I AM VIRGIN

Tagline: "One lonely man, six billion sex-crazed vampires. Be careful what you wish for!"

Well, there's the premise for this I AM LEGEND spoof above, in a nutshell. The only other thing to perhaps take heed of is the little lettering on the back cover telling us this is "a Cheezy Flicks production" ...

Over the opening titles, a montage of TV riot footage with breathless broadcasters' voiceovers shows how the world became such a barren and desolate place: a virus wiped out most of the population, causing mass hysteria in the process.

We then cut to "Three years later", and a few unexpectedly eerie daytime shots of empty city streets, not unlike the opening scenes to 28 DAYS LATER.

It's here that we meet twenty-something Robby (Adam Elliott Davis), getting caressed and kissed by four randy chicks. He addresses the screen and admits that he is one lucky bastard. But how'd he get to be so lucky? He offers to tell us, and we rewind a short time to find pre-stud Robby and his Bassett hound Billy traversing the empty land in their Cherokee in search of life.

With his trusty rifle in hand, Robby ventures in to seemingly deserted hometown Portland and begins to have a nosy around. Exploring a darkened building, he's delighted to stumble upon three heavily tattooed girls who he spies on while they engage in a prolonged lesbian clinch. But when the girls are finished pleasuring each other, they clock Robby and threaten to ravage him. Terrified, he sprints away. "Come back," one of the harlots cries, "I wanna suck your cock". Fool!

Instead of letting them have their wicked way with him, he flees home and converses with the only girl he's ever been intimate with - a purple blow-up doll (a female alien with one too many tits). Robby's happier home alone (well, with trusty Billy constantly at his side) where he can keep up to date with his video diary and read porno magazines.

In the meantime he suffers upsetting flashbacks of his parents preaching to him about the sins of the flesh and how schoolwork is all that's important, which help to explain why he's never had the pleasure of a real woman. Robby, at this point in the film, is a virgin who still clings to the prospect of saving himself for the right woman.

Gradually becoming more at ease with life among the zombies (actually, they're sex-crazed vampires - but it's all academic), Robby continues to trawl the streets by day searching for food and cheating on the crazy golf course, and enjoying candid conversations with his triple-breasted pal on an evening.

But how long can he resist the temptations of a horde of local female vampires, all of whom have been driven to insatiable dementia by the mysterious virus? They all want Robby's cock, but if he gives it to them he's doomed to turn into a vampire himself. So ... what's his problem?!

I AM VIRGIN sounds dumb and cheap. It's certainly a very low budget, shot-on-digital film and undeniably exists as a quick cash-in on I AM LEGEND. A soft-core comedy version, no less. By all rights, it should be shit.

But Sean Skelding's film is actually pretty good in its own way. It's well shot and proficiently edited, while the pace rarely lets up and the script - co-written by director Skelding and David Wester - has its fair share of amusing lines.

What impressed me most about the film was how stylish it frequently was, and how Skelding has strived for atmosphere in many scenes - eschewing the facile humour I'd anticipated in favour of quite a lot of subtle gags that are complemented by considered visuals and some ambient use of coloured lighting.

The films major drawback is the several scenes of soft-core sex, which tend to drag on a little in a Seduction Cinema manner.

Porno legend Ron Jeremy turns up later in proceedings as the vampires' ringleader, adding more bad acting to the already rum performances. It matters not, as I AM VIRGIN is often cheesy enough to benefit from lousy over-acting. Luckily the one cast member who's on the ball throughout is the more reserved and likeable Davis, who lends gravity to the films more sober, haunting moments.

FX are dodgy for the most part, but some ropy-looking corpses still manage to illicit an odd chill.

Ever so slightly schizophrenic in tone (Is it a sex film? A comedy? A horror?), I AM VIRGIN is nevertheless good fun if you're willing to overlook the low budget and above shortcomings.

The film is presented in a surprisingly good anamorphic 1.78:1 transfer. Colours are bold without bleeding, while the digital origins are rendered well into a clean and sharp presentation that is happily free from noise or artefacting.

Incidentally, this disc presents the film in its unrated version, a full 12 minutes longer than the R-rated theatrical cut.

The English 2.0 audio is clear and consistent from beginning to end.

The disc opens with a static main menu page that leads into a static scene-selection menu allowing access to the main feature via 20 chapters.

Weirdly, none of the disc's extras are listed on the cover.

First up is an audio commentary track from Skelding and Davis. Skelding sounds a little like Bill Lustig and offers a healthy amount of information while sounding sincere about his love of role models I AM LEGEND and THE OMEGA MAN, discussing with ease everything from the principals of his own "buddy movie" to Jeremy's appearance on-set for the final day of shooting, and the ins and outs of shooting gorgeous women in various states of undress. Davis hovers in the background, drawling occasionally when prompted by Skelding. It's a decent track though, fluent and reasonably engaging.

An eight-minute Making Of featurette entitled "T&A Of Darkness" is narrated by the main feature's second assistant director Adam Thompson, while a succession of behind-the-scenes footage and stills play out above a rock soundtrack. This doesn't add much information-wise (the scripted narration is rife with corny one-liners like "the weather was hot and the chicks were hotter") but at least we get to see a lot more of the "hot vampires".

Finally, we get trailers for other titles from Independent Media Distribution: a full trailer for the disturbing PENANCE, and then a five-minute promo reel that takes in CRIMINAL DESIRE, DEADLY RECKONING, NO REST FOR THE WICKED, MY EX-GIRLFRIEND'S WEDDING RECEPTION and TEXAS TALIBAN. Classics one and all, I'm certain.

I AM VIRGIN is cheap, derivative and arguably pretty pointless. But it's also a lot more fun than any Will Smith film I've ever seen and is frequently more stylish than I'd have ever imagined. It's hard not to like.

Review by Stu Willis