Lesbian Vampires in the Movies

I admit that I watched the appalling Lesbian Vampire Killers (2009) and was suitably disappointed. (And I unashamedly like terribly, B-Movie style films). Though I suspect it meant to be an ironic homage to early lesbian vampire movies, it ventured too far into celebrating them and became lad-mag fantasy.

But the article, ‘Why Lesbian Vampire Movies are Terrible (but Also Totally Amazing)’ is a more considered approach to this subgenre. As Sheridan Le Fanu’s Carmilla (1872) and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s ‘Christabel’ (1800) show, there is a long history of sapphic bloodsuckers. The success of the web series based on Le Fanu’s novella, Carmilla (2014-) also shows how this can updated and adapted with a contemporary sense of understanding regarding LGBTQ issues without resorting to tired fantasies involving the masculine gaze.