ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Joseph Perry writes for the film websites Gruesome Magazine, The Scariest Things, Horror Fuel, The Good, the Bad and the Verdict and Diabolique Magazine; for the film magazines Phantom of the Movies’ VideoScope and Drive-In Asylum; and for the pop culture websites When It Was Cool and Uphill Both Ways. He is also one of the hosts of When It Was Cool’s exclusive Uphill Both Ways podcast and can occasionally be heard as a cohost on Gruesome Magazine’s Decades of Horror: The Classic Era podcast.

Official synopsis: A black bounty hunter moves into a rundown apartment complex, but finds herself forced to protect an orphaned boy from the white vampire landlord.

Writer/director Remington Smith’s LandLord is a gripping debut feature that blends social commentary with genre-film thrills. Although set in the present day, it has the urgency and feel of gritty 1970s drive-in features that packed a wallop of criticism along with their action and shocks. 

Adama Abramson gives an intriguing lead performance as a bounty hunter who unwillingly becomes involved in a vampire conspiracy. Cohen Cooper is solid in the second lead role as a young boy whose mother was killed by vampire John William Lawrence (William McKinney) who owns the shabby apartment building around which the film largely revolves. McKinney gives a truly chilling performance as a supernatural villain who exploits his poverty-stricken renters both financially and for their blood, draining them dry in more ways than one. 

Smith paces LandLord well, balancing the social bite and the crime and vampire themes winningly. This well-acted and well-directed feature has something to say, while always keeping the genre-cinema elements at the forefront.  

LandLord screened as part of Nightmares Film Festival, which took place October 16–19, 2025, at the Gateway Film Center in Columbus, Ohio. For more information, visit https://nightmaresfest.com/.