According to Biblical etymology, the name Jakob as found in Genesis is derived from the word for “heel”. In Jakob’s Wife, the eponymous Jakob (Larry Fessenden) is indeed a heel; an old-fashion minister who looks down his nose at his parishioners and town’s hoi polloi and treats his wife as a subservient inferior. When an old flame comes through town, obedient church mouse spouse Anne (a perfectly cast Barbara Crampton) gives into temptation…and is delivered unto the ultimate evil: a primordial vampire hiding out in the abandoned mill in their small town.

Pierced in the neck and turned to the dark, Anne casts off the dutiful cloak of the submissive wife and begins to live life on her own accord. Naturally, this involves drinking a whole lot of blood, which Anne attempts to purchase from the local grocer, and Jakob’s Wife goes full steam ahead letting the violently funny camp of it all take the wheel. Written and directed by Travis Stevens, with co-writing credits going to Kathy Charles and Mark Steenland, Jakob’s Wife manages the kind of laugh-out loud blend of domestic ennui and goofy vampiric kills that rarely makes its way across our screens.

The extremely over-the-top, tongue-in-cheek, micro budget horror-comedy, like blood or bleu cheese, is surely not for everyone’s tastes. The blood-soaked practical effects can be at times low-fi, the seams unquestionably showing through (though that might be intentional), but it’s all part of the rustic charm. As it stands, the laugh-a-minute script, which feels like a deliciously irreverent blend of the comedic styles of Schidtt’s Creek and What We Do in the Shadows, manages to Trojan Horse a relationship comedy into a campy vamp splatterfest and I for one could not be any more delighted that this tasteful abomination even exists at all.

That Stevens has the audacity to ask Jakob’s Wife to then challenge gender norms within the Christian religion, taking the ancient idea of patriarchal subservience to task, might end up feeling a bit like outdated gender politics but with the formidable Barbara Crampton at bat, the proceedings feel instead existential: highlighting the eternal struggle between man and wife and the shifting power balances within any long-standing relationship. It’s hokey in a “why I oughta!” sitcom manner and leads to some arcenic-laced banter that cuts up the otherwise bloody vampire interludes.

Perhaps because of this, formally and tonally, Jakob’s Wife feels like both a 90s throwback and a 100-years in the making direct sequel to Nosferatu. The creature design of lead vamp and Anne’s “master” is openly inspired by that OG on-film vampire – from the iconic rat teeth, the awkward forked hands stance, and the peely, pale egghead. There’s plenty more Nosferatu Easter eggs strewn throughout, with Stevens not the least bit concerned with letting his hat tip heavily towards the 1922 masterwork.

What underpins the giggly greatness of Jakob’s Wife is Crampton and Fessenden, two oft-overlooked character actors operating at new comedic heights. Take their casually staking a man to death in the kitchen right in the middle of a level-headed domestic conversation or Jakob’s inane jealousy overwhelming the more important fact that his wife is not, you know, technically alive any longer. It’s a silly brouhaha doused in buckets and buckets of blood where one element does outshine the other but co-exist, like life and death itself. And as far as tastes go here, if you can’t handle the cheese, get out of the kitchen.

CONCLUSION: ‘Jakob’s Wife’ is a total vamp-camp gas with a laugh-out-loud script that’s executed to soul-sucking perfection by the combination of Barbara Crampton and Larry Fessenden. Bloody, fun, and shamelessly ridiculous, Travis Stevens has made a gleeful tribute to vampire’s enduring legacy in the horror genre and highlighted why they make for sure good comedy.