Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat (1989) – The Forgotten Vampire Western Comedy

If you thought From Dusk Till Dawn invented the vampire western, let me stop you right there. Before Tarantino and Rodriguez, there was Sundown: The Vampire in Retreat (1989) — a bizarre, hilarious, and strangely heartfelt cult vampire horror-comedy western that almost no one saw when it came out.

Why? Timing. The movie hit just as Vestron Pictures, the studio behind Dirty Dancing and a ton of cult horror flicks (Waxwork, The Gate, Chopping Mall), was collapsing financially. Sundown got buried, only to re-emerge decades later as a hidden gem for horror fans like me.

The Plot in a Coffin-Sized Nutshell 🧛‍♂️🌵

  • A desert town called Purgatory is home to vampires trying to live peacefully.

  • They drink synthetic blood instead of humans (basically the True Blood idea years early).

  • Enter a human family caught between “civilized” vampires and a rebel clan that still craves real blood.

  • Toss in Bruce Campbell as a bumbling Van Helsing and David Carradine as Dracula (yes, really).

  • By the finale, it’s vampire civil war, giant crosses in town squares, and one of the weirdest redemption twists you’ll ever see.

Why It Rules (And Why You Missed It)

  • The cast is stacked — Bruce Campbell and David Carradine bring campy charm.

  • It’s part horror, part western, part comedy — a genre mash-up that was too ahead of its time.

  • The “fake blood supply” subplot feels like a proto-What We Do in the Shadows.

  • The twist ending? Killer. Vampires finding faith isn’t something you see every day.

The Vestron Curse

By ’89, Vestron was bleeding money. The studio was known for giving us midnight-movie gold (Blood Diner, Slaughter High, C.H.U.D. II), but expensive flops like Highlander II tanked them. By 1991, they were bankrupt, and Sundown was one of the casualties.

Binge Rating:

Binge Now.
If you want something funny, campy, and different — this is it.

💀 Want more cult horror comedy reviews? Check out my latest Johnny Spoiler Podcast episode and YouTube breakdown where I cover Sundown, Rick Moranis in Spaceballs 2, and why AMC needs to rethink naming anything Down by the River.

👉 Listen to the full podcast here: https://www.bwpodcast.com/sundown-the-vampire-in-retreat-review-johnny-spoiler
👉 Stream cult classics with me on Paramount+: https://paramountplus.qflm.net/Ry9G3v

#Sundown #CultHorror #VampireMovies #HorrorComedy #WesternHorror #JohnnySpoiler #Vestron

1980s movies, blog, B movies, horror, horror comedy, horror movies, PodcastsBob E. LoggerComment