Darkness Forums: Local Indie movie scene bites bigger audience - Darkness Forums

In 1995, when a motley crew of spring-green volunteers and a few old pros carted lights, cameras and costumes into a defunct Newport strip club, their aim was to make a silly, sex-crazed vampire movie that might sell a few copies on video.

Nine years later, that Z-grade horror movie, Vamps: Deadly Dreamgirls, has scored more commercial success than any other local feature made since.

On July 27, a two-disc DVD of the original and its sequel, Vamps 2: Blood Sisters, will arrive in video outlets nationwide, including Best Buy, MediaPlay, Hollywood, Suncoast, Tower and Virgin stores.

More important to the local arts scene is the influence of Vamps veterans.

"It became a breeding ground for a lot of the indie production going on around here," said producer Mark Turner, who used a number of Vamps veterans on his feature April's Fool. "Not that they set out to do it, but they really started the whole make-your-movie-on-video-however-you-can-get-it-done scene here in Cincinnati."

"For me, it was a chance to work with some people who were ... serious about their project," said Vamps crew alumni Jeff Dunn, who went on to direct an award-winning educational film as well as his own horror film, Zombie Cult Massacre. "They tried to do something more than a lot of people in the B(-movie) market, the ones who simply want a nice-looking box and don't care too much about what's inside."

http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/07/1..._sunlede18.html