Stars: John C Reilly, Ken Watanabe, Josh Hutcherson, Chris Massoglia, Ray Stevenson, Patrick Fugit, Orlando Jones, Willem Dafoe, Salma Hayek
Running time: 109 mins
Rating: ★★★

NINE years ago the first Darren Shan Cirque du Freak book came out.

Since then, the series has been published in 37 countries in 30 languages. Now comes the movie, The Vampire’s Assistant, and the timing couldn’t be better – although the film could.

There’s a fascination at present for all things vampiric, whether teenage vamps in Twilight, sexy vamps in True Blood on TV or a sequel to the original Dracula book in print.

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The worrying thing about The Vampire’s Assistant is trying to fathom exactly what audience it’s aiming at, being too dark for young audiences and not bloody enough for horror fans. It risks ending up pleasing no one. Sixteen-year-old Darren (Chris Massoglia) and best buddy Steve (Josh Hutcherson) are normal teenagers until they stumble across a travelling freak show. Meeting a bearded lady looking like Salma Hayek would affect anyone but it’s vampire Larten Creplsey (John C Reilly) who changes young Darren’s life by offering to turn him into a vampire. Well, it gets you out of doing homework, even if you are undead.

Darren finds himself working alongside not only hairy Madame Truska but Patrick Fugit’s snake boy, Ken Watanabe’s Mr Tall plus the oddly, but descriptively freakishly named Alexander Ribs, Corma Limbs, Rhamus Twobellies and Gertha Teeth.

There’s a downside to being a vampire’s assistant as Darren finds himself slap-bang in the middle of a vampire war with vampanezes, led by soldier Murlaugh (Ray Stevenson) and corpulent Mr Tiny (Michael Cerveris).

They want to fight the other vampires with only peacemaking Gavner Purl (Willem Dafoe) ready to mediate betwen the two sides, but not until the special effects boys have had a field day conjuring up freakish appearances.