Written and directed by Taylor King, Super Hot is an indie vampire flick that harks back to the buddy comedies of the nineties. Watch as Star Wars-obsessed friends take on sorority house bloodsuckers in the ‘burbs. Think Kevin Smith’s dialogue-heavy ‘View Askewniverse’, like Mallrats (1995) or Dogma (1999), and you’ll get the idea. Geeks vs the world! Unfortunately, sarcastic wit can’t hide how reluctant Super Hot is to show its fangs.
Disgruntled with yet another rude customer, Jackie quits her job as the pizza delivery girl for Super Hot, opting to spend the last few weeks of summer with her best friends, Sam (Elijah Cooke) and Kevin (Coleson Berlin). She is also crushing hard on her friend Carmen (Sierra Michelle), which is problematic for two reasons. Firstly, Carmen has a boyfriend, Brad (Sam Watkins), and secondly, unbeknownst to anyone, she has moved into a sorority of vampires.
But I’m getting ahead of myself! Sensing that Jackie is feeling dispirited, Sam proposes a plan: Order a Super Hot pizza to be delivered to the sorority. Get Jackie her job back – for one night only – so she can be the one to deliver the pizza. Carmen will open the door excited to see Jackie (“I didn’t order a pizza!“), and invite her to join the party. What could possibly go wrong? We did mention this was a sorority of Nosferatu, right?
As sorority leader (and head vampire!), Monica (Lissa Carandang-Sweeney) hopes that their newest pledge will be the sacrificial virgin they need to resurrect Dracula himself! And if not, well… Jackie and her friends seem nice! Fortunately for our unlikely heroes, Warren (Nobuaki Shimamoto), a Japanese descendent of the Van Helsing, has been hunting the undead cult and will ‘try’ to keep Jackie and her friends alive.
Scribed with frequent references to nerd culture – everything from Army of Darkness to Gundam – Taylor King’s Super Hot is a love letter to cult fandom; a movie that, for better or worse, overindulges in the back and forth geekery between its lead characters. To quote Kevin Smith: “Nothing can be happening in a movie, and two people can be sitting in a room for the whole flick, and as long as the dialogue pops, it’s there“.
For Super Hot, this banter does indeed ‘pop’ at times, provoking a genuine smile, but this only serves to distract the audience from the movie’s ultimate sin. There is minimal visual style, hindering Super Hot‘s ability to generate suspense and sucking all excitement out of this creature feature (pun intended). SFX is also limited – a casualty of Super Hot‘s shoe-string budget – resulting in most of the action appearing off camera.
Fortunately, Super Hot‘s fairly inexperienced cast sink their fangs (puns!) into their respective roles – particularly Kandace Kale, Elijah Cooke, and Nobuaki Shimamoto – the final act teasing their return in the sequel, Van Helsing. Produced by Sean King, New Zealand Son Films has crafted a low-key, quirky indie comedy that is closer to Clerks than Fright Night. Despite a few disappointing bites, Super Hot has just enough topping to be a mildly entertaining slice of cult cinema.
Super Hot is available to stream via Prime Video now.
