BORDELLO OF BLOOD
A film review by Paul-Michael Agapow
Copyright 1997 Paul-Michael Agapow
The second outing from the "Tales From the Crypt" crew: the prim Katherine (Eleniak) works for moneyed evangelist Reverend Current (Sarandon). However her brother (Feldman) has gone missing and she turns to sleazy two-bit detective Guttman (Miller). He in turn is lead to a funeral home which is a front for a brothel run by arch-vampire Lillith (Everhart) ...
There is a big problem at the heart of the "Tales from the Crypt" formula , TV and movies, which is difficult to put a finger on. But the epicenter is this: for the writers (4 on "Bordello of Blood") and producers (11!) this is not so much an attempt to create a new story as it is to slavishly imitate a genre. Or perhaps to slavishly imitate their idea of a genre. Thirty years ago, cheap and nasty four-colour comics titillated 15 year-olds. Now those 15 year-olds have translated the comics to the big screen, with much sentiment and little creativity.
It's not scary. It's not meant to be scary, you say. It's not very dramatic. It's not supposed to be dramatic, you reply. It's not especially funny. It's not really a comedy, you explain. So what is it?
In fact "Bordello of Blood" is not much of anything. Even at the very concise runtime of 87 minutes (around 80 if you cut out the superfluous shrieking bookends by that muppet with Tourettes, the Cryptkeeper) it has barely enough to do. The creators are simply trading on the resonances of the movie, wanting you to say "This is just like those old schlocky horror films and comics! Great!" But as the current revival of old TV favourites (Brady Bunch, Flintstones, the Saint etc.) demonstrates, bringing a small idea to the big screen with big production values does not necessarily make that idea big. More the converse - a movie length production demands movie size ideas and story, not just money. Those are things that "Bordello" ain't got.
Occasionally "Bordello" does spark, never to the extent that its predecessor "Demon Knight" did, largely when some meta-joke occurs. Confronted with the vampiric bordello, the detective Guttman starts theorising "duchovnian riffs". Teenybopper heartthrob Corey Feldman shows up just long enough to be slaughtered mercilessly. The cast is competent if unspectacular, Eleniak and Everhart being present purely for their looks. Sarandon alone shows some life, perhaps being not a great actor but a good one.
About the worst thing you could say about "Bordello of Blood" is that it's self-indulgent and largely harmless. Perhaps the "Tales" producers will retire the series or at least think more before hauling it out next time. [*/misfire] and velvet-covered furniture on the Sid and Nancy scale.
"Tales from the Crypt Presents: Bordello of Blood" Directed by Gilbert Adler. Starring Dennis Miller, Erika Eleniak, Angie Everhart, Chris Sarandon, Corey Feldman. Released 1996.
------ paul-michael agapow (agapow@latcs1.oz.au), La Trobe Uni, Infocalypse [archived at http://www.cs.latrobe.edu.au/~agapow/Postviews/]
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