VAMPIRE CLEANUP DEPARTMENT (2017)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *metaphysical*

In the world of VAMPIRE CLEANUP DEPARTMENT, everyone in Hong Kong knows that (1) vampires exist, and (2) there are official departments to exterminate the vamps and minimize the damage they cause.

College student Tim Chau (Babyjohn Choi) has no involvement with the "vampire cleanup department," though his parents were part of the VCD. Both were infected by vampirism and voluntarily slew themselves rather than becoming monsters; however, Tim's mother was pregnant with him, and before she died he was delivered, an apparently normal male infant.

Through a series of events the VCD learns that Tim has a side-benefit of his parents' infection: he gets bitten by a vamp but his blood gives him immunity to vampirism (which is treated as something affected both by modern medicine and Chinese exorcism beliefs). The reluctant young man is inducted into the VCD and is taught to use magical sigils and swordplay, with the sole goal of destroying vampire bodies and sending their souls on to the next life.

But during field training Tim accidentally has a lip-lock encounter with a young female vampire (Lin Min-chen), whom he names Summer. Summer, who initially seems zombie-like and incapable of affect, nevertheless follows Tim home like a lost dog, and he conceals her continued existence from the other members of the VCD. Slowly Summer begins to take on imperfect human traits and a romantic bond of sorts forms between the two of them.

There are a handful of fight-scenes throughout VCD, but the moments of comedy and romance are paramount, and in comparison to some HK comedy-romance of my acquaintance they're very well done. Tim's vampire slaying remains reluctant but it does indicate some filial feeling toward his lost parents, as well as loyalty to the living. Summer has only two brief moments in which she utilizes her vampire-powers to fight vamps menacing Tim, and there's only one major vampire threat in the movie. The romance is at once doomed but given a second chance of sorts, and though it's a familiar compromise audiences should welcome the satisfying denouement.