User reviews

I'm a huge fan of creature features, even the dodgy ones in which CGI monsters run amok and tear overacting cast members to pieces. Hell, I got a kick out of ATTACK OF THE SABRETOOTH and AZTEC REX, which is saying something. But VAMPIRE BATS, a sort-of modern-day version of NIGHTWING, turns out to be a deathly dull and completely senseless addition to the genre.

Originally shown on Halloween in 2005, this is a short TV movie which nevertheless feels like it goes on for ages. The entire production is padded with dull SCOOBY DOO-style scenes of the characters creeping around and investigating a series of mysterious murders. It's all routine and predictable as you'd expect. Oddly, this is a sequel, a follow up to LOCUSTS which also starred Lucy Lawless.

Needless to say that the acting is extremely bad, even from Lawless who would later go on to enjoy a mini career renaissance with her great role in the gory TV show SPARTACUS: BLOOD AND SAND. The special effects are a mix of silly CGI bat swarms and some slightly more convincing rubber models. One of the worst things about it is that there's no gore to speak of, no decent attack scenes a la THE BIRDS, just mindless, mind-numbing plotting with no wit, style or imagination. Give it a miss.

This made for TV film is about killer vampire bats but with an environmental twist.

Some college students get drunk and drugged, end up being attacked supposedly by wild animals but the college biology professor Lucy Lawless reckons its mutated Vampire bats caused by toxic waste in the river.

Lawless does her best with a lot of bland non entities. The CGI and special effects are below average and the action is boring with the bats being very selective as to who they attack.

A poor and rather silly film.

Aaron, Eden and Jason are back for another semester at Tate University in Louisiana. It is quite hot, so many of the guys and gals are showing off lots of skin as they have fun getting wet. The three students with lines want to party too, but in a different way. They all go to a party at night where there is drinking--and they do more than get drunk.

One of the students starts hallucinating and hearing weird noises. He even hears what might be bats.

Dr. Maddy Rierdon, who saved the world from locusts in another movie, teaches biology at Tate, and her husband Dan does as well. They are building a house, with the usual problems that causes, and their two kids need someone to take care of them while their parents are in school. That responsibility falls to the kids' Aunt Shelly, who likes to move things around even when Maddy and Dan have everything the way they want it.

Two of Maddy's students are arrested after another of her students is found dead. Maddy gets involved, but it's not just because she cares too much about her students. Her area of expertise allows her to figure out just why the student died the way he did (isn't this amazing!). It turns out the student has similar wounds to those found in dead deer in the area--and he has been completely drained of blood.

This may or may not be related, but Hank, the town's mayor, seems to be a little too friendly with Carbide, a company dumping toxic wastes.

The party animals find a new place for their next event--the steam tunnels under the campus. Their guests, as it turns out, include bats. In fact, Maddy and Dan also attend a party--a much more dignified one--and guess who also shows up?

Maddy comes up with a plan for getting rid of the bats. It's not perfect, but it might work. And her students are all too willing to help. Several solutions to the problem are found--all pretty unbelievable and none quite ideal, but entertaining nonetheless. Especially since the wildlife officer doesn't completely support Maddy's efforts.

I didn't see a lot of good acting in this movie, but Lucy Lawless seemed to do quite a good job in class as she explained to her students what was going on. Brett Butler did the best job as the annoying Shelly, who was nowhere near as caustic as the "Grace Under Fire" character, which I never saw except in clips.

The story wasn't all that scary. Most of it was investigation and problem-solving, which turned out to be enjoyable if not all that realistic. Maddy and her students would have to be absolutely brilliant and incredibly lucky. As for the bats themselves, I have to wonder why they were so selective with their targets and with their lairs. I didn't care for their ugly faces or the graphic violence (which probably lasted all of 15 seconds). Another thing: we are lucky rabies symptoms don't appear as quickly as they apparently did here. Once there are symptoms, there is no hope.

Maddy's students included Lizzie (Robin Hines), Eden (Jessica Stroup), Aaron (Brandon Rodriguez), Keith (Andrew Matthews) and Miles (Josh Segarra).

Overall, I found this enjoyable.

I personally wouldn't go as far to say that Vampire Bats is a great movie. However I don't think it is a terrible movie either, I have seen far worse. There is a predictable story that is not particularly scary that felt half nature gone amok and half of a derivative Scooby Doo episode, a cheesy and overly-talky script that is full of ludicrous scientific motivations, clichéd characters and the final scene was unnecessary, feeling tacked on. However, it doesn't look too bad a movie, the locations are great and the editing is much better than the slipshod quality I was expecting. The music is decent, adding a bit of atmosphere, and there are a couple of scenes that did make me jump if never really terrifying me. The vampire bats are reasonable, they are used more effectively than other creatures in other movies with similar if not completely identical ideas, and while not realistic they are less hokey in design than I thought. The acting is uneven, with Lucy Lawless who is actually good the best of the lot. Dylan Neal is a non-entity sadly and Brett Butler comes very close to overdoing it. All in all, not a good movie but there are far worse movies out there. 5/10 Bethany Cox

In this made-for-TV film, a group of freshman college punks get drugged up at an underground party, and ended up being attacked by violent bats. This leads to an investigation by biology professor Maddy Rierdon (Lucy Lawless), who discovers that the creatures are mutated vampire bats, threatening to the town.

