User Reviews

From what I understand, Mr. Bava abandoned this project before completion...AND RIGHTFULLY SO!!! If I were him I definitely would have made sure that EVERY copy was burned and if anybody in the future ever asked me about this film...IT NEVER HAPPENED & IT NEVER EXISTED...end of story.

Despite some great sets and good photography this is one horrible film...is it supposed to be scary? (not in the least) is it supposed to be funny?? (puh-leese) A total waste of time...and I really don't like to have to say that!!

A bit violent and gory, this is an episode from TV mini-series 'Brivido Giallo' directed by Lamberto Bava.

A newly auditioned team of film aspirants is lured to the lavish lodgings of Dracula to be his guests. The formidable and filmy Dracula offers his guests a tough time in his big house with intricate dungeons till the time the clue to kill him is finally known.

Lamberto Bava must have made "A cena col vampiro" ("Dinner with the Vampire" in English) for fun. The plot follows some young people who get invited to a director's castle, only to discover that he's actually an ancient vampire who wants them to murder him. The movie contains typical '80s music and a butler whom one of the youths calls Marty Feldman (he seriously does look like Feldman).

The copy of this movie that I saw appears to be a copy of a copy. To crown everything, this copy even has Greek subtitles! As somebody fascinated by etymology, I always looked for words easy to recognize from scientific prefixes.

Otherwise, there's nothing really significant about this movie. George Hilton has certainly done better.

If in fact any Greek watched this copy, would s/he know who Marty Feldman was?

Dinner With a Vampire is a made for TV movie and it's directed by Lamberto Bava, so obviously you cant go into it expecting to see a film of the highest quality. While this is certainly not of the highest quality, for me the good ideas and interesting execution more than make up for that! I really can't say that I've seen every vampire film and read every bit of literature on the subject; and while I've seen similar ideas in other films, it really does have to be said that this is an original take on a subject that has been done to death - and you need at least credit the film with that. The film begins with a film crew that unwittingly unearths a one thousand year old vampire. Fast forward some years and the vampire is a successful horror film director who is holding auditions across the world for starring roles in his latest film. Four wannabe actors are chosen for the roles and make their way to his house - where they are informed that he is bored of his immortal life, and told that they have until dawn to kill him...or face a fate worse than death.

The film is really more of a comedy than a horror film, and it has to be said that a lot of the comedy is misplaced - although it does have some amusing moments. The lead role is taken by George Hilton - an actor I'm more used to seeing playing suave leads in Giallo's. He's actually really good here - he's aged a bit since the seventies and really looks the part as the bored vampire. Naturally, the rest of the cast is barely worth a mention, but really this is Hilton's show anyway. Lamberto Bava is not as great a director as his father, but he does know how to build an atmosphere - and the setting here is really great; a lavish castle with a cobweb filled dungeon! It's well used too, which is a good job since the bulk of the film takes place in it. The best thing about Dinner With a Vampire for me is definitely the way it handles the vampire legend; parts of it are kept and other parts are lampooned, and overall Bava succeeds in creates a mythology all of his own. The story boils down to something of a predictable conclusion; although the way that the vampire is killed is really good and it's a lot of fun getting there. The film will not appeal to everyone, and indeed it doesn't exactly have a great reputation; but for me the style and execution more than outweighs the flaws, and I would recommend this film to any horror fan!

The great master of horror movies from Europe, Lamberto Bava, really gets it going with this true-to-the-tone vampire NEW classic. The movie delivers it in great style with one of the most sexy vamps of all times, played by the beautiful Isabel Russinova, and classic vampire movies clichés, like the castle(a beautiful moorish/mediterranean one), the hunchback-like butler, the Christopher Lee alike main vampire. It sure ain't a movie that gets you scared, but if you're looking for fun and a Castlevania-like plot, this is the movie for you !

This film was disappointing. As a rule of my own, I never like comedy mixed with vampires - 99% of the time I think it fails, and does on this occasion. One slightly redeeming quality was the Dorian Gray sub-plot, but even this failed to help the film along.

Bloodless and not funny at all. One for collectors only.

Dinner with a Vampire (1988)

BOMB (out of 4)

Italian horror film about some actors who goes to an old castle thinking they're going to be filming a horror movie but instead they meet a vampire who just happens to be hungry. I think Lamberto Bava has taken some unfair heat over the decades due to him not being as great as his father but I think he has managed some good films and a masterpiece in Demons. This here is certainly the worst film I've seen from him, the worst Italian horror film from this period and perhaps the worst vampire film. I really, really, really hated this movie from start to finish and was ready to claw my eyes out by the time we finally get to the ending. The entire film is just downright stupid and corny from start to finish and I'm sure this was meant as a horror/comedy but neither aspects work. The laughs are lame and the horror silly. There's a few minor gore scenes but nothing to get worked up over. The performances are all bad as is the direction for Bava doesn't show any of the style he usually brings to a film.

You'd be somewhat hard pressed to find a saucier, more generously Parmesan sprinkled 80s shocker than Italian Horror maestro Lamberto Bava's gloriously Dolmio-drenched, dentures-of-doom goofy Gothic comedy 'Dinner with a Vampire' (1989) And rabid fangs of Giallo super-stud George Hilton will find much grisly goodness to sink their blood-soaked bicuspids into here! The cobweb-creaky creepshow 'Dinner with a Vampire' playfully serves up a deliciously decadent, all you can shriek B-Movie buffet by a truly refined master of midnight movie macabre! Maestro Lamberto Bava's triumphant transfusion of terrifically toothsome titters and timeless terror tactics remains a blissfully batty bonanza of plasma pumping perversity!

'Dinner with a Vampire' (1989) is a sinfully silly, super saucy, generously Parmesan sprinkled 80s shocker from stylish horror maestro 'Lamberto Bava' - Goosey Lucy@Buxom Bloodfiends.

'The tall, grisly-gorgeous, gum-happy, heroically handsome hedonist George Hilton is arguably one of 80s Euro-horror's more skin-prickingly suave bloodsuckers! - TerrorTampon @ SalonTitty.

'The deliciously high camp, Dolmio-drenched 'Dinner with a Vampire' is a goofy Gothic comedy in a jugular vein!' - 'Tor Bronson @ 'The Heroic Blood Shed'

This is one hell of a Great movie. All of the characters are nice in some way and the actors does a OK but most certainly not a excellent job. In a Scooby Doo like style the movie is more a comedy than a real horror movie, and for a change it works well. Some minor gore is also in here, including torn out hearts and gory skeletons but those scenes are not much worse than the ones in any Indiana Jones movie. What i like so much about it is that it have this Hammer feeling into it but yet it stays fairly fresh and never gets boring with some typical 80s feeling mixed into the blend. i definitively recommend this to all those who like cheezy Italian movies and horror comedies.

Here I was complaining about how Michele Soavi's The Church was lacking in that good old Italian cheese that flavoured the late-era horror films they were producing, so here comes Lamberto Bava to plunge me into a huge tub of molten Fontina. Just get a load of those auditions at the start, that's pure eighties fromage right there.

This one (a TV movie) is a kind of horror comedy which involves a lot of those staples required for an Italian horror film of the era. A creepy location, annoying youngsters running around, neon lighting, bad effects, and a low budget.

This one's even dafter than usual as it involves four would-be entertainers (including the worst comedian in the world this side of Jimmy Carr, a singer, an actress, and dancer Yvonne Scio – and for those out there with the Kleenex ready for Yvonne, hold onto your mess until you see Rutger Hauer's Armageddon – she's way too young here). They've all passed an audition and are now being invited to a famous director's creepy house, with a view to starring in his new film.

Things get strange right away when a boz-eyed hunchback lets them in, complete with a ludicrous, Nick Alexander dubbed voice. There's also a management type with Bela Lugosi's voice and a woman who seems to spend her time laughing at everything. That's nothing compared to the director himself, played by George Hilton (a man who is probably pinching himself to this day judging by the amount of nude scenes he had with Edwige Fenech), who promptly reveals that he's a vampire! George's proposal is this: His human side is bored of being immortal, and he wants to be killed. However, his vampire side doesn't want to die, and will spend the night trying to kill our four heroes. The night will either end with George dead or the four kids dead, and there's only one way to kill George, and it's not the traditional vampire slaying way… For a film that's set in one place and basically involves the youngsters running around, I wasn't bored for a second. George Hilton for instance is an old hand and kind of straddles the thin line between horror and comedy while prancing around in a cheap cape, while the kids actually come across as likable (the annoying comedian actually comes through as the hero in the end). There's a bit of gore (hearts being pulled out of chests etc), and some low rent Plasticine make up effects (like that show Trapdoor!). The ending makes no sense whatsoever and although the younger me wouldn't have liked that, it's now become a requirement for old, brain damaged me.

Going back to The Church, I'd say that film was a bit taxing on me due to the amount of characters, actual plot etc. Dinner with A Vampire is the kind of film where your brain goes into a low gear and is all the better for it. Next up: Fulci's Aenigma. God help me! P.S – How come George didn't cast a reflection in life but did on film? How did that chick go from being a vampire to not being a vampire? Was that guy in the end meant to be George? What happened to the henchman guy after he becomes a zombie? Next up: Fulci's Sweet House of Horrors. God's Kelpie!

DINNER WITH A VAMPIRE (1987, original title A cena con il vampiro) is one in a quartet of TV movies that Italian director Lamberto Bava shot in the late '80s as part of a package deal, the others being GRAVEYARD DISTANCE, UNTIL DEATH and DEMONS 3: THE OGRE. I got quite a lot out of this one, which is a typically cheesy vampire comedy about a group of actors who turn up at a castle to find that their new director is a vampire who's grown bored of life and wants them to kill him!

It's low budget stuff that alternates between a nice cobwebby crypt set and the genuine colourful interiors of a Moorish castle which looks absolutely fantastic. Things start off with the actors (including lookalikes of Winona Ryder, Linda Hayden and, er, David Milliband) watching an old silent horror about a Nosferatu-style vampire, with shades of Bava's own DEMONS, before they meet a suave Dracula-type later on for the titular sit-down. George Hilton, veteran of many gialli and spagwests, is the urbane bloodsucker, and there's a Dorian Gray-inspired twist late on in the proceedings. A little heart-ripping gore features along the way, but the emphasis is more on the jokes than the scares. I found it quite enjoyable in a low budget way.

A beauty vamp movie is a very different plot. It contains scary natural horror. It tells a story of a real vampire. The victim/s are subjected to become a vampire. It is a bloody show. The ending is a mystery. Like all horror.