I picked some kid friendly vampire themed movies for a list I did on my Letterboxd back in January 2023.
Vampire movies are such slippery slope to deal with. They are both simultaneously not meant to be for children and at the same time, meant to be metaphors for everything. Much the way fairy tales are. What this selection of movies manages to do, is fill some of the gaps between these book ends. With topics of believing in yourself and not falling into peer pressure, dealing with acceptance of others, dealing with divorce and blended families, dealing with being the new kid in the area, relationships and how we see ourselves.
We'll start with the Vampire Dog. The plot of this is fairly simple. A 500 year old vampire dog is looked after by the oldest family member in a particular family line. He's basically the family's heirloom. As his last caretaker dies, the dog ships himself off to the next living family member. The goofiness starts right off the bat, as the current family members have no idea he even exists. This brings us to our other main character, a teenaged boy who just wants to fit in at school. He ends up in the position of the traditional Renfield spot; as he has to find an endless supply of red jelly for the dog as well as help save his school. Our villain is a scientist in the beauty industry who not only wants to tear down the school for her own plans, but to get the vampire dog in order to use his dna for her products. This is a family movie with a simple plot and lots of slapstick laughs.
Speaking of slapstick...Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. Made back in the 1940's, with Bela Lugosi himself. There's not a ton to uncover here. Just the usual from the comedy duo. Dracula wants a new brain for the Creature and has decided to use one of them for it. It's a lot of running and hiding from the bad guys.
Mom's got a Date With A Vampire. Well, this one is charming on so many levels. After getting a divorce, a mother of two decides to start dating again. She meets the count and is instantly charmed and seduced. Little does she know he's Dracula himself. Her children and their friends end up hiring Van Helsing to help them fight Dracula and save their mother's soul.
The Little Vampire. We've got two versions of this one. One is the 2000 live action film, the other a 2017 animated remake. Both films are based on the television and book series from the late 1970's/early 1980's. Our lead character moves with his family to a new country and finds he becomes the target of some bullies. Meanwhile, a vampire child, stumbles across him one evening and sees him pretending to be a vampire. They quickly form a bond and it becomes a bit of a buddy comedy as the vampires need help to hide from a vampire hunter. Both the young boy and his new vampire friends are being bullied for who they are. In the live action version, the vampire family are just trying to be normal, while the human boy is trying to escape his loneliness.
The Hotel Transylvania films, in particular the first two; deals with fear of the unknown. Again, the idea that everyone just wants to fit in and find their chosen family. The first movie is about Dracula's fear of his daughter growing up around humans. Because of the way his wife died, he's become a recluse who does not trust the world. When his daughter becomes a teenager, she falls in love for the first time, and it forces Dracula to admit he's been afraid. In the second film, it deals with the idea of blended families, as now that Mavis has grown up and had a child of her own, she's introduced to her husband's family and their culture clashes.
Hocus Pocus. Now, right off the bat most people don't even think of this as a vampire film, but they would be wrong. Our witches are indeed vampiric in nature as they are soul-suckers and are effected by holy ground and the sun. This pulls right from folklore, which states if you are a witch or a werewolf in life, you are destined to become a vampire in death. This movie deals with being the new kid in town, being bullied because of being different, cultural clashes while dating, believing in yourself and not falling into peer pressure and the acceptance of others.
The two Munsters movies, both about twenty years apart; deals with relationships, family and how we see ourselves. In the first one Scary Little Christmas, Marilyn is trying to understand why she's having a hard time dating, and in the Rob Zombie version, it's a straight up rom-com. The joke that most often is used in the franchise is that Marilyn's dates are put off by her family; while in the 2022 film, it's the Count who's against Herman and Lily dating. Scary Little Christmas also has a subplot of Santa's elves not wanting to work because they feel unheard.
Just like most fairy tales, there is a lot of teachable moments in these family friendly vampire movies.
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