There are some average-rated action, including all the scenes of investigations, bat attacks and residents fleeing for their lives. Other than that, everything else was batty. The cast of characters didn't have much acting abilities, save for Xena star Lucy Lawless; the overall plot lines were not exciting; there were lack of scares and suspense; and the movie had an illogical messaging (especially the environmental elements).

Overall, it is a pretty predictable but unexciting film, with no suspense built-up.

Grade D

In Mercier, Louisiana, the freshmen friends of the Tate University Jason Ortiz (Arnie Pantoja), Aaron (Branson Rodriguez) and Eden (Jessica Stroup) go to an underground party in the woods nearby the local cemetery. They drink the punch spiced with ecstasy and completely drugged, Jason is attacked and killed by violent bats. When the police finds the body, they arrest Aaron and Eden as prime suspects. However, their biology professor Maddy Rierdon (Lucy Lawless) sees the corpse and advises that the youngster had been actually bitten by animals. When Maddy catches bats using a goat and a net, she realizes that the animals are mutant vampire bats with extra fangs and that the modification of the breed was caused by the water dumped by Carbide Waste Resources in the river. While a group seeks the lair of the bats and a means to eliminate them, Maddy discloses corruption in the town.

"Vampire Bats" will never win an Emmy but it is a pleasant entertainment. The Brazilian title of the DVD induces the viewer to horror genre and I believe the target audience is never reached. The story is actually an adventure and if the viewer watches this movie with minor expectation, he or she may find a nice surprise. There are some usual flaws and clichés in this film, but there are also good and funny moments. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Morcegos - Assassinos da Noite" ("Bats - Night Killers")

Make no mistake, this absolutely comes across as the TV movie that it is, and one of the classic "nature run amok" variety. All the staples of the genre are here: one big star (Lucy Lawless) and other names of varying renown; a small number of experts, town officials that try to downplay the danger, and a large host of nobodies to become victims; themes of environmentalist warning signs, official corruption, and/or capitalist malfeasance; a ham-handed ending. Scenes of social gatherings of any size ride a line between setting the stage for a bloodbath, and just padding out the length. Having been made in the early 2000s, 'Vampire bats' treats us to further common elements thereof including overzealous editing or camerawork as a substitute for judicious storytelling or film-making, annoying pop rock and nondescript EDM, obnoxious college students, and the like. None of this is to say that this feature is wholly bereft of entertainment value, but we've seen this movie before, and we can reasonably ask what cause we have to see another.

For what it's worth, this is well made such as it is. The effects are fine, including blood, gore, and special makeup, and the production design that adjoins the swell filming locations. The cast perform well, I think, with the material they have to work with. Any "action sequences" or moments of violence come off well enough. There are, truly, no surprises in Doug Prochilo's screenplay, nor in Eric Bross' direction, but both demonstrate competence in their work. 'Vampire bats' never quite achieves any especial thrills or impact, but it's suitably enjoyable - which is, in fairness, more than can be said for some of its brethren. There are better examples of the genre, by all means, but apart from noting the typical inelegance or heavy-handedness we expect from such titles, the worst that can really be said here is that it's perfectly in keeping with its cousins - which is to say, average. Unless you're a big fan of Lawless or someone else involved there's no reason to seek it out, but if you happen to come across it or want something low-key to pass the time on a lazy day, well, 'Vampire bats' is fun enough to satisfy that want, and maybe that's all it needs to be.

If you are looking for a well done movie normally found on cable look no further. This movie was made for Haloween and they didn't have the biggest budget, AND was well written and acted. There where several minimal choosy scary scenes. There was fairly, thought out and great scenes that carried this movie in a singular directions This was more psychologically scary with minimal bloody cheap shot scenes, one quickly knows the major cause and evil are man drinking blood suckers i.e. the vampire bats, hence the movie name. The surprise are the few human blood suckers who dump things in the water they shouldn't! Sorry I can not tell you more just see the movie it is entertaining. Not a Oscar winner but worth your time. Anyway I can't remember any Oscar nominated scary movie let alone a winner. Enjoy, Brian bcpmd

The dialogue of the college-aged characters towards the beginning of this made for TV film captured my attention. The group, which tended towards the Gothic or nerd type of college stereotype, spoke like real people.

The pacing and editing was above par for a TV movie, and the fact that Lucy Lawless does not age continues to confound me.

I Tivoed this movie, and because of the Sunday time-shifts from the afternoon NFL games, I missed the last 15 minutes of the film. I hope to catch it the next time it is run. Ideally, I will not have to wait until next Halloween.

This movie, with a little more money and the proper advertising, could have been an acceptable movie theatre offering. OK, maybe another A/B list lead to counter Lucy Lawless would be necessary, but the basics of an intelligent, somewhat thought-provoking movie are firmly in place with Vampire Bats.

