20. The Brotherhood (2001)

Oh wow. Just... wow. This movie is BAD. It almost missed my cut-off by earning only 2.3 stars on Netflix, but I allowed it in the marathon because I remember this film sitting on the Blockbuster new release wall when I was in high school and people renting it. So, out of high school nostalgia, I added this one to my Netflix instant list. Be prepared to be amused and horrified...


Now, this film's concept is actually a fun and funny one: vampire frat boys. That sounds hilarious, right? There is a very good movie in that idea somewhere. This is not that movie.

The movie's first problem comes from not knowing what fraternities or frat boys are like AT ALL. Imagine a frat boy. Do you imagine popped collared polo shirts? Red cups? Greek letters?

Whatever you imagined, you already must have done a better job than this director. He apparently decided that vampire frat boys wear poofy white shirts and leather pants (you know, because they're vampires). Oh, and necklaces that look like they were stolen off of Bela Lugosi's corpse.

So that's what we're going with here...?

Said director also decided that frat parties have absinthe commonly there, and that frat names can have completely made up Greek letters in them and no one will notice. He also seems to assume that no one will notice that the characters are very obviously in someone's Los Angeles wood and stucco house when one character says that the house was "a monastery" from Europe that was brought over "brick by brick."

Yes, those stucco monastary bricks. I've heard of those.

What makes this movie ALMOST so bad that it's great, however, is (a) the horrifically wooden acting that almost becomes a sort of performance art and (b) the fact that the movie has more gay subtext than Nightmare on Elm Street 2. 

"Not possible!" you surely will say. "NoES 2 is the gayest film maybe ever! Even Brokeback Mountain isn't as gay as that movie!" And yes, you're right, hypothetical reader. The second Nightmare on Elm Street has gone down in film history as a horror movie  which managed to fly under the 1980's radar as a metaphor for a kid struggling with homosexuality... as he runs from a dream-based killer with needle-claws for fingers. The LBTQ news magazine The Advocate just this year did a story on the film where author Jase Peeples explains that NoES2 was "celebrated by both the horror film and LGBT communities as one of the gayest horror movies of all time." But NoES 2 still doesn't have its protagonist and a frat boy vampire in bed together, wearing nothing but their underwear, for over ten minutes.

Seriously, this unbelievable scene is one of the highlights of this vampire film. The two characters climb into the bed supposedly to feed from the willing sorority girl, who is also in her bra and panties. This somehow does not make the scene seem any more hetero-erotic, however, as the two near-naked boys get up next to the girl and suck at her... elbows. For about 10 minutes. Um, sexy?

If you watched that clip, you may have noticed something else odd about it. The weird I-think-it's-supposed-to-be-lightning strobe light. This is actually used throughout the film, along with tons of seemingly random dry ice/smoke. It's like the director watched Flatliners and thought, "Wow, this Joel Shumacher guy is an amazing director and someone whose style of random lights and smoke I really want to emulate!" and then proceeded to make choices that look so much worse.

I won't spoil the "twist" ending for you, but the climax of the film literally has the lead vampire saying to the new frat recruit, "Let me inside of you" and it supposedly wasn't meant sexually. It was about then that I collapsed in a giggling heap and just about couldn't take it anymore.

The worst part of this film is that it seems to take itself seriously. Don't waste your time; if you're really curious, check out some of the gloriously bad acting for yourself on youtube. Otherwise, you can safely avoid this low-budget trainwreck.

Rating: 0 out of 5 bites

~ LK