Written and Directed by Producer Adam Sherman, VAMPIRES OF THE VELVET LOUNGE brings together a slew of your favorite character actors in a meandering CGI heavy movie that you wish would do more with them.
VAMPIRES OF THE VELVET LOUNGE (2026)
★★ & 1/2 ★ OF ★★★★★ stars
I love vampire films and the Vampire genre. Even stuff like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, John Carpenter’s Vampires, Underworld, and Blade. I mention those films because a lot of your favorite characters from those films and universes find themselves in Adam Sherman’s VAMPIRES OF THE VELVET LOUNGE which hits theaters on March 20th from Strand Releasing. This film very much feels like a throwback to the ennui riddled vampire films of the 90s, like masks which was recently re-released. The sense of life as an immortal is long and difficult, but do is hunting down these monsters. Such is the life of Cora (played by Severance’s Dichen Lachman) – she hunts down vampires as channels Underworld’s Selene by way of Deckard’s Blade Runner. She works for a Watcher’s Council/Vatican type group who is represented here by Inception’s Tom Berenger. Her current mission is to spy on Countess Bathory (played by Mena Suvari) whose scheme us lure rich men to her absinthe bar via dating apps so she and her vampire companions don’t have to hunt anymore. Being that she runs an absinthe bar, she morphs into a green fairy to feed her would be victims who think they’re hallucinating as they die.
Their big score is a group consisting of tech bros played by Tyrese, Lochlyn Munro from Peacemaker and Blade’s own Stephen Dorff. Things go off the rails somewhat and Dorff ends up becoming one of the undead while Bathory ends up trying to control Cora and make her one of her thralls. Will Cora escape or find herself in league with the damned.
There is a lot going on with VAMPIRES OF THE VELVET LOUNGE and while there’s some great actors in here, the parts don’t really make a better whole. Dorff isn’t in the film long, but his character is memorable and has a good arc. You can’t say that about everyone in this film and the films distinctive look feels like there was an ambition beyond what they could produce. I would say this is a good throwback watch with your friends popcorn movie because there’s some so bad it’s good moments here, but there’s some choices here that just leave you scratching your head at times. The relationship between Subaru’s character and India Eisley’s vampire bartender seems like it would be the obvious mine to explore. There’s moments between them that channel ONLY LOVERS KEFT ALIVE but Eisley’s character is all over the place and that seems to be a script issue versus performance. The absinthe bar setting seems such a specific thing that it just feels out of time with the film and the plot about using apps to lure men to be turned into vampires seems current if it wasn’t also super similar to the dating connection plot of ONCE BITTEN. That being said, there’s nothing wrong with it being similar but it doesn’t really go anywhere. That also can be said of Lachlan’s Cora, who is sort of oversold as a badass but doesn’t really deliver too much in that department. There’s a lot of ideas here that seem cool but there’s too many and I don’t know if any of them gel. The films e ding seems to set up for a franchise, but also comes across as a non ending where we go through a lot with the main vampire and Cora and nothing is really resolved in the end.
That being said, there’s a lot of fun moments in the film. Scenes where vampires run down pedestrians just to get blood splattered on them. A fun modern version of Bathory bathing in blood with help from her familiars and Dorff fighting a vampire hunter in a graveyard while screaming his vampire name. If you like blood, and throwback video store horror visuals, you’ll likely dig VAMPIRES IN THE VELVET LOUNGE in theaters this weekend.