Gillian Reid 2009.Right off the heels of all their current success, numerous awards, mixed critical reaction and an absolutely essential appearance on Gordon Ramsay's Cook-a-long live, Horne and Corden have taken the next logical step. Cinema. Following in the footsteps of Britain's other favourite "down on their luck" duo, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost (in case you live under a rock, stars of one of the best comedies ever screened on TV, Spaced and stars of the equally brilliant Shaun Of The Dead and Hot Fuzz) they have decided to take a stab (no pun intended) at the horror genre in the form of this delightful family piece Lesbian Vampire Killers, directed by new-comer Phil Claydon and written by two screen writers from the Friday Night Project (no not Alan Carr or Justin Lee Collins...). The plot is pretty much as you would expect it to be, revolving around two down-on-their-luck slackers, Fletch and Jimmy - (Corden and Horne), who decide to temporarily escape their woes and go on holiday to a remote village, only to find that all of its women have been enslaved by (yes you guessed it) lesbian vampires, after they hook-up with a bus-load of attractive foreign female history students and run in to the local vicar (played by one of the film's few saving grace's Paul McGann). Even at it's core the mere concept of LVK could be a semi-decent enjoyable laugh with your mates, but frankly it does little to even make you smile never mind laugh out loud. The comedy isn't smart and there is only so many dick, fart and "I'm a fat bastard, heres my belly. LOOK!" jokes Corden can come out with that will carry a show for so long.
From a film making perspective I can't really tear into the production team too much, clearly influenced by the likes old school Hammer Horror movies (trivia: This was originally meant to be a kick start for a new wave of Hammer movies, but was passed by the company. Smart move) and 1950s/60s vampire films, with the intention of making it cheap and nasty (or maybe that was budget restraints?) with even more cheap and nasty ladies. And yes the ladies, lets be honest, we don't go to see a film called Lesbian Vampire Killers for Oscar Winning performances from it's leading women, we aren't expecting a performance on par with Kate Winslet in The Reader but I honestly would not be surprised if the casting boys just opened an issue of Nuts and went "Right, her, her, her, her and.....her." "Awesome. So have they got much acting experience." "What?..." However Swedish born actress, MyAnna Buring who plays Horne's love interest isn't actually that bad though if you want to see a genuinely terrifying movie featuring the beautiful Buring I recommend her 2005 appearance in The Descent (still can't fathom how they're making a sequel to that with the original cast but anyways...). Probably the film's final stake in the heart (see what I did there?) is that it was pretty much all taken up by Corden, when in my opinion Matthew Horne is probably the better actor of the two. Corden should have been the bumbling side-kick/comic relief to Horne's straight man but it stupidly did not work out that way. Long story short this film is bad, it isn't that funny, it isn't remotely clever and the plot is even more ridiculess than it is even suppose to be. However if you're really really drunk after a night out with your mates and want to stick on a movie to laugh at while you munch on that 2am kebab, by all means this wouldn't be a bad choice. But the right choice however would be Shaun Of The Dead. Sorry lads, but Simon Pegg and Nick Frost you are not. Back to TV with you.
2.5/5
See this if you....are drunk. And I mean really drunk.
Lesbian Vampire Killers is in all cinemas from today.
A.M.
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