A History of Vampires, Sex and Cinema

Vampires are inextricably tied with erotica. They are permanently young, beautiful, and have an innate desire to suck on you.

Throughout the past century we have seen the vampire myth develop from it’s origin; a queen who** bathed in the blood of virgins** to stay young; to the indisputable classic of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, to Buffy the Vampire Slayer and a vegetarian vamp who doesn’t burst into flames but rather, ahem, sparkles.

The blood-sucking fangers have been bad-ass, butt-kicking heroes; they’ve been old crumbly freaks who sleep in coffins; and they’ve been your fat neighbour next door who “must work the night-shift”; but what they all share in common is a dark, underlying sexuality that is irresistible to an audience. Which makes them the perfect platform to explore the most taboo of sexual subjects.

In Let The Right One In a 12-year old boy called Oskar falls for his mysterious vampire neighbour – a tragic, innocent, violent, genderless but feminine Eli. She in return is drawn to him when she witnesses him stabbing a tree with a knife, sensing that his imagination may be as bloody as her reality. Later in the film she climbs naked into bed next to him after a vicious murder. Seeing as her age is unknown, although she is permanently trapped in a child’s body, the sexual tension is at once uncomfortable and intriguing.

Kirsten Dunst also famously snogged Brad Pitt before she even hit puberty in the classic Interview With A Vampire. As Claudia, a woman forever trapped inside the body of a girl, she begins to** develop a sexuality that is insatiable**. This is true of the young boy in Near Dark, who wants to turn a human child into a vampire so that he can finally find someone who’ll have sex with him; and Jessica in HBO’s True Blood who *will remain a virgin for the rest of eternity*. Within these universes, feeding on the blood of humans becomes the ultimate sexual release, and this trend develops further in more modern vampire tales, where exchanges of blood and bites are at once fetishistic, animalistic, and spine-tinglingly sexy.

In the 21st Century there is no question that, sparkly vampires who are vegetarian and won’t have sex outside of marriage (not naming any names coughEdwardCullenSuckscough) aside, the vampire is still the sexiest other worldly beast in our zeitgeist. The popularity of True Blood and The Vampire Diaries, with sexually fluid characters, explicit sex and abundant blood baths, make this abundantly clear. So this Halloween, why not treat yourself to a particularly bloody weekend and re-discover the sexiest vampires on screen? I even compiled a handy list for you below. And you can always check out my homage to vampirism in “Can Vampires Smell My Period?”, my adult short film released last week that combines blood-thirsty night crawlers with menstruation and, of course, some damn good sex.

Only Lovers Left Alive, Jim Jarmusch, 2013

A Girl Walks Home Alone At Night, Ana Lily Amirpour, 2014

Near Dark, Kathryn Bigelow, 1987

Underworld, Len Wiseman, 2003

Queen of the Damned, Michael Rymer, 2002

True Blood, Alan Ball, 2008

From Dusk Til Dawn, Robert Rodriguez, 1996

Interview with the Vampire, Neil Jordan, 1994

Bram Stoker’s Dracula, Francis Ford Coppola, 1992

Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Joss Whedon, 1997

The Lost Boys, Joel Schumacher, 1987

What do you think? Did I miss anyone? Let me know in the comments below! And check out another vamp inspired confession on XConfessions here!