching my friends get drunk, I noticed an unusual movie playing on one of the televisions. The sound wasn't on, but the imagery presented, backed with the bar's heavy metal and gothic music pounding in the background captivated me.

The movie was Razor Blade Smile (1998), independent fare from England. OK, it looked bad, but I had to see this thing in full. The DVD arrived today.

Having just watched the closing credits (and a little surprise when they're done) I realize this is a mish mosh of atrocious acting, bad editing, horrible effects and abundant slickness that comes together and works much better than it should.

The tale is of a 150 year old vampire "Lilith Silver" who is bored to tears and fills her time by knocking off people for money. Yes, she is a hit-vamp. Her current boy-toy employer has her knocking off people who wear rings with eyeballs in them. When she finally gets curious and asks a contact of hers about them, she learns they belong to a group called The Illuminati, a mysterious cabal that has inundated itself into the world's power structures.

It turns out that Sethane Blake, the ancient vamp who turned our murderous vixen into a blood sucking (and other sucking) fiend heads this group and has also contracted out Lilith's boss to rub out the lower members of his frat house. If this sounds at all interesting, see it. It's quite entertaining if you don't take it too seriously.

The stars are basically no one. Eileen Daly (Lillith) did a few minor roles and is known as the "Redemption Girl". Christopher Adamson (Sethane) is trying to be the next Christopher Lee. He doesn't have suave good looks, incredibly sexy voice, and his skin is bad. David Warbeck (The Horror Movie Man) appears to have had something of a career, but died before the film was released. He doesn't have to worry about appearing in a sequel.

There are lots of effects. None of them are memorable. Someone on some said it looked as if director Jake West got his hands on some video editing software and went nuts. There's black and white, kooky color with lots of blue and red contrasting, grainy picutre, bad focus, slow motion, fast motion, jerky fast motion, lots of fire, blood, a few stakes, computers, guns, rubber, mylar, sunglasses, a lesbian scene in catsuits (OK, that's not an effect, but it was pretty damn hot and coming from me, that's saying something), a few decapitations and a guy blowing his brains out.

And in the end, all is not what it seems. In fact nothing is as it seems. It's like a bad car wreck. You just can't look away. Oh, and don't leave before the credits end.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Sex, Blood, and Rock 'n' Roll
Review: About a week ago I was sitting in the Washington, DC bar Asylum in the checkered Adams Morgan neighborhood. Sitting there with a glass of water, watching my friends get drunk, I noticed an unusual movie playing on one of the televisions. The sound wasn't on, but the imagery presented, backed with the bar's heavy metal and gothic music pounding in the background captivated me.

The movie was Razor Blade Smile (1998), independent fare from England. OK, it looked bad, but I had to see this thing in full. The DVD arrived today.

Having just watched the closing credits (and a little surprise when they're done) I realize this is a mish mosh of atrocious acting, bad editing, horrible effects and abundant slickness that comes together and works much better than it should.

The tale is of a 150 year old vampire "Lilith Silver" who is bored to tears and fills her time by knocking off people for money. Yes, she is a hit-vamp. Her current boy-toy employer has her knocking off people who wear rings with eyeballs in them. When she finally gets curious and asks a contact of hers about them, she learns they belong to a group called The Illuminati, a mysterious cabal that has inundated itself into the world's power structures.

It turns out that Sethane Blake, the ancient vamp who turned our murderous vixen into a blood sucking (and other sucking) fiend heads this group and has also contracted out Lilith's boss to rub out the lower members of his frat house. If this sounds at all interesting, see it. It's quite entertaining if you don't take it too seriously.

The stars are basically no one. Eileen Daly (Lillith) did a few minor roles and is known as the "Redemption Girl". Christopher Adamson (Sethane) is trying to be the next Christopher Lee. He doesn't have suave good looks, incredibly sexy voice, and his skin is bad. David Warbeck (The Horror Movie Man) appears to have had something of a career, but died before the film was released. He doesn't have to worry about appearing in a sequel.

There are lots of effects. None of them are memorable. Someone on some said it looked as if director Jake West got his hands on some video editing software and went nuts. There's black and white, kooky color with lots of blue and red contrasting, grainy picutre, bad focus, slow motion, fast motion, jerky fast motion, lots of fire, blood, a few stakes, computers, guns, rubber, mylar, sunglasses, a lesbian scene in catsuits (OK, that's not an effect, but it was pretty damn hot and coming from me, that's saying something), a few decapitations and a guy blowing his brains out.

