whatcha watching: love bites (1992)

posted 24 june 2023

horny rating: softcore

now, when it comes to gay erotica i'm most certainly an amateur. a novice. a noob even. i've watched pink narcissus and blank narcissus and that's about it. as for the gay vampire, i've read the route of ice and salt (quite good) and watched vampire boys (quite terrible). and obviously interview with the vampire in all its iterations. so my view is certainly surrounded by blind spots. i'm listening and learning.

still, i'll review this as i usually do with the lesbians.

love bites is a softcore gay romcom about a rookie vampire hunter and a vampire that is so very tall. look, i forgot everyone's names and there's no wikipedia page or anything for me to reference so bear with me. hunter is aided by a reluctant comic relief sidekick in his quest to kill his very first vampire, but the count doesn't really look like a threat and he is just so tall and handsome and lonely. also there's renfield to take the sidekick out of the way when needed, and the two also get paired up (all off screen).

i don't want to criticize the story or the acting too much, given that's not the point of the movie. i think they're both serviceable for a romcom, a genre i am not a fan of. but not even edging a little bit into horror territory is just wasteful. look, if your vampire themed softcore romance called love bites doesn't have blood in it… what even is the point here.

there's some fairly funny jokes here, mostly innuendo as you'd expect. it's thoroughly campy, as you'd also expect, so you never lose sight of the fact that this is just a silly movie. still, it's got some heart behind it. there are some sweet moments and stuff. it is a romance, and unlike vampire boys, one that i can see some appeal in. i can see why it might be sexy.

so let's get into that. i think there's poor payoff when it comes to eroticism here. the movie has basically three horny moments: 1) we start with hunter and some hunk he doesn't give attention to because he's too focused on reading about vampires; 2) a brief shower scene with the sidekick; 3) hunter and vampire sex, (fun fact, i have an autokey script triggered by that phrase that just puts out 'sex horror sex bat sex horror sex vampire sex bat horror vampire sex', and that i had forgotten about when writing this) which is more or less the climax of the movie (there's some stuff after it to wrap up the relationships). now, i'm not the target audience so yknow, as many grains of salt as you'd like, but i found the first two to be quite nonsexual / unsexy. like these are just some dudes with their thangs out. who cares.

while the hunter/vampire scene (the whole point of the movie) is pretty good, i just don't feel like it was enough payoff. idk, i think we lost a great deal with his (literal) defanging. i think he could still be made sympathetic even if he was an actual threat. it'd be sexier too. blood sucking is already basically softcore anyway, and then there'd be a reason for the movie to be called love bites plural. there's a single one. and it's not even by the vampire.

all in all, the movie is far from a must watch, but it's interesting anyway, and it's just a little over an hour, so like. idk. up to you.