The film begins with a teenage boy named Jeremy Capello, who is having a dream about making love with different girls. But it ends badly with him getting in trouble for going into the girls’ locker room.

Jeremy wakes up and goes downstairs for breakfast with his parents. Then his best friend, Ralph, comes to take him to school.

While there, a girl named Candy Andrews has her eye on him. But Jeremy is particularly interested in this girl, Darla Blake. However, Darla feels uncomfortable when Jeremy stares at her.

Jeremy has been having bizarre nightmares about a strange woman seducing him. He doesn’t understand why.

Sometime later, he is delivering groceries for his job. When he gets to a particular home, it feels peculiar and even haunted, especially with a noisy black cat.

Then a lady named Nora, dressed in goth lingerie and heavy make-up, invites Jeremy to do her. Jeremy then gets very intimate with her. Not only that, but Nora also bites his neck.

Meanwhile, Ralph is outside, aware of what Jeremy is doing. Aside from him are two strange men, who barge into the home and try to hurt Jeremy. With no time to get dressed again, Jeremy wraps the blanket around him and escapes with Ralph, who drives him home.

The next morning, Jeremy experiences a lot of differences than before. His face is pale and he has lost his appetite. His mom won’t even understand how he’s not hungry for breakfast. She also assumes that he’s sick due to his face pigmentation fading.

Regardless of those changes, Jeremy refuses to acknowledge or accept that he’s no longer a normal person. He is now a vampire, although no one has told him at this point.

Throughout the day, a strange man observes him. Later, he goes into Jeremy’s room and introduces himself as Modoc. He reveals that Jeremy is officially a vampire and all the traits that come with it, such as a lack of appetite, paler face, hatred of garlic, sensitivity to sunlight, and a taste for blood. Yet Jeremy denies those reasons for him being a vampire. He still refuses to believe that.

On the bright side, Darla develops interest in him. She will even date him.

However, Jeremy’s parents notice that he is acting weirdly and that worries them. Ralph tells them that it’s romance related.

Jeremy is out to dinner with Darla. But something stresses him out to the point where he drives away and leaves Darla behind. The poor girl is now heartbroken and in tears. Her friend, Gloria, who never liked Jeremy, reassures him that he’s not worthy.

Mortified by how he left Darla just like that, Jeremy tries to convince her that he’s sorry and to give him another chance. But she refuses.

If that’s not bad enough, Ralph is now in danger thanks to an evil vampire hunter called Leopold McCarthy and his assistant, Grimsdyke. They assume that he is the new vampire and they try to abduct him to kill him.

What will happen next?

I was surprised how much this movie kept me engaged. It was likely because of the fast pacing and quick scene-switching. The film itself is not even an hour and a half long.

But besides those reasons, the movie had a lot of strong elements. One was the concept. I admired how an adolescent boy became a vampire but wanted to be a normal human. He also did not look or dress like Dracula, similar to the vampires in the Twilight saga, which of course came out many years later.

Jeremy was very likable and relatable when it came to trying to live as a teenage boy. He had feelings for girls but also had to adjust to being a vampire. And the actor who played him was only 18—which is young, compared to lots of other films from that time, where teenage characters were (and still are) played by actors in their 20s.

The worldbuilding was also strong, even though it was pretty small since the setting was modern-day (as of the 80s) America. Although Nora was a minor character, I will admit that she was good, too, as was Ralph, Mr. and Mrs. Capello, Darla, and others.

Even though I was never a vampire story fanatic (Twilight didn’t work out for me, either), I did enjoy learning about the features of them and how Jeremy’s life was going to change. One aspect that intrigued me was how those who became vampires while they were alive differed from those who turned into vampires after they died. For instance, only vampires who were revived avoided the sunlight completely.

As with any good film, the tension levels remained high throughout. Twists and turns occurred, as well.

Overall, I enjoyed My Best Friend is a Vampire. Note that even though it is rated PG, it’s got profanity and sexual content. If it came out today, it would have been PG-13.

Anyway, I give this film 5 out of 5 stars.