Dundead: Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Get set for the heart-pounding, adrenaline-soaked, explosive new film season Art of Action. Part of BFI's Art of Action, a UK-wide film season celebrating high-octane cinema, we're bringing a wide-ranging selection of the best-ever action titles to our screens, each including an expert introduction. 

Enjoy any three films from this season (excluding Kubo and the Two Strings, which is Donate What You Can) for the special price of £24 when you book them at the same time. Simply select your tickets and the discount will be applied automatically at the checkout

This screening will be introduced by Dundead Programmer Michael Coull.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer the television series was a pop-culture dominating phenomenon, rightly hailed as one of the most subversive, ground-breaking and consistently innovative television shows of all time.

Creator Joss Whedon wrote this film which was released some 5 years before Sarah Michelle Gellar would make the character the icon she became. In recent years, there have been serious allegations of misconduct by Whedon on the set of Buffy, and while his distinctive dialogue is on full display here, Whedon disowned the finished film, unsatisfied with director Fran Rubel Kuzui’s contributions. 

It is a complicated legacy, and there is a sad irony in the fact that Buffy the character has always heroically fought back against the predatory, exploitative and controlling behaviour of the male world, including in this film, while her creator was purportedly engaging in the very behaviours he claimed to stand against. 

It is a pleasure, then, that 1992’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer is a delight in defiance of the actions of one its creators.  

It may have been overshadowed by the series, but perhaps the film was just ahead of its time; many of the qualities that attracted such a passionate fan base are very much present in this film. 

Kristy Swanson is terrific as Buffy Summers, the lovable teenager thrust into a world of demons, vampires and the forces of darkness; she is funny, smart and deadly with a one-liner or a stake through the heart. Donald Sutherland is her ‘watcher’ Merrick, who introduces her to her destiny, while genre legend Rutger Hauer (Blade Runner, Hobo with a Shotgun) is having a whale of a time as head vampire Lothos, ably backed up by a very funny Paul Reubens (best known as Pee-Wee Herman) as his goateed henchman (forget Marvel, this is how you do a post-credit scene!). Amongst Buffy’s teenage peers is Riverdale’s Luke Perry as “damsel in distress” love interest Pike (their chemistry is very sweet), a young Hilary Swank, and Scream’s David Arquette doing what David Arquette does best.