Breathing new life into the vampire genre isn’t the easiest thing in the world. The cliches are so shop-worn that we know every one of them by heart. And, in the last few decades, the most enjoyable vampire flicks have been those that’ve stood the genre conventions on their heads, like NEAR DARK.

That said, I give mad props to Mark Burchett and Michael D. Fox, the writer/producer/director duo that made VAMPS, an ambitious, if not always successful, vampire stripper flick. The hook in VAMPS (also the name of the strip club run by vampiress Tasha and henchsluts Tabitha and Randi) is that the fresh meat dancer (Jennifer Huss) is a high school chum of Seamus (Paul Morris), a horror-flick obsessed priest who seems to be questioning his calling. Which would explain what the hell he’s doing in a strip joint in the first place. Once it’s established that Tasha (Jenny Wallace) wants to bring Heather over to the dark side while Seamus wants to bring her over to an entirely different dark side, it’s a race to see who gets the All-American Girl first: vampire girl-gang or horny priest.

Unfortunately, like many other stripper-in-peril flicks, VAMPS has the feel that some of the folks involved have never been inside a strip joint. The routines range from dull to pathetic, which explains the lack of patrons. Shit, how’re you supposed to recruit fresh meat when chunky Tabitha is up there shakin’ her fleshy arms like it’s a remake of ROLLER BOOGIE? Not that the rest of the cast fares much better, but at least they’ve got good bods even if they’re routines have all the passion of a cable access Christian dance show.

I certainly won’t spoil any of VAMPS’ inventive twists, but this is one genre entry I’d love to see remade with a bigger budget and maybe Ewan McGregor as the tortured priest. But keep the killer soundtrack!

EDITOR'S NOTE: Not to be confused with VAMP from 1986 starring Chris Makepeace, Richard Rusler, Geddy Watanabe and Grace Jones as...a vampire stripper!