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‘Severance’ Star’s Grindhouse Throwback Doesn’t Have Any Bite
Vampires of the Velvet Lounge feels distinctly like a made-for-TV movie that would have aired on the Sci-Fi Channel in the middle of the night in the late ’90s. It’s the kind of campy vampire horror that might’ve once faded into distant memory, bleeding into the fever-dream era of Blood Ties or Forever Knight — the kind of titles only revisited while falling down an IMDb rabbit hole of long-forgotten titles.
While that era of filmmaking may have had its fair share of questionable scripts, they never felt like they were engineered for the moment your attention drifts. Vampires of the Velvet Lounge is perhaps one of the most egregious examples of preemptively preparing for second-screen viewing. Even Netflix’s intentionally “dumbed down” scripts aren’t as hamfisted and lazy with their dialogue. Despite knowing each other for — quite literally — centuries, the aforementioned vampires of the Velvet Lounge take a moment to detail what type of blood they prefer, how long they’ve been vampires, and what their individual modus operandi is upon their first introduction on screen.
‘Vampires of the Velvet Lounge’ Rehashes Familiar Tropes
The first twenty minutes are dedicated almost entirely to establishing the film’s lore. Through a series of intertitles, writer-director Adam Sherman reworks Countess Elizabeth Báthory’s alleged crimes as the origin story for his vampire mythology. It’s a familiar hook, and one that never quite evolves beyond its surface-level appeal. The opening credits — which are shockingly long — aim to evoke the glory days of television, something akin to Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s iconic, never-skip intro. The difference is that Buffy gave you a reason to care. Vampires of the Velvet Lounge offers a parade of blood-soaked imagery without any emotional investment to anchor it.
Here, Elizabeth (Mena Suvari) and her coven have relocated to Savannah, Georgia, where they operate a back-alley absinthe bar. Alongside Joan (India Eisley), a grizzled, blood-covered enforcer (Mark Boone Junior), and a sultry accomplice (Sarah Dumont), they lure unsuspecting victims via webcam dating schemes. It’s a genuinely fun premise — one that should lean into camp and absurdity, but it somehow lands flat. Even with scene-stealing supporting players like Timothy V. Murphy, Stephen Dorff, and
Tyrese Gibson, the execution never quite matches the potential.
Naturally, a coven needs opposition. Enter Cora (Dichen Lachman), a former assassin turned gun-for-hire who’s been attempting to lure Elizabeth into a trap through an online romance. Lachman’s performance leans toward a Sin City-style stoicism, but it reads as flat more than hardened. The script does her no favors. Despite her character’s narrative importance, Cora is largely sidelined, appearing briefly to bookend a midpoint that collapses under the weight of the film’s disastrously bad mid-point. For an actor coming off the critical acclaim of Severance, it’s a frustratingly underwritten role.
‘Vampires of the Velvet Lounge’ Fails Its Cast of Characters
Sherman leans heavily into the aesthetics of the genres that inspired him, but often misses what made them work. There are flashes of visual appeal, particularly in the production design of Elizabeth’s bar and Cora’s apartment. But Sherman undercuts himself by being all Tarantino and no Rodriguez. The film’s female characters lack personalities beyond being man-eating vampires that look like demonic green fairies (a poor attempt to riff on the iconography of absinthe). Cora’s roommate (Rosa Salazar) fares even worse. She’s inexplicably staged in a constant state of undress, pacing the apartment in her underwear while discussing her dating life, lifting weights, and bending directly into the camera’s distinctly male gaze. It all feels voyeuristic for the sake of voyeurism, lacking any narrative or stylistic justification. It’s not even provocative.
Lachman brings her usual screen presence, but the script gives her little to work with beyond surface-level traits, leaving her performance feeling one-note through no fault of her own. It’s a missed opportunity, especially in a film that could have benefited from more dynamic character interplay. The potential queerness of her character — particularly where allusions to a deeper interest in her roommate and something more than just a farce with Elizabeth — are nothing more than implications, rather than anything actually character-impacting.
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Within all of this, there are flashes of something better. Most notably in India Eisley’s performance. Eisley stands out immediately, bringing a level of emotional commitment that the rest of the film struggles to match. It helps that her character is the only one with internal conflict and something resembling a fully trackable narrative arc. While the script gives her the same exposition-heavy material as everyone else, she manages to ground it, finding moments of genuine feeling in scenes that might otherwise fall flat. There’s a sense that she’s working through the limitations of the writing rather than being supported by it, and the result is a performance that feels like it belongs to a more cohesive, more intentional version of this movie.
It’s not that Eisley transforms the film (there’s only so much one performance can do), but she does provide a glimpse of what Vampires of the Velvet Lounge could have been with stronger character work and a clearer sense of direction.
‘Vampires of the Velvet Lounge’ a Future Cult Classic?
Even for vampire B-movie connoisseurs who are used to turning off their brains to enjoy a visually appealing and well-acted movie, Vampires of the Velvet Lounge may be a stretch. The plot makes no sense, and the visuals — particularly when Elizabeth and Joan (Eisley) go for a joy ride through Savannah — are grotesquely bad. The horror is also a non-starter, and largely blood and gore for the sake of blood and gore, with illogical deaths and questionable visual effects.
From a storytelling perspective, Vampires of the Velvet Lounge is so aggressively reliant on exposition that it’s almost unbearable. Characters don’t reveal themselves through action or subtext; they explain themselves, repeatedly. Motivations are spelled out, then restated, then reiterated again, as if the script is constantly checking to make sure viewers are still loosely following along. It’s not just “tell with no show,” it’s tell, then tell again for good measure.
While Vampires of the Velvet Lounge is undeniably a mess that is plagued by clunky dialogue, uneven performances, and distractingly bad visual effects, it’s also oddly watchable. In the same way that you can’t quite help but look back as you drive past a car accident. The film desperately wants to be seen as a grindhouse-inspired vampire romp that gestures towards camp and pulp, and the hazy glory days of sexy vampires lurking in neon-bathed nightclubs, but it settles into something more modern: background noise cinema. As it stands, Vampires of the Velvet Lounge is exactly what it seems to be: a messy, mildly entertaining vampire movie that works best when you’re only half watching it.
Vampires of the Velvet Lounge is now playing in theaters.
Vampires of the Velvet Lounge
A wannabe grindhouse vampire horror that has been completely defanged.
- Release Date
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March 20, 2026
- Runtime
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105 Minutes
- Director
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Adam Sherman
Cast
- India Eisley delivers a grounded, emotionally compelling performance throughout the film.
- Vampires of the Velvet Lounge’s campy, pulpy premise has moments of fun despite the film?s many flaws.
- Repetitive, exposition-heavy dialogue constantly explains instead of showing why audiences should care about the film’s cast of characters.
- Vampires of the Velvet Lounge features a nonsensical, poorly structured plot with little payoff or coherence.
- Male gaze-heavy framing feels gratuitous and adds nothing to the story and takes away the potential of the female cast of characters.
- Dichen Lachman is severely underutilized in a flat, underwritten role, which is a shame because she’s a brilliant actress.
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