Rockula

Rockula is a 1990 American comedy film directed by Luca Bercovici. The story centers on a vampire under a curse (the tagline is: "He's a vampire that hasn't scored in 400 years- tonight's the night!"). It was written by Bercovici and Jefery Levy. Dean Cameron stars as the vampire Ralph LaVie, Toni Basil plays Phoebe LaVie, Ralph's mother, and Thomas Dolby is the villain Stanley.

Bo Diddley has somewhat more than a cameo, as Axman, playing in Ralph's band, incidentally named Rockula. The Director of Photography was John Schwartzman, later the DP on Seabiscuit and Saving Mr. Banks.

Ralph Lavie (Dean Cameron) is a friendly vampire. He's 400 years old and still lives with his mother, Phoebe (Toni Basil), who is also a vampire. Ralph is living under a curse. After meeting Mona, the girl of his dreams, 308 years ago Ralph lost her after she was killed by her jealous boyfriend, a pirate. Since that time Mona has been reincarnated every 22 years, only to fall in love with Ralph and die under exactly the same circumstances (killed on Halloween by a rhinestone-peg-legged pirate wielding a giant hambone). Ralph, weary of the whole thing, vows to stay locked in his room and not meet Mona again until after Halloween, much to the chagrin of his sentient and libidinous reflection (another side effect of the curse).

Ralph meets up with friends at a local bar (including rock legend Bo Diddley) and once again recounts the story of his curse to them. Walking out into the streets he is hit by a car being driven by none other than Mona's latest incarnation, a local singer (Tawny Fere). Immediately warning her off him Ralph runs off, but a portentous dream reinvigorates him to try and save her life now that events have been set in motion. He goes looking for her and discovers a flyer with her band playing at a local club. When he goes to visit her, the two hit it off immediately much to the dismay of Mona's manager/ex-boyfriend, an eccentric mortuary owner named Stanley (Thomas Dolby). After Ralph is unable to adequately say what he does for a living, he states that he's in a band. Realizing that he actually is a decent musician after hundreds of years of piano and guitar lessons, he and his friends start the band Rockula, playing up his vampirism as the band's gimmick. Rockula's first gig is a success and the band quickly becomes a hit. Ralph and Mona start dating and even start collaborating musically, writing songs and filming a video together. Stanley sees this as a threat and seeks the council of a local Psychic, Madame Ben-Wa who reveals that Ralph is a vampire. He begins a plot to kill Ralph and cryogenically freeze Mona using equipment from his mortuary so he'll have her forever.