Strippers vs. Werewolves

PLOT:

When Mickey, the member of a werewolf gang is accidentally killed in a strip club, the girls who work there have until the next full moon before his bloodthirsty wolfpack seek murderous retribution.

REVIEW:

A few years back, there was a film released called Strippers vs. Zombies starring Jenna Jameson. I have yet to see it all the way through, but from what I saw, it was good, campy fun. With Strippers vs. Werewolves (not in the same universe, as far as I know, for those wondering), I was hoping for the same kind of kitschy tone, but did I get it?

What is this about?

When werewolf chief Jack Ferris is accidentally killed in a strip club the girls who work there have until the next full moon before his bloodthirsty wolfpack seek murderous retribution.

What did I like?

Mythology. As much as vampire mythology has been turned every which way but right with every iteration that comes out, werewolves seem to have received the better half of that deal, if you will. In nearly every pop culture version, these furballs are killers who turn at the full moon and can be killed with a silver bullet. I have to give this film kudos for not straying from that formula, although the invincibility factor I had never heard of before watching this film. Since when were werewolves able to put themselves back together after being blown to pieces?

Pack mentality. Wolves travel in packs and in these packs there are sure to be different personalities? In this particular pack, we have a punk, soccer fan, horny fat/muscle guy, Alpha, and the “normal” one who gets the girl…supposedly. Despite the obvious differences, the pack functions as a band of brothers. When one of their own is missing, they spring to action to find him and extract revenge. I found myself drawn to this aspect of their personas, even if I didn’t agree with their reasoning.

What didn’t I like?

False advertising. Not to come off as someone who is letting his hormones do the talking, but in a film that has strippers as the main character, should there be some stripping? I think in this entire film, there were only 2 girls that showed any kind of skin, one was in a dressing room and the other was on a pole, which I believe was done just to placate the audience. Also, realizing that there wasn’t exactly a huge budget for this film, couldn’ the werewolves have looked like something other than bastard offspring of Eddie Munster? Surely we’ve gotten better with makeup since The Munsters, right?

Vampires. So, we have strippers, werewolves, and in some forgotten subplot there is a guy who fights supernatural beings and apparently broke up with one of the strippers. Not really sure how was that important to the proceedings, other than introducing him so he could show up at the end, but let me not get on a tangent. We also have vampires thrust in to the mix. Thankfully, they aren’t anything warring with the werewolves and seemed preoccupied with Van Helsing wannabe, but the fact that they were included serves no purpose. Now, had it turned out that the strippers were actually zombies, that would have been better, but alas, no dice.

Freddy’s dead. This film had two names to draw people in, Page 6 model Lucy Pinder, making her film debut, so we can’t be too hard on her, plus she only has like 3 lines of dialogue. The big name, though, was Robert Englund! Yes, Freddy Krueger is in this film, but we don’t even see him until the last 30 minutes or so and that is only for one scene, not counting a post-credits cameo. I question why they even bothered giving Englund a character if he was to be this underused.

With a title like Strippers vs. Werewolves, who would expect such a serious flick? I just got into a discussion about movies not being fun anymore since Christopher Nolan appeared last night, and this seems to be another example of a film that by all accounts should be a fun romp, but instead is nothing more than a bore. To me, it felt like a child who was full of energy, jumping around all over the place (that is the audience’s expectations), until they do something wrong, get in trouble and are grounded by their parents (what we experience after watching). No, I don’t recommend this to my worst enemy, unless they’re having trouble sleeping. Stay away! Far away!

1 out of 5 stars