Playgirls & The Vampire
by Piero Regnoli
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Alfredo Rizzo, Lila Rocco, Maria Giovannini, Marisa Quattrini, Walter BrandiDirector: Piero Regnoli
DVD: Region Code 0
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Subtitled); Italian (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Black & White, Dubbed, DVD, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 80 minutes
DVD Release Date: 1999-08-24
Audience Rating: Unrated
Studio: Image Entertainment
Movie Reviews of Playgirls & The Vampire
Movie Review: Titillating Italian vampire tale looks great on DVD
Summary: 4 Stars
Having been fairly unimpressed by the censored, interrupted-by-a-dozen-commercial-breaks version of this (Curse of the Vampire) on USA channel years ago, I was curious to see how the original would hold up. Perhaps I've simply matured, but uncut and uninterrupted on disc, Playgirls is much more entertaining than I remembered. The plot is standard issue: a bus carrying a troupe of showgirls breaks down, stranding them at the castle of one Count Kernassy (Walter Brandi [Slaughter of the Vampires, Vampire and the Ballerina]) who reluctantly allows them to stay the night, whereupon they move in and sponge off of him seemingly indefinitely. The movie provides some occasional unintentional amusement, but it's certainly no Bad Film atrocity; it's competently produced and fairly absorbing, if you're not too demanding of the logic of the script. There are a number of "wandering the castle corridors at night" scenes (requisite in Italian horror films), a few effective shocks, some icky-cheesy gore effects when a vampiress gets staked, the bloodsuckers all sport highly visible pearly fangs (de rigeur for movie vampires after Horror of Dracula), and convincingly creepy gothic atmosphere is generated throughout. Fashionistas will no doubt marvel at the eccentric '60s wardrobe (Lila Rocco sports a very mod checked coat and the Count favors pinstripe and plaid suits over flowing capes). As expected, the dubbed vocal performances all have that annoying stuttering cadence that Euroshock and kaiju eiga fans know and love. The 'Adults Only' sequences that we've waited years to see amount to a few scenes with barely-discernable nipples glimpsed through very sheer nighties, one quick topless shot, and a mildly sexy striptease, to her undies, by one of the 'playgirls.' Somehow she manages to remove about a half dozen undergarments without actually getting naked! It's hard to believe Richard Gordon made any money at all with this on the grindhouse circuit; its definitely not for the trenchcoat-and-kleenex crowd. Although not as horrific or sexy as one might wish, Playgirls and the Vampire still provides plenty of camp entertainment value, and is essential viewing for students of early-60s Italian horror films such as I Vampiri, Black Sunday, Castle of Terror, Atom Age Vampire, etc.Image's DVD is unspectacular but quite presentable. Thirteen chapter stops are listed on the main menu screen, and a pretty decent-looking trailer, with no dialog or narration and marred only slightly by some light speckling and vertical scratching, is included. The source print used for the feature actually looks surprisingly good, with generally excellent brightness, contrast, grayscale, shadow/highlight detail, and sharpness. There is some light speckling throughout, but no other notable physical damage. The Dolby 2.0 mono audio does reveal deficiencies in the source soundtrack, particularly a relatively soft but nearly constant hiss, and some sporadic crackling and popping, but the music, sound fx, and dialogue tracks are reasonably clear. All in all a very nice addition to the film library of any aficionado of Italian horror.
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