If nothing else, Embrace of the Vampire sets the bar even lower than the 1995 film of which it is a remake. That particular bar, mind you, was already so low that perhaps only Barbados Slim could passed under it; then again, there was no way that a new version of the film that first gave us Alyssa Milano in all her glorious full-frontal nudity wouldn’t be a let down. People, mostly of the female persuasion, undress and have sex here, but they’re just nameless, faceless naked bodies. The action, such as it is, takes place in the small, fictional North Summit college. How do I know it’s small? As far as I can tell, there is only one course: a mythology class taught by English literature professor/fencing head coach/closeted vampire Mr. Cole (Victor Webster). Professor Cole introduces his subject by asking whether "These glorified monsters [that] have graced the pages of our literature, our plays, our cinema" are "Myth? Reality? Maybe a combination of both." He goes on: "Can we not draw similarities between, say, a devil and a vampire? [never mind that both are, as far as his students are concerned, equally imaginary] Or better yet, a dinosaur and a dragon? Or a Neanderthal to an ogre?" That is a little bit "better," though not by much. To the movie’s credit, we do see people actually fencing — both literally, as well as figuratively with their tongues; like the original movie, this one includes an instance of totally gratuitous HLA (hot lesbian action). Also like the original, there’s some contrived, convoluted, half-and-half (half-baked and half-assed) bullshittery going on here; to wit: "The only way that we could stop these creatures was to use their own blood to transform their offspring," which sounds suspiciously like artificial selection. This actually could have been an intriguing concept, had the movie bothered to explain it. And then there’s this: "When a vampire finds a virgin from the creature who bit him, from the bloodline, he can use this pure blood to change back into his human form, but only if the virgin, you, Charlotte, only if you give yourself to him willingly." Charlotte (Sharon Hinnendael) wonders, "if I can just end it, then why don't I just give myself to him?"; the answer is, because she "will suffer for eternity in hell." Huh. So the same fluid exchange would redeem the man, but condemn the woman. Patriarchal much? Undeterred, Charlotte tries (and fails) to preemptively have her cherry popped by romantic interest/manager at the coffee shop she works at Chris (Ryan Kennedy), so that she’ll no longer be of use to Cole; this isn’t made explicit, which would mean she’s smarter than the movie — on the other hand, she does say in her job interview that she "worked at an eyetalian coffee shop for two years," so maybe I’m giving her too much credit.

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