And in the end, all is not what it seems. In fact nothing is as it seems. It's like a bad car wreck. You just can't look away. Oh, and don't leave before the credits end.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Great title wasted on a very bad film.
Review: As a fan of vampire movies, I'm generally willing to give anything in the genre a shot. Razor Blade Smile sounded fairly cheesy plotwise, but after passing it up half a dozen times, I opted to give it a try. I'm not opposed to campy, low-budget movies as a rule, but this one had NOTHING going for it. I won't go into the poor camera work because plenty of the other reviews do. I will point out that the sound was equally bad, forcing you to either blast the volume or rewind constantly to understand what people were saying. The movie had minor goth references, but not enough for goth fans to buy it. A song or 2 by Fields of the Nephilim in the club scenes, a slew of tacky Illuminati rings that might as well have had "Alchemy Gothic(TM)" stamped across them, and Lillith's ubiquitous pvc/faux leather corsets pretty much sum up the goth influence. The corsets and catsuits actually do more harm than good to the whole concept of the 'vampire assassin.' Assassinations rely on stealth, and stealth becomes highly implausible when every movement the assassin makes is accompanied by a chorus of squeaking vinyl. Her wardrobe choice isn't the only thing that makes "Lillith Silver, Master Assassin" hard to swallow. The phrase 'low profile' is clearly not in her vocabulary. Having managed (somehow) to squeak, er, sneak up on a target, she drains him, leaving very distinctive fang marks on his throat. Speaking of fangs, you'll get a good long look at hers--most of the time they're extended, with her mouth hanging open like a dog on a hot day. Clearly, not a subtle gal. Add to this cheesy visual a pretentious script, poorly-developed plot, weak ending, unsexy sex scenes and 1-dimensional characters you couldn't care less about. Still want to buy it? You've been warned.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Warning
Review: Believe me, don't waste your money on this. Bad acting, no characters. The positive reviewers must have seen a different movie.

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: If you like this Vampire movie then you know...all?
Review: Dear oh dear oh dear. This movie is hilarious. A female vampire as a modern-day assassin? Sweet as. Problem is she runs like a girl. How is she spoed to be able to kick all these guys...? Anyway her human lover is being hunted down by these guys called the "illuminati" which is all very mysterious. She's being hired to kill the "illuminati" one by one. Ok fine. Makes for an interesting vamp movie. But the biting looks pathetic. The martial arts are d-grade, and she sounds like a british stripper and wears clothes to match. The movie dribbles on and on going around in circles until it becomes clear at the end that the only way to kill a vampire is to cut their heads off.("Highlander" anyone?) It's trite, slow and takes it's humour far too seriously. If it was a college slasher movie then I might understand.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Sexy Vamp with a gothic feel
Review: Forget the detractors on this B-flick. This is a Well made fun movie. Also lead Actress Eileen Daly is absolutely delicious as Lilith Silver. She can drain me anytime. The campy fun during this film can be found throughout. Lilith just loves the blood, and from what I read Eileen drank it like water during the shoot. A word of advice for parents, this is a very violent and sexual film, especially the unrated version. For those of you who are looking for another Blade, or Interview with the Vampire, don't bother, cause this is a B-movie in the true sense of the word. No big budget, in fact the 20,000 pound budget, Appx 35,000 US was far less than the touted Blair Witch Project. Best tip: Get a bunch of friends together in a living room, aquire a lot of salty popcorn, turn down the lights and watch. To think that the budget of this was less than the one day catering bill for Titanic!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Cool Vampire Chick!
Review: I am a avid lover of vampire movies so when I saw saw this video in the store, I had to watch. Overall the story was a good one. this movie gave us insight into the life of a modern day vampire. Certainly, this is a low budget movie so it is best to concentrate on the storyline.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: A wicked Film
Review: I am a huge horror movie fan but have never been remotely interested in Vampire flicks until now. I bought this film originally in VHS format and loved it !!!! When I saw it had been at last released on DVD Special Edition I got it straight away!!! Even without special features this film is superb and well worth owning, but the addition of the short film made by Jake West as a part of his graduation makes it an absolute MUST HAVE !!!!! Club Death is a clever, cool and smart little movie that easily puts some of the Rubbish churned out by the eternal Hollywood machine to shame !!!! The documentary on the making of both these films is terrific and fun to watch !!!! It is of constant amusement to me just how many people there are around who constantly vent their spleen when they write a review on the internet who have absolutely NO IDEA what they are talking about!!! Jake West deserves an award of some description just for having the sheer guts and full on determination to pull off such a brilliant project!!! Let alone the fact that he actually managed to get HIS OWN movie into central London cinemas!!! I seriously doubt whether this is a FEAT we will be seeing too much of in the future history of movie going as The Hollywood Machine has everything sewn up NICELY!!!! I LUV THIS MOVIE !!!! Dare I suggest the word Sequel ?!!! Lilith Silver SHOULD RETURN!!

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: What is here?
Review: I am probably in the wrong section but I am trying to find people who have seen the unrated version of this film as well as the R rated version. When I saw the R version I felt as if something was missing in the continuity. Certain points seemed to jump forward, leaving me with a feeling that the director had a mood to construct that the censor did not want shown. All in all it was a very entertaining film but I wanted to see more and hopefully that will be fixed by seeing the unrated version. Any comments?

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: This movie is just terrible.
Review: I blindly ordered this DVD after reading a cool review of it that highly recommended this movie. I want my money and my life back. This movie is low, low budget. The acting is way over-dramatic, to point of being plain cheezy. The costumes are all leather and zippers to the extreme. The script itself is pretty bad. The characters have no depth and you never have reason to care about them. The photography tries to get artistic or something hip at points but it just doesn't help.

I mean, I wanted to like this movie but there is not much good to say about it! How did this film get enough support to be released as a Special Edition? I'd have a hard time recommending this movie to even the hardest of vampire fans. Stick with Anne Rice.


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