Martin (John Amplas), a young man who looks around 20-years-old, boards a train in Indianapolis, Indiana for New York. At night, he breaks into a sleeping car and sedates a woman with a syringe full of narcotics. She struggles, but he tells her not to struggle or be upset because she wont feel pain. After a few minutes, the woman falls asleep, and Martin has sex with the unconscious woman. Afterwards, he slices her wrists with a razor blade so he can drink her blood. The woman bleeds to death in her sleep.
In the morning, the train stops in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where Martin disembarks. He is met by Tata Cuda (Lincoln Maazel) an elderly and hostile