I was previously resistant to the allure of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, whether the TV show or the 1992 film. I only finally rolled the dice on the movie because I needed a third, similarly-priced titled for a Target “buy 2 get 3” sale. I’m glad I did, because I found the movie to be quite a pleasant surprise.
Admittedly, it is would difficult to completely ruin a movie that has Donald Sutherland, Rutger Hauer and Hilary Swank in it (the last, admittedly, in a bit part). There’s even Luke Perry, who was wildly popular at the time, so I think its funny how skinny, awkward and timid he is here. Other recognizable faces include David Arquette and even a cameo by Ben Affleck before he was anything.
But the biggest surprise in the casting is Paul Reubens as the main vampire’s right-hand man. I’m not sure I have seen him outside of his Pee Wee Herman persona, except on talk shows. He has a lot of fun with this part, including a hilarious death scene I cannot imagine anybody but him being able to pull off.
Kristy Swanson, as the titular character, is really the star. She’s very good in this, though her character really only has two modes: valley girl and action hero. And there isn’t overlap between these two sides of her personality. At one point, she’s spouting airhead gripes such as, “Excuse me for not knowing about El Salvador. As if I’m ever going to Spain anyway”. A little while later, she’s expertly catching a large knife thrown right at her face.
I’m just disappointed the script doesn’t give her more funny lines, but at least it doesn’t reduce her to being a scaredy-cat who runs away from everything. That, it turns out, is Perry’s role in this. This inversion of the expected gender roles seems notably prescient for a movie made in the early 1990’s.
The plot involves an age-old battle between Hauer, as the king of the vampires, and Swanson, as the most recent incarnation of a long line of vampire killers. Apparently, the vampire slayers are always female, but it doesn’t appear they are related. I felt the background wasn’t sufficiently explained, but quickly concluding it doesn’t really matter. All the hunters have the same birthmark on their chest, but I still don’t understand what that has to do with being “the chosen one”.
Swanson is largely a reluctant hero, which was a smart way to play this. Like a certain popular 80’s song, she just wants to have fun. Instead, she has to carry the burden of saving the world from vampires. There’s a moment where she even briefly throws in the stake: “I’m the chosen one and I choose to be shopping.”
The plot never deviates significantly from the directions I thought it might go in, yet I enjoyed the ride, regardless. This was Joss Whedon’s first feature film, and you can see the signs that he was destined for greater things. There’s little touches I especially appreciated, like how Arquette uses a photo booth after he has been turned and the machine ejects a strip of identical photos of the curtain behind him.
I had enough fun watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer that I intentionally overlooked such things as a guy already having a tombstone when he only died three days earlier. This a movie which doesn’t strain itself, but is just clever enough for me to recommended to all. This is a film that knows what it is, as evidenced by such moments as an on-air TV reporter saying one victim had “a neck bite wound that looked like, according to one bystander, a really gross hickey.”
Dir: Fran Rubel Kuzui
Starring Kristy Swanson, Donald Sutherland, Paul Reubens
Watched on Fox blu-ray