Witch (Brinke Stevens). When the two stop to assist a woman (in reality, The Witch) involved in an auto- mobile accident, they are persuaded to take charge of her daughter, Carmilla (Maritama Carlson), who then accompanies them on their journey. After sev- eral pit stops to permit Sapphic interludes between Jenna and Carmilla, it is later revealed that the final destination is Carmilla’s crypt, where the Fontaines and the General hope to dispatch her undead corpse and restore the general’s daughter to... some prefer- able state that is never specified. Given the fact that Jenna is at one point unable to distinguish between a bite wound in her thigh and the onset of her menstrual period, the prognosis is guarded at best. In addition to the references already mentioned, the film includes Jenna first encountering Carmilla in a dream, a gypsy and her dog companion sell- ing protective charms, multiple cons perpetrated by the Witch in furtherance of an agenda that is never made clear, a father who harbors uncom- fortable suspicions regarding his daughter’s sexual orientation, another dream sequence that attempts to recreate Georgia’s nightmare in BLOOD AND ROSES, and even, in the tradition of IN A GLASS DARKLY, a possible medical explanation for the entire affair. It is also, sadly, one of only two cin- ematic adaptations to acknowledge that Carmilla is not the only lesbian in Le Fanu’s novella.
Though obviously made by someone who read the novella with care, the film’s attempts at horror, humor, erotica, and action are all undercut by a weak script, absurd dialogue, sound effects literally stolen from video games, and miserable acting. But the final insult—as numerous angry 12-year-olds on
Amazon.com have pointed out—is that we don’t even get to see vampires fighting zombies. Carmilla’s appearance is as brief as it is unex- pected in Michael Goguen’s animated feature THE BATMAN VS DRACULA, which finds the Caped Crusader squaring off against the Lord of the Un- dead and his plan to establish a vampire kingdom in Gotham City. Carmilla Karnstein is here intro- duced as Dracula’s deceased bride (whose “blood- thirst rivaled even his own”) and her appearance is limited to a brief reanimation scene. Completely divorced from Le Fanu’s source material, the film’s revisionist depiction of Carmilla as both hetero- sexual and married now serves primarily as a re- minder that, just a few years before GLEE and Archie Comics’ KEVIN KELLER, it would have been unthink- able for a gay character to appear in an entertainment vehicle targeted to children. While Patrick Keith’s BLOODWINE is by far the best DTV production featuring Carmilla, it really has little to do with Le Fanu’s novella, relegating the char- acter to a cameo in what is essentially a two-woman
Melissa Johnson as Andrea, a Goth girl fond of Carmilla Brandy imported from Romania in BLOODWINE.
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