Films such as this, simply made and at low cost, can go either way as to insult your intelligence or titillate your senses of fun and humour. This particular genre, the British independent film genre, is taken to lower levels and with good company such as "Psychomania" aka "Death Wheelers" (1973) that rolls along with Nicky Henson, Beryl Reid (1919-1996) and George Sanders (1906-1972), joining the shenanigans "Come Play with Me" (1977) has Mary Millington (1945-1979) jumping on more than the band-wagon, too, Johnny Vegas and Mackenzie Crook in the half-baked "Sex Lives of the Potato Men" (2004) and the whiter-than-white "The Calcium Kid" (2004) delivered to us by a young Orlando Bloom making an all too disinvite crease in this celluloid bargain-basement bin genre.
It's all been done before; the highest example for this accolade is the winning team of the exceptionally successful English comedy franchise the "Carry On..." films (all Pinewood Studios shot) spanning thirty years (1958-1978). For decades this British tradition of slap-stick, innuendoes, double entendre and low-brow wit regurgitated as it may feel never feels drawn-out but is highly additive cinema indeed; it's a language all of its own.
"I Bought a Vampire Motorcycle" is no different, but it tries its hardest not to excluded itself from this pile. It fits into all the niches that brings this into the fold. On the surface this comes over as rather unsophisticated and that is exactly what it is. It holds no punches set against its downfalls of low budget production and simpleminded script. Saying this, this does not make for a poor, dull and unoriginal score. Bearing in mind its premise is extremely original and this is its draw and fascination.
A British Norton Commando motorcycle inadvertently becomes the harbinger of death and commands a thirst of a bloodlust that brings laughs from the bottom of the barrel to casually float to the top with the classic British one-liner technique. While not smutty, its sarcasm and target-audience clichés hold up the lowest common denominator and delivers its strength and keeps the stakes deeply pushed into the heart of this quirky little motor with a few nuts & bolts of its own to give this production a slant of personality.
To surpass beyond the pale of barrow-boy antics we see that the pièce de résistance is most definably the art of the cameo. Here we see film and television personalities as Burt Kwouk (1930-2016) "The Return of the Pink Panther" (1975) etc, "Tenko" and Ed Devereaux (1925-2003) "Skippy" plus a unusually cast, but a undeniably surreal highlight, Anthony Daniels "Star Wars (1977) as a trike riding priest to raise an eyebrow of intrigue and surprise.
This is certainly a film of night or day, with such a captivating title as "I Bought A Vampire Motorcycle", it draws you in to entice you to its curiosity. Being what it is, it holds no pretentious misgivings as to what you are getting. You may reach the fork in the road and on seeing this you may, you can, then decide if you were humoured or simply taken for a ride.
