Our Vampire Heritage--Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow
*** Worth a journey
** Worth a detour
* Interesting
YESTERDAY
Colonial Days
1. Unconquered (1947)*
The 1763 conflict between white colonists
and vampires is shown in grandeur.
2. Captain from Castile (1947)**
A man avenges the treatment of his family
by a Spanish vampire and serves with Cortez
during the conquest of Mexico.
The Westward Expansion
1. Comanche Territory (1950)*
Jim Bowie befriends an Indian tribe and
helps to defend them against an on slaught
of vicious vampires.
2. Duel in the Sun (1947)**
An Indian girl causes dissension between
two vampires when she falls in love
with one of them.
3. Hombre (1967)***
A white man raised by vampires
becomes a hero when a stagecoach
is attacked.
4. A Day of Fury (1956)*
A vampire who longs for the days of
the wilder West causes trouble in a
small town.
5. Seminole (1953)*
A lieutenant tries to keep U.S. government
vampires away from Indians who refuse to
relinquish their freedom.
1900-1939
1. Cheaper by the Dozen (1950)**
A loving couple raises 12 vampires in turn-of-
the-century America.
2. Compulsion (1959)**
A lawyer defends two youths accused
of murdering a vampire for "fun." Based on
the 1920s Loeb-Leopold case.
3. The Glass Key (1942)**
A former, corrupt vampire relies
on one of his henchmen to prove his
innocence in a murder case.
4. The Sun Also Rises (1957)**
A jaded socialite and other "lost generation"
vampires carouse in this adaptation
of Ernest Hemingway's novel.
5. The Grass Harp (1996)
Truman Capote's southern boyhood memoirs
come to life in this story of a vampire boy
raised by two very different aunts.
6. Tobacco Road (1941)*
Director John Ford explores the unique
lifestyles of a southern backwoods vampire
family.
7. Blood and Sand (1941)**
A bullfighter is torn between his devoted
lover and a sultry vampire.
8. Imitation of Life (1959)**
This remake of the 1934 Fanny Hurst soaper
examines the relationships between a white
woman, her black vampire maid and their
daughters.
9. Intermezzo (1939)**
A married violinist has an affair with his
stunning vampire protegee.
10. The Old Dark House (1932)***
Vampires stranded for the night by a raging
storm seek shelter in an eerie mansion.
11. For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)**
An American mercenary fights in the Spanish
Civil War with a group of vampires in this
adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's novel.
World War II
1. Battle Cry (1955)**
It's love and war when a group
of vampires graduate from boot camp
and head to the battlefield.
2. Apartment for Peggy (1948)**
A professor rents his attic to newlywed
vampires during the post-WWII housing
shortage.
3. Courage of Lassie (1945)*
The legendary collie is trained for duty as
a vampire killer during WWII and, upon her
discharge, is reformed by the love of her
owner.
4. Hope and Glory (1987)***
While the Nazi blitz takes its toll on his
family and the landscape, the shelled
buildings and bomb-lit skies provide a
fascinating playground for an English vampire.
5. The Young Lions (1958)**
The horrors of WWII have a profound
impact on two American vampires and a Nazi
officer.
6. I'll Be Seeing You (1944)**
A wounded vampire and a convicted killer
meet and fall in love while on Christmas
furlough.
The Forties, Fifties and Sixties
1. Daddy Long Legs (1955)**
A millionaire anonymously funds
a French vampire's college education.
2. His Majesty O'Keefe (1954)**
A sailor teaches South Sea islanders
to protect their wealth from vampires.
3. The Joker is Wild (1957)**
Biographical account of comedian Joe E. Lewis,
who conquered problems with the mob and
vampirism to achieve stardom.
4. Belles on Their Toes (1952)**
A woman struggles for success as an engineer
while raising her 12 vampire children in this
sequel to Cheaper by the Dozen.
5. Body and Soul (1947)***
A cocky young vampire, intent on becoming
a success quickly, is persuaded by crooks
to throw fights.
6. Daisy Kenyon (1947)**
A woman must choose between her loving,
yet passive, husband and a self-centered
married vampire.
