SOURCE: Thomas, Kevin. “In Carpenter's Vampires, the Genre Takes the Stake.” Los Angeles Times (30 October 1998): F22.

In the following review, Thomas criticizes the plot and direction of Vampires, calling the film “more trash than anything else.”

Twenty years ago John Carpenter came up with Halloween, which became a classic, but for this Allhallows Eve his savage horror comedy Vampires is more trick than treat, and more trash than anything else. It's so ludicrous—every scene is a sendup, intentionally or otherwise—that it would seem that Carpenter is making an all-out attempt at what he surely knows to be impossible: to drive a stake through the entire vampire genre.

At least Carpenter, who also composed the film's hard-driving score, proceeds with exuberance and energy. That's also true of his star James Woods, who sets the film's tone for sheer outrageousness as a manic, foul-mouthed vampire slayer in the...