The Vampire Happening

Rating:
Summary: Why was this dubbed into English?
Review: Beautiful sets, lights, props and music were marred by English dubbing.... all of the German had been dubbed over, and there wasn't even any German in the subtitles. "Gebissen wird nur nachts," of course, means "Bites happen only at night" (one of those typical impersonal passive constructions that First Year German students run into. The English cover that came on this DVD was pretty good, as English goes ("The Vampire Happening"), but it wasn't what I expected. It wasn't until I opened up the DVD that I found the slip of paper with the original title - 'Gebissen wird nur nachts' - but where on earth did the German go? Why was this dubbed into English? Now, that said, this is not a total disappointment. It is what you would call 'soft-R' and not even 'soft-core.' A couple of scantily clad vampiresses are seen, and the plot was easy enough to follow. What I was struck with most with this film was the Disney-ish sound-track, a little more bouncy than "sound of music" but enough to remind me of the 1960's. If you are only into rap music, or rock, this soundtrack will probably strike you as rather lame. I think most of the value behind this DVD rests in what lessons it teaches the film student who looks at it from the perspective of how to put a movie together. It's a good enough movie if you can get past the English, which proceeds at odds with the movement of the lips of the actors. Sigh. Film collectors that want to follow the career of Pia Degermark might also find this movie valuable. But beware, ordering "Gebissen wird nachts" means getting "The Vampire Happening" when the DVD finally arrives in your mailbox. And there were no menu choices that you could click to turn on any German, not even German subtitling. I sure hope that ordering "Der Blaue Engel" or "Kleider Machen Leute" doesn't mean getting "The Blue Angel" or "Clothes Make the Man" when the DVD finally arrives in the mailbox.

Rating:
Summary: I Liked the picture on the box.
Review: Ok, I'll admit the picture on the dvd package made me buy this dvd. I must say, I didn't know what to expect. It was like a parody of a horror movie by Benny Hill. It was however, atmospheric, the scenery and music gave it a foreign feel. The story is a bit strange though, but if you don't take it too seriously, you'll have fun with it. This wouldn't win any awards, but I intend on keeping it in my collection just as a novelty.