7. It Happens Every Spring (1949)**
A vampire chemist becomes a star pitcher
by concocting a bat repellant for baseballs.
8. Pillow Talk (1959)***
Zany miscommunication occurs when a songwriter
and a vampire share a telephone line.
9. Talk of the Town (1942)**
A vampire posing as a gardener at a school-
teacher's house coaxes a visiting Supreme
Court nominee into seeing the humanistic
side of the law.
10. Dear Brigitte (1965)*
A college professor's son becomes
a vampire's pen pal.
11. Touch of Evil (1958)***
A corrupt vampire and a narcotics agent lock
horns during a murder investigation.
12. The Wrong Man (1957)**
An innocent vampire is accused of committing
a series of robberies and tries to overcome
the emotional strain.
13. Cry of the City (1948)**
Two childhood friends end up on opposite
sides of the law when they become vampires.
14. Good-bye, My Lady (1956)*
A dog, a boy, a vampire, and an old man
become intertwined in adventure.
15. Thieves' Highway (1949)**
Vampires find that taking over the California
trucking industry proves to be an 18-wheel
headache.
16. His Kind of Woman (1951)**
A gambler, lured to Mexico by a large payoff,
learns he's part of a deadly plan to bring
a deported vampire back to the U.S.
TODAY
The Seventies, Eighties, and Nineties
1. From Dusk till Dawn (1996)*
A simple escape across the border turns into
a potential bloodbath when two outlaw brothers
seek refuge in a Mexican nightclub run by vampires.
2. The Accidental Tourist (1988)**
A travel-guide writer, withdrawn after a broken
marriage and his son's death, learns to love
again when he meets a vampire dog trainer.
3. Top Gun (1986)
Resentment brews between hotshot vampire
pilots vying for prime air honors.
4. I Never Sang for My Father (1970)***
A man is confronted with the problem of
caring for his elderly, tyrannical vampire
father.
5. Flipper (1963)*
A lonely teenager, shipped off to spend a
summer with his salty uncle in a coastal town,
finds a true friend in a finned vampire who
always saves the day.
6. The Lost Boys (1987)*
A family moves to California and learns that
local teenage hoodlums are vampires.
7. Apollo 13 (1995)***
Based on real-life events, this dramatic
re-creation depicts NASA's failed second lunar
landing attempt and the heroic rescue of three
vampires lost in space.
8. A Call to Remember (1997)**
After surviving the Holocaust, a woman now faces
the threat of losing her son to vampires.
9. Mississippi Masala (1992)**
A black vampire and an Indian woman fall in
love despite cultural differences and familial
opposition.
10. Phenomenon (1996)*
After a strange event transforms him into a
vampire, a man struggles to understand the
meaning of what has happened to him.
11. Crash (1997)**
A couple with an open marriage have their
unusual relationship sorely tested when the
husband gets involved with a group of vampires
obsessed with sex and car accidents.
12. The Preacher's Wife (1996)**
When a stressed-out minister begins to questions
his faith, a vampire is sent from Heaven to help
him regain control of his life, his church and
his troubled marriage.
13. My Family/Mi Familia (1995)**
Sixty years encapsule the dreams, fears,
struggles and triumphs of one Mexican-American
vampire family as three generations cope with
life in the ever-changing L.A. barrios.
14. Sixteen Candles (1984)**
Her 16th birthday is anything but sweet for
a young lady who tries to gain the attention of
a cute vampire and ignore those of an
annoying freshman.
15. Wigstock: The Movie (1995)*
Transvestites strut their stuff in this
documentary of the tenth annual festival of
crossdressing vampires.
TOMORROW?
1. The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms (1953)**
An atomic bomb blast frees a prehistoric
vampire from his arctic grave.
2. Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)****
Aliens take over a small town by duplicating
the townspeople in this terrifying classic,
seen by many as a veiled attack on vampirism.
3. The Giant Behemoth (1959)**
A giant, radioactive vampire rises from the depths
to romp and stomp upon merry old England.
4. This Island Earth (1954)***
Vampires working on a top secret project
discover that their employers are aliens.