Rules of garlic and sunlight rules still apply, but Modern Vampires, from Forbidden Zone director Richard Elfman, is an unconventional vampire film, both fresh and funny.

Here, the bloodsuckers take residence in the Hollywood Roosevelt hotel and visit a nightclub where humans are kept in cages until feeding time. Looking like he finally comprehends the words in a script, Starship Troopers‘ Casper Van Dien stars as Dallas, a cigar-smoking vampire who takes a trailer-trash vamp (Natasha Gregson Wagner, Urban Legend) under his, um, wing.

But the subplot is what really makes this comedy fly: Vampire hunter Dr. Van Helsing (a crazed Rod Steiger, Mars Attacks!) comes to L.A. and is forced to take out an ad to find an assistant. The only applicant is gang member Time Bomb (Gabriel Casseus, Black Dog), a Crip who is at first reluctant to complete the duties of his job: namely, driving a stake through a vampire’s heart. “Man, I’m on probation!” he protests. “I don’t wanna fuck that up!”

Count Dracula himself is played by Robert Pastorelli (TV’s Murphy Brown), while other creatures of the night are Udo Kier and Kim Cattrall. Yep, she’s slutty in this one, too, and when she’s raped by gang members, they turn into the world’s first black vampires — a distinction of which they’re awfully proud. This humorous take on the vampire legend was written by the talented Matthew Bright, who infused equal amounts of humor and horror into his wicked Little Red Riding Hood update, 1996’s Freeway. —Rod Lott

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