If I were to list all the things I like, then both strippers and werewolves would probably be on there somewhere alongside low budget horror movies, so if there is any likely audience to appreciate this film, I’m it. So when I tell you that this is by and large a disaster, know that I do so with a heavy heart.

On paper, it probably sounded like a good idea. When stripper Justice (Adele Silva) kills horny werewolf Martin Kemp via a silver fountain pen to the eye in the first minute or so, it would certainly seem that the film is delivering what the title promises, but you are already suspecting the worst, given the cheap-ass off-screen werewolf transformation and truly awful makeup that has the lyncanthropes looking like slightly hairier rockabilly fans rather than terrifying monsters. Even a comedy werewolf should look better than this – I can’t recall seeing anything more pathetic in decades of werewolf movie watching. And while Silva looks suitably saucy in her school uniform, you already know that most of these strippers won’t be taking very much off.

Kemp, it turns out, is part of a pack of werewolf gangsters (of course), headed by Billy Murray (of course) who have already had dealing with strip club boss Sarah Douglas, and who swear revenge on his killers. And that’s pretty much it. There’s a sub-plot involving Simon Phillips as the vampire-hunting boyfriend of Goth stripper Barbara Nedeljakova, and pointless, painful diversions into the fumbling love life of gormless bouncer Nick Nevern and even more gormless stripper Dani (Ali Bastian), but otherwise, the film is pretty much the joke of the title stretched out to breaking point.

That needn’t be a bad thing, but the whole affair is as sloppily handled as the monster makeup. There are bizarre, ham-fisted edits (fades to black that play like TV commercial breaks and often don’t even allow a dialogue scene to finish properly) and pretty shoddy production values; there are too many bad actors delivering terrible dialogue (you’ll be wanting several characters to die just so you don’t have to watch them any longer) and a final showdown that is big on posing but short on actual action. And the whole thing feels rushed, or possibly butchered in post – Charlie Bond’s perky stripper-turned-magician (the only one of the strippers not to be annoying) wanders into the midst of the wolf pack but we never see what actually happens to her, while other characters seem to just fade from view. Director Jonathan Glendening barely seems to be trying.

But the worst thing is that the film isn’t funny. Now, I didn’t expect it to work as a horror movie, but the humour mostly falls flat (again – bad dialogue, badly delivered) with only the odd moment even raising a smile; and odd moments of straight-faced nastiness – a werewolf stamping on the neck of a naked, desperate, bloody woman for instance – seem completely out of place. Attempts to give the film a comic book feel (with cartoon graphics and a lot of split screen) don’t work either – especially when used to cover for the fact that the film couldn’t find enough actresses playing strippers to get their tits out.

There are pointless (apart from marquee-value adding) cameos from Robert Englund, Lucy Pinder, Steven Berkoff and an unrecognisable Lisette Anthony (not to mention journalist Billy Chainsaw, doing a better job in his few seconds of screen time than most of the leads), none of whom really add anything to the story (Englund effortlessly out-acts everyone else in his two minutes of screen time, making you wish he’s had one of the larger roles). And the soundtrack is excruciating – when Duran Duran’s Hungry Like the Wolf is the best song featured, you know you’re in trouble.

While not as awful as Kill Keith – another crude Brit horror comedy that this feels somehow connected to – Strippers vs Werewolves falls apart because it doesn’t deliver enough of anything in either quantity or quality – strippers, werewolves, horror and comedy are all under / badly represented here. It’s a nice idea, but it lacks vital energies, basic technical polish and a sense of fun. A wasted opportunity.

DAVID FLINT

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