Love At First Bite (DVD)
APPROX. 96 MINS. - PROD. YEAR: 1979 - MPA RATING: PG
" There are killer lines and exchanges, but not the overall consistency you'd hope for in a film like this, or the kind of energy that could drive a stake through our ennui.
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Dracula is also played as a less menacing and even comic figure. The townspeople are hardly afraid of him, and officials from the communist government show up at the Castle to inform him he's got 48 hours to clear out, because they're turning the fortress into an athletic training facility. As the Count leaves, he almost sounds like an echo of Richard "They won't have me to kick around anymore" Nixon when he sulks, "Without me, Transylvania will be as exciting as Bucharest . . . on a Monday night." There's plenty of self-deprecating humor, too, with the Count telling Reinfield that immortality as a vampire isn't all blood and roses. "How would you like to go around dressed like a head waiter for the last 700 years?"
Some of the bits remain funny—as when Dracula meets the Van Helsing heir in a classic comedy confrontation, with the pair having an amusing hypnotizing duel ("You're almost asleep by now." "No, you are.")—but a large portion of the jokes are so low-key that you almost forget it's a comedy. There is, for example, a long dance scene between Hamilton and Cindy that generates neither laughs nor a sense of the romantic. It's so '70s. So are appearances by TV's George and "Weezy" Jefferson, with Sherman Hemsley playing a preacher and Isabel Sanford a judge.
Video: Viewers have two options: 1.33:1 pan and scan, or the 1.85:1 aspect ratio which was apparently the original theatrical release, enhanced for 16x9 televisions. The picture quality is quite good, which, given the number of scenes shot in low light or with fog or cobweb effects, is a relief.
Audio: For English Dolby Digital Mono, the sound quality isn't bad. There's no real booming resonance and no full low tones to support the higher ones, but there's also no hiss or pop or any of the other annoying imperfections we've come to associate with some of the mono releases.
Extras: Sorry vampire fans, no extras.
Bottom Line: Tonally, "Love at First Bite" has more in common with a Wes Anderson film than a Mel Brooks one—something that's reinforced by comic actor Dick Shawn's deadpan performance as a detective who looks into the vampire goings-on (Newspaper headline: "Blood Bank Robbed of 200 Gallons"). It's the kind of film that makes you smile inside, if you get it, rather than prompting you to grab your side (or your neck) and guffaw your head off. But the writing isn't as clever as it is in an Anderson film. Yes, there are killer lines and exchanges, but not the overall consistency you'd hope for in a film like this, or the kind of energy that could drive a stake through our ennui.
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