There is nothing like a vampire flick to get you in the mood. The erotic nature of evil has long been a staple of the horror film genre, and the vampire flick often exploits the sexiness of blood-sucking vampires and tight leather to engage a (let’s face it) mostly pubescent male audience into a hot sweat. If you’re fan of Sapphic vampiricism – and hey, who isn’t?- Vampyros Lesbos (1970) by Jesus Franco, is the film for you. This horror film tells the story of a vampiric seductress who goes around killing women in order to cure her insatiable lust for female blood. The blood-sucking sapphically-inclined vampire appears in an American lawyer’s dream (where she harasses and makes love to her), a dream that eventually becomes real. The lesbian vampire also appears in Phil Claydon’s Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009)- a film I can’t comment on as I have not watched, and have absolutely no desire to. In the vein of erotic female vampires, Kate Beckinsale’s performance as the leather-clad S&M vampire figure Selene in Underworld (2003) has provided many a wet dream to date.
If you’re after more serious vampiric eroticism, try F.W.Murnau’s German silent classic Nosferatu (1922). This is the original vampire film and also the first cinematic portrayal of Dracula (the literary creation of Bram Stoker in 1897). Count Orlok, frighteningly played by Max Schreck, provides a strangely sexy (though this almost certainly is just be me) portrayal of the vampire figure, credited as being the most animalistic vampire portrayal in cinema. However hot, if you’re not a fan of silent cinema, avoid this like the plague.
Those with sensitive mothers should also probably avoid the phenomenal Dracula (1931), directed by Tod Browning. I don’t know what it is about Bela Lugosi’s portrayal of the Count- whether it’s the thick foreign accent that delivers such memorable lines as “Listen to them. Children of the night. What music they make”, or the glittering eyes so suggestive of future danger (-will he tie me up? Will he suck my blood?- you just don’t know). Either way, Lugosi’s portrayal of Dracula placed him firmly in cinematic history, and provides, in my view, the best vampire character on the screen. You read it here –the vampire flick provides the hottest tricks around.
