Vamps | Film review - Alicia Silverstone & Krysten Ritter sink their teeth into the roles of party-loving New York vampires

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Alicia Silverstone and Krysten Ritter play a pair of party-loving, flat-sharing vampires in modern-day New York in Vamps, a fun-spirited if cheesy-looking vampire comedy from writer-director Amy Heckerling, maker of teen classics Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Clueless (the film that made Silverstone a star).

Made immortal by bloodsucker Sigourney Weaver in the 1840s and 1980s respectively, the duo party and work by night, sleeping in coffins by day and drinking rat's blood to survive. Then Stacy falls in love with Joey (Downton Abbey’s Dan Stevens), a descendant of the vampire-slaying Van Helsing clan…

Evidently made on the cheap, notwithstanding the surprisingly classy cast, Vamps is a bit of a mess, but there’s sweetness and wit here, too, making this a movie worth sinking your teeth into.

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Certificate 15. Runtime 92 mins. Director Amy Heckerling.

Released on DVD by Metrodome Home Entertainment.  http://youtube.com/v/I22Lqr9IRKY

Jason Best
Jason Best

A film critic for over 25 years, Jason admits the job can occasionally be glamorous – sitting on a film festival jury in Portugal; hanging out with Baz Luhrmann at the Chateau Marmont; chatting with Sigourney Weaver about The Archers – but he mostly spends his time in darkened rooms watching films. He’s also written theatre and opera reviews, two guide books on Rome, and competed in a race for Yachting World, whose great wheeze it was to send a seasick film critic to write about his time on the ocean waves. But Jason is happiest on dry land with a classic screwball comedy or Hitchcock thriller.