Any vampire film carrying the tagline “In space, the sun never rises” should be approached with considerable caution. After all, the sun doesn’t need to rise, because where but space does that flaming ball of gas sit? Dracula 3000 is that film, but other reasons exist that encourage avoidance, not the least of which is Casper Van Dien’s name leading the credits.
The Starship Troopers himbo stars as Abraham Van Helsing, captain of the spaceship Mother III. After his craft locates a ghost ship missing for years, he decides to investigate; you know how that’s gonna turn out. He and his crew members — stock roles filled by Tiny Lister (The Human Centipede III [Final Sequence]), Erika Eleniak (Tales from the Crypt Presents: Bordello of Blood) and Coolio (China Strike Force), who is saddled with the not-at-all-racist moniker of “187” — accidentally end up resurrecting Dracula (here called Count Orlock) from the ashes.
As played by Langley Kirkwood (Dredd), this Drac is one of the shoddiest-looking Dracs to grace the screen. He looks like an in-costume dad/ financial adviser beamed in from your local church’s “fall festival.” Spend five bucks at your local Halloween supply store, and you’re every bit his equal.
187 is the first among the crew to get bitten, and if you can imagine the rapper fitted with red contact lenses and a pair of fangs, you may have a hint of the kind of unintentional comedy that results. And if you do not, this kind: “Do you know how many times I’ve thought about ejaculating on your bazongas?” a vampiric 187 asks Aurora, before proceeding to talk about “stroking my anaconda.” More people are bitten, while others are staked, and yet you’ll be the only one reeling in pain.
Do not insult the comparative genius of Wes Craven Presents Dracula 2000 by mistaking this as a 2000 sequel. Dracula 3000 looks as if director Darrell James Roodt (Dangerous Ground) shot it in the lower level of a South Africa franchise location of Jiffy Lube. Considering he managed to find a way to include a scene of Coolio taking bong hits, but failed to get Eleniak to strip out of a sailor suit while emerging from a giant cake, Roodt deserves as much scorn as you can muster.
Just when I thought I’d finally found a genre movie with a muscular African-American man who doesn’t exclaim, “Now that’s what I’m talkin’ ’bout!,” Lister pops up in an end-credits stinger to utter those very words directly to the camera, then punctuates them with a slap to Eleniak’s ass. —Rod Lott
I remember that cover image from my local rental shop. Glad I never bothered.