A supernatural kung fu romcom designed as a vehicle for the manufactured pop duo, Twins, made up of singers Charlene Choi and Gillian Chung. Emperor Group bring out the big guns for Twins’ first action outing, recruiting Donnie Yen as co-director and fight choreographer – who gets to channel his experiences on Blade II in another gothic vampire setting – and none other than Hong Kong movie royalty himself, Jackie Chan, who appears in two extended comedy routines and joins Twins to sing the theme tune. The inclusion of both Jackie and Donnie (who had previously worked together in Hollywood on Shanghai Knights) highlights just how much Emperor were willing to invest in this horror-fu caper – not to mention the special effects budget – at a time when Hong Kong was losing clout as the action movie capital of the world, with much of its domestic talent relocating after finding fame in the west. Donnie makes sure the trademark Hong Kong style is still heavily in play during the film’s many exciting, insane fight scenes, and he does very well to get great physical performances from Twins in the final reel. Much of the film, however, is a lot gentler, dealing in a ménage à trois narrative in which new vampire hunter Gypsy (Gillian Chung) falls in love with her sword-slinging mentor and veteran fang-slayer, Reeve (Ekin Cheng), while his slightly irritating sister, Helen (Charlene Choi), rather awkwardly falls for sophisticated bloodsucker, Kazal (Edison Chen). Kazal turns out to be a prince in possession of a key which can unlock some mad powers, which is targeted by a troupe of evil European vampires, and all hell breaks loose. The film is too erratic to convincingly connect with any of the relationships at the heart of the film, but as bright and breezy popcorn fodder, it works rather well.

AKA: Vampire Effect.