Wizard-8
There is an interesting and entertaining vampire movie buried deep deep down in the Canadian effort "Graveyard Shift", and occasionally it comes out and bares its fangs. For one thing, while the movie had a painfully low budget, it actually looks very decent. The photography and lighting is very eye-catching, and it also manages to generate a little atmosphere - you really feel the cold and creepiness of this setting. If only the screenplay had been given as much care as the movie's look and feel. For starters, you never get a real sense of what is going on in the characters' heads, particularly the taxi driving vampire. What was his past? What are his motivations? We never get the answers to questions like those. And the subplot with the estranged couple also has some vague touches and is not resolved in a satisfactory manner. The unanswered questions really pick up in the second half of the movie, with the plot really starting to become muddled. If you don't care about the plot and characters and are just looking for basic horror thrills, you'll likely be disappointed - there is not much blood and gore, though to compensate there are several instances where the characters take off their clothes. I don't think the movie works in the end, but apparently it did work for enough people during its initial release on home video, because there was a sequel the following year. But I'm in no rush to track down a copy.
jonathan-577
Visually and dramatically, this movie heralds the Alliance Shift in Canadian film-making: the move from unpredictable, chaotic incompetence to shiny, meaningless competence. It brings to mind Stephen King's description of Prophecy: "Slick but also somehow cheesy, like a dead rat in a lucite block". And I use the word competence loosely; maybe 'professionalism' would be a better term. It's a vampire flick, so let's have a blue light going this way, a red light going that way, and instead of atmosphere you get a neon shop after hours: how 90s. (That's not even to mention the shots that didn't quite work out but got left in anyway: some of the indoor connecting stuff is Ug-Ly!) The funny thing, for a movie that is trying to channel Anne Rice, is how frumpy everyone is: the vampires have like wisdom fangs or something, they're way out at the side so they look all jowly and have to open verrry wide to display them. In full fetter the vampire cabbie looks like Gilbert Gottfried playing Al Lewis at a costume party. And Helen Papas comes off more like a line producer than a romantic lead; it's like she wandered in front of the camera by mistake. Or perhaps she was coerced by her pal the aspiring director.
Joseph P. Ulibas
Graveyard Shift (1987) is a cheesy movie about a love sick vampire named Stephen who drives a cab at night to pay the bills. When he's not attending to his posse of the living dead, he's pining his attention on a terminally ill woman named Michelle (Helen Papas) who has struck his fancy. Looking like death warmed over, this wimpy looking vampire dresses all in black and cruises for fares and victims. But poor Stephen can't seem to get his dream girl out of his mind.Eventually the two hook up. Michelle's off again on again boyfriend doesn't take to kindly to this interloper. One time he catches Stephen in her room and threatens to wake him up from his daytime coma by pulling the curtains!! Too bad he didn't because it would have be interesting. The vampire's world collapses when the cuckolded boyfriend puts two-and-two together. He has the cops raid his hang out. To his horror her finds his woman about to be snacked on. by Stephen. Weeks later there's a new cabbie on the beat dressed in black working the night shift. It's Michelle living out her life as a vampire. I guess she's working the night shift as well.Slightly recommended.,
brandonsites1981
350 year old vampire works as an all night cab driver and only kills females that are about to or willing to die. His newest target is a TV producer who is dying from terimanal cancer, but he falls in love with her. Also, seems he didn't finish off all his victims cause female vampires walking the streets are slaughtering off innocent people.Smart, stylish horror flick is well directed and features a good premise. Fast editing, snappy pacing, some seriously sexy moments, and a good finale make this very low budgeted film much better then expected. The special effects could have used a bit more work though. Rated R; Strong Sexual Content, Extreme Violence, Graphic Nudity, and Profanity.