Directed by Ernest R. Dickerson. Two bored teenagers, Kerry (
Arjay Smith) and Justin (Branden Nadon), sneak into a morgue one night and are attacked by a vampire, Mr. Chaney (
Michael Ironside).
Tropes:
- And Starring: Michael Ironside, who plays Mr. Chaney.
- Antagonistic Offspring: Justin hates his father.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Justin says that he would "cut my old man's throat". Later he is forced to, and hates himself for it.
- Big Brother Instinct: Mr. Chaney thinks that kidnapping Justin's little sister and forcing him to feed on her will make him embrace his vampirism and bend him to his will. He is very wrong.
- Black Blood: Vampires leak black goo when injured.
- Black Eyes of Evil: After being turned, all vampires have these.
- Depraved Homosexual: Mr. Chaney is a (former?) ephebophile
. Conveniently, he is only interested in turning male teens. - Early Films: Universal's Dracula is playing on TV when Justin arrives home.
- Eye Scream: Used by Justin to defeat Chaney.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Justin commits suicide by strapping himself before sunrise in order to kill Chaney.
- Last-Name Basis: We never learn Mr. Chaney's first name, presumably because the main characters only know him as such.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Vampires have black eyes and extremely pale skin, but normal looking teeth and do reflect on mirrors. Also, staking them in the heart does not kill them but decapitation and sunlight does.
- Shout-Out:
- The teens jokingly quote "They are coming to get you, Barbara!" while in the morgue.
- Kerry quotes Dracula (1931) when he tells a fellow bus passenger "I do not drink... wine". The same film is playing on TV in another scene.
- The vampire is named Mr. Chaney, after Lon Chaney Jr., the Universal Horror legend.
- When Mr. Chaney first goes after the boys, his hand's shadow reproduces the iconic scene of Nosferatu.
- Sophisticated as Hell: Mr. Chaney.
Mr. Chaney: Anyway, he told me that your dad was a mean, evil, bastard, that he was a... (to Kerry) what'd you call him? Ah, a dickface! Yes, a dickface, how wonderful."
- The Unreveal: We do learn a lot more of Mr. Chaney's backstory than we ever cared to know, but we never find out how he became a vampire.
Justin: "How'd you get like this? You bite the wrong dick or something?"
Mr. Cheney: "Or something."
- Vampire Bites Suck: Mr. Chaney has no fangs to bite a victim's throat... so he tears out a hunk of flesh and laps up the blood. In another scene, a vampire slashes a man's throat with a piece of glass so his hungry friend can feed.
- You Will Be Spared: Justin refuses to feed on his family, and makes Kerry promise he will stay away from them too.
