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 t's probably for
the best that Desi Scarpone didn't have a large budget, otherwise his vampire
movie would only end up looking like the recent "Dawn
of the Dead" remake, and truthfully, we can always do without another
one of those. Clocking in at a frugal 80-something minutes, "Dark
Town" has no hope of becoming anything extraordinary, even if Scarpone had
been given a decent budget, which he was not, considering the film's low-budget
nature and its status as another shot on digital horror feature. Unlike other
horror features that found its way onto DV, "Dark Town" is
surprisingly good, and in this genre, that's more than good enough.
The film opens with slumlord Curtis Armstrong (Joel King)
discovering what looks to be a little girl wearing a mask in one of his
warehouses. Before Curtis can swing away with his flashlight (as, we learn via
exposition, he's apparently prone to do), he's attacked. Curtis soon returns
home, where his downtrodden but loyal wife is holding a surprise party for him.
In a bit of forced "Pulp Fiction"-esque scenarios, we are introduced
to the rest of the cast while they are all in their respective natural
environments: Curtis' headstrong lesbian daughter Jen (Janet Martin) and her
lover Lisa; revenge-minded ghetto youth Rakeem (Del Willis) and his
"posse"; Heather (Sarah Horvath), Curtis' other daughter, whose
gangbanging boyfriend is on his way to Curtis' house after a shoot out with some
gangbangers; and Curtis' son and his hypochondriac pregnant wife.
It just so happens that on the night all these disparate
characters are converging on the same suburban house, the city is going through
a power outage. Phones aren't working, streetlights are on the fritz, and the
streets are dark. This is the perfect time for a little vampire outbreak, which
is what happens when Curtis returns home, quickly turns daughter Heather, the
wife, the son, and the pregnant daughter-in-law into vamps. Unfortunately for
Rakeem, he stumbles into Curtis' slaughterhouse and finds himself forced to ally
with Jen, the only survivor of the Armstrong brood, as vampires begin to take
over the neighborhood. What's a ghetto youth and a lesbian social worker to do?
In a nutshell, "Dark Town" is an ambitious
vampire film made on a very tight budget, two elements that have a hard time
cohabitating, and could have spelled doom for the production. If decades spent
raiding the B-movie shelves of Blockbuster have taught me anything, it's that
there's nothing worst than a filmmaker who refuses to reign in his ambitions in
accordance to his resources (or lack thereof). To Scarpone and company's credit,
they manage quite a lot with what they had on hand, and the final product is
pretty impressive, even if it is shot on digital video, a format that I do not
personally care for.
In fact, "Dark Town" works quite well as a horror
genre effort. Scarpone and writer David Birke seems to know exactly what their
audience wants, and provides plenty of everything. The gratuitous nudity is more
than accounted for (throw in plenty of girl-on-girl action, all involving the
attractive lead, and you've got a film that's going beyond the call of duty);
also, the violence and gore are aplenty. The final Act, when Rakeem and Jen goes
on a killing spree after a long night of feeding by the vampires, is one of the
movie's standout sequence, if just for its straightforward nihilistic approach
to slaughtering.
Although much of it is played straight, there is some
surprising humor sprinkled throughout "Dark Town". There's a character
that gets shot, then later stabbed, only to end up crucified on a wall. You
would think he'd be dead after this, but you'd be wrong, as he ends up dinner
for a vampire and then later, for a gaggle of vampires. Talk about bad luck.
Jen's status as a white, bleeding heart lesbian social worker Liberal is also
brought up on a number of occasions, including the rather odd fact that Jen, who
has been estranged from her family, seems to be on speaking terms with (in her
own words) her father's "crazy alcoholic stripper" mistress.
Just for chuckles, "Dark Town" even indulges
in a little "under the surface" propaganda. It's no accident that the
vampires are the very waspy Armstrong clan, who subsequently turns the
neighborhood into vampires, including two "Uncle Tom" black
characters. (Translation: White people are the cause of the world's social ills,
and if you embrace them, it will be your downfall!) To battle this plague, the
world must rely on a headstrong lesbian social worker and a black youth from the
inner city. (Translation: Only when the progressive white folks join forces with
the inner city black folks can we resist and defeat The Man's tyrannical rule!)
It's also no
coincidence that Curtis, the head honcho vampire, is first bitten and turned
while checking his property, where we witness him using slang Spanish in a
derogatory manner. (Translation: The White Man is inherently racist!) For you
see, Curtis is not only the ultimate enemy because he's rich (well,
middle-class, anyway) and white, but he's also a -- gasp! -- Capitalist! (No
surprise, as Evil White Capitalists show up more often as villains in horror
movies than killer aliens or the occasional genetically engineered mutant
worms.)
The script's odious stabs at social propaganda
notwithstanding, "Dark Town" makes for good genre entertainment, and
that's really all it's good for. The special effects, such as they are, are
achieved via very low-tech methods. Even so, Scarpone uses some excellent
framing devices, and there's a clever use of shadows and reliance on insinuation
rather than actually showing what the filmmakers obviously couldn't manufacture
with non-existent money. If "Dark Town" has one irresistible ace in
the hole, it's the spunky Janet Martin, who is quite possibly the best thing
about the film. Utterly convincing as a vampire fighter (and a lesbian, natch),
Martin elevates the film beyond minor diversion into the realm of passable, even
surprisingly good, entertainment.
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