Search - Shira: The Vampire Samurai on DVD

WE WHO ARE ABOUT TO DIE SALUTE YOU

Karen Shaub | the inner reaches of the outer limits | 07/28/2008

(1 out of 5 stars)

"You know me, I can't pass up low budget flix. I may go into the store with the best of intentions and a long list of recommended films but just let me catch a glimpse of that single copy of some horror movie or martial arts film that looks as if even the director's mother wouldn't voluntarily sit through it and I've got to rent it. No kidding, you catch a lot of good movies that way. But unfortunatly you also undergo hours of needless torture. So guess what happened when I rented a movie called SHIRA THE VAMPIRE SAMURAI "Part Vampire, Part Samurai, All Woman"? Yep, I got just what I deserved. Now, in all fairness to me, I really wasn't expecting much from this one, after all one of the male leads was Adrian Zmed, who doesn't exactly have a good track record when it comes to knocking out good movies, and the other male lead lead was my buddy James Lew from FLUFFY BUNNY FEET OF DEATH--er, 18 FINGERS OF DEATH.

I'd gladly tell you every bit of the story and spoil it all for you thus sparing you the agony I endured, but frankly I only remember bits and pieces that filtered through my foggy brain. Shira, as best I could tell, became a half-vampire sometime in the middle ages, I know this because of a fight between ninja-vampires and armoured European knights that takes place at the very beginning when she gets the bite laid on her. Although she only vaguely looks Japanese, Shira still gallantly tries to commit the female version of seppacu, but is prevented by Kenji, an important Japanese fellow (played by Louis Klein) who reminded me of a red version of Darth Helmet from SPACEBALLS. I don't know exactly what went on in many places because the music was very loud and tended to drown out the dialogue at every possible opportunity. That does have its advantages. You may want to insert your own plot devices instead.

Well centuries pass, as they often do, and Shira is just as non-Japanese looking as she ever was but has become a highly trained samurai as well as a half-vamp. Plus now she a few buddies; her main squeeze, Ash (Lawrence Dwonzh) who is very tall and built like a brick s***house, Nathan the cute quasi-Asian compter geek who's actually got some first class fighting skills (Joe Eric Marcado), and Xu the laid-back martial arts master with the level head, and a brand new hair cut after 35 years, James Lew. They all hang around and do good and fight evil and all that kinda stuff. Until one day--

Enter the evil-doers headed by Adrian Zmed with an appropraitely middle European name, Kristof Something. Or should that be Zomezing? Anyhow he runs the big vamp night spot and strip club which gives our heroine a chance to show that she knows what to do with a stripper pole and that she spends a goodly amount of her half-vamp time getting tan lines on the breasts that are all hers as soon as the last credit card payment is made. Now Zmed has been waiting for Shira to show up for a couple of centuries because its been prophecied in this book that even James Lew knows about that one day he (Zmed) will breed with her and create a race of Day-Walkers where upon Marv Wolfman and Stan Lee will sue them all.

Oh, forget it. You don't really want to hear all of this, do you? But just in case you DO care this is where that ****MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT*** begins. We'll try and end this as quickly as possible. I'm not quite sure how this happened, but Zmed captures Shira and then has a doctor friend of his who used to work with Mengle harvest a few of Shira's eggs. After which she escapes while the cavalry is, of course coming to rescue her. Suffice it say that after a battle in which Shira's main squeeze gets to rip off his shirt and reveal his muscles and James Lew gets to do more fighting than he's done in his last three films combined, they both die. Oh yeah, yet another relative of Prof. Van Helsing's shows up in time to get slaughtered along with one of his cohorts too. Just outta nowhere.

And we end on a final shot of Shira moping about how sad it is to have to live forever and watch everybody you love blah blah blah. But somebody has to fight the blah blah blah. Even if there is a suffering vampire battling evil, make no mistake about it--this is definitely not ANGEL! ****SPOILER ALERT ENDS****

I think you can see what this film's bad points might be, in addition to that horrendous soundtrack I mentioned. Yet it does have one or two things ever so slightly in its favor; Joe Eric Mercado and James Lew. They both come off very well in this film. I would go as far as to say that Mercado could have a future in the biz now that he has some footage to show--although he's so good, both in action and as an actor that its hard to believe that this is his first appearance. I'll have to look him up and see what I can find. And Lew looks good in every way possible--I just wish that his big fight scenes hadn't been filmed wearing a robe so I could have seen more of the body lines.

Its time for final judgment: I WOULD RECOMMEND THIS FILM ONLY FOR THOSE WHO FEEL THAT THEY HAVE COMMITED SOME SORT OF INEXCUSEABLE CRIME FOR WHICH THEY MUST PAY THROUGHOUT ALL ETERNITY AND THEY WANT TO GET STARTED NOW.
"

Its Fair, Good & Aright..... But her BF.....

Butterfly Wings | USA | 03/26/2008

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I thought this was pretty fair and good. I still Love Blade (Male Version), Because it has more umph in it. This one has Adrian Zmed, u know the T Bird guy from Grease 2. He's awesome in some ways. But the Shira's boy toy friend is very hot, and he's fine, and he plays a good part but he' as well as the others die at the end. This movie has allot of fighting scenes and brief nudity, it also jumps to the past and back to the present. But above all she looked alittle to old to play this half human and half vampire. And the reason i give it 3 stars is because her bf is cute and it did have allot of action. But above all i Just love Vampire Movies."

Ok Movie

indy film | Florida | 01/12/2010

(3 out of 5 stars)

"I'm not a fan of this type of movies but I like when a movie has action, drama, and suspence. This movie has all of it, specially fights. They are ok, the effects are not the best, but pretty decent. For people that are into these type of movies, I know that there may be better option, but this one is not a bad option.
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