#First bite podcast movie#
#First bite podcast series#

I have since revisited Love at First Bite and can see its many flaws. I especially liked the crazy antics of Arte Johnson as Dracula’s servant Renfield, the actor throwing himself into the role with wild abandon.īenjamin, Saint James, and Hamilton share a Bite It was the stepping stone for me between Sesame Street’s Count (always my favorite Muppet, as I secretly hoped one day he’d count the other Muppets on which he’d fed) and true horror killers like Freddy and Jason.

#First bite podcast movie#

This was a movie that made horror accessible to a 6-year-old. The movie didn’t intend it, but I must admit, I was slightly afraid of George Hamilton’s Dracula. His magical ability to transform into bats and dogs, and his thirst for blood, still held me in thrall. Now, just because I thought he was funny didn’t mean I wasn’t also in awe of Dracula, his immortality and powers. He didn’t want to slaughter innocents, he wanted to be reunited with his centuries-old-love! He wasn’t turning people into ghastly, zombie-like minions, he was feeding on winos and getting drunk off their blood! I understood this Dracula to be silly. Hamilton was sharing the screen with familiar faces like George and Weezie Jefferson (Sherman Hemsley and Isabel Sanford, respectively). The few times I would try to watch horror films - including Frank Langella’s Dracula from this same year - I needed an adult nearby to protect me from the “evil” radiating from the screen.īut in Love at First Bite - here was a Dracula I could handle. I would watch horror films through slatted fingers I could not bear to see the monsters but I also could not look away. To an imaginative young boy that thought is rapturous, and terrifying. It was as if seeing them would be like reading from the Necronomicon itself, opening me to a world of demons and monsters.

I was mesmerized by trailers on television for movies like Friday the 13th and Evil Dead. As I have mentioned in previous reviews, I have always been fascinated by horror. I was too naieve to really understand all the references to the swinging seventies, and the meaning of the word “kinky.” More, the social commentary about urban youth rehabilitation, psychiatry, and religion was all mostly lost on me. His quest is thwarted by Cindy’s psychiatrist boyfriend Jeffrey Rosenberg (Richard Benjamin), who also just happens to be a descendant of Dracula’s nemesis van Helsing.īarely in first grade, I was probably far too young to be watching Love At First Bite. The story tells of Dracula (George Hamilton) coming to (then) modern-day New York City to find his true love Mina Harker, who has been reincarnated as supermodel Cindy (Susan Saint James). The movie that did was a little George Hamilton horror spoof, Love At First Bite. And I cannot leave out Francis Ford Coppola’s mad masterpiece Apocalypse Now, which is certainly the most engaging and best-made film from 1979.īut while I always enjoy getting lost in the jungles of Coppola’s Vietnam, I didn’t see the film until adulthood, and it hasn’t shaped my life or my views. It’s not easy to choose a favorite film from 1979 - so many of that year’s films have influenced my life in one way or another, from The Muppet Movie, which solidified a love for the older-skewing Muppets, to Alien, which scared the pants off me (and Sigourney Weaver), to The Jerk (which may be Steve Martin’s finest ludicrous performance).

#First bite podcast series#

This series appears daily on the Venganza Media Gazette. In The 40-Year-Old Critic, Venganza Media creator and host Arnie Carvalho recalls a memorable film for each year of his life. 40 Year-Old-Critic: Love at First Bite (1979)