Found this film very entertaining and horrifying with a real close up to a bats face and horrible teeth and angry looks. These bats had a devil looking way of dealing with humans and animals. It took quite a while before some of the local people and mostly college students discovered the fact that bats had taken on an aggressive attitude to loud, wild music and were mostly turned on to red hot blood flowing humans. Lucy Lawless,(Maddy Rierdon), gave an outstanding performance and showed off her great body form. There was lots of wild parties and plenty of young gals and guys getting really spaced out. One girl started foaming at the mouth in class and caused a great deal of gasps in the classroom. Great film and lots of fun to watch, especially the Vampire Bats!

BAD, BAD, BAD ! I can't stress this enough. I know t.v. movies suck, but this... The actors who played the students should look for work in a paint factory, cause watching that dry would have been a much better use of my time. This could have had something, but it was handled poorly. Even the lead actors were very boring. It felt way to padded. It could have run at about one hour. That to would have been to long. I don't know why Xena would get hooked up in this. The ending was so bad, even a 5 year old could guess what was going to happen. I was sort of looking forward to this, but was let down, way down. Next Halloween leave this in the guano where it belongs and choose something with some real bite !

Vampire Bats, a made for television Lucy Lawless horror movie, is quite a passable time waster. Interesting enough but you might struggle to recall much of it a day or two later.

Nightwing, Bats, Bats: Human Harvest, The Bat People - has there ever been a truly good movie about bats? Don't dare suggest Chosen Survivors as being an OK bat movie. It's only OK by comparison. Vampire Bats is better than some others but as we have acknowledged, the bar is not set too high.

Director Eric Bross has his cast well in hand and keeps the action ticking over. Production values are at the better end of the 'made for television' spectrum. Lucy Lawless is easily up to the job.

The plot is just a little cliched even down to the environmentally irresponsible local official but there are enough twists to maintain interest. Without giving too much away, a scientist, Lawless, gets caught up in the investigation of several unexplained deaths in which some of her students are implicated. She does add up two and two pretty quickly but as her characters says, she does have PhD in biology.

The actual vampire bats are a combination of real bats, CGI and practical effects. They are quite credible as 'flitter mice'. Vampire bats are literally flying rodents, well, all bats are, and they are portrayed as being ugly, blood thirsty and generally disgusting which they sort of are. It's the bloodthirsty aspect which is exaggerated in this movie. Bross handles the gore aspects, the actual human attacks, well. There is enough blood and brutalized flesh to get the movie over the horror line but remember that it is made for television.

The first major bat attack sees parallel scenes of a kids rave and an adult soiree. Bross is trying. Writer, Doug Prochilo, pens non-cringeworthy lines though he did a marginally better job in Locusts, the precursor to Vampire Bats also starring Lawless.

All in all, Vampire Bats adds nothing to the bat movie sub-genre but it is a palatable 85 minutes of entertainment.

After a rash of strange deaths, a teacher in a small Louisiana college town comes to believe that the strange deaths are the result of a strain of vampire bats mutated from released toxic waste and must try to find a way of stopping the creatures from further spreading throughout the area.

This here turned out to be quite the enjoyable and entertaining effort. One of the better parts to this one is the fact that there's much more to the main storyline on display here, and makes for quite a stronger story than expected. The first half where the police being the investigation into the first accident and let the murder investigation turn into the initial realization of the bats being the culprit before turning into the investigation of their appearance there. That does lead into this one managing to feature some rather impressive action scenes here once they do learn of the creatures as the first attack on the boat-bound fisherman comes off rather well, the rather impressive double-attack where the bats simultaneously attacking the ferry's party and the rave at the same time which is rather fun how they're cross-referenced in order to play out at the same time and the chilling night-time sequence in the pool where the teens are attacked while trying to have a date- night in the pool are all quite chilling here. The finale is also quite fun with the confrontation in the church with the bats and their attempt at getting the bats to leave gives this some rather enjoyable fun to give this a high-end finale. With some solid- looking bat puppets used for their scenes, it looks quite nice overall. While these here are quite fun, this one does have a few minor issues against it. The film's biggest issue here is the fact that there's just not a whole lot of screen time with the bats in here, though there's some rather nice scenes of them here. There's several factors that hold up the pacing, with a large part of it due to the film's incessant and rather overlong explanation scenes where they go about tending to the kids and how they go about finding the different rationalizations that bring the bats to their attention, and it really seems to keep the attacks to a minimum while really figuring on the extended downtime here to this one. Being filled with the kinds of scenes that really just holds the creatures to these few scenes and really focuses on the other elements which is where the main problem with this one lies. Likewise, the fact that this one goes for the environmental cover-up in the second half is another rather strong factor in this one which really doesn't need to be here and really stretches this one out on bat-attacks as well as going for quite a clichéd plot line. As well, there's also the rather big issue with the CGI featured, which is quite a rather large issue here with the utterly terrible scenes in here showing their flight through the air or the plainly bad sequences of the multitude of creatures in one scene. These here really manage to hold this one down.

Rated Unrated/PG-13: Violence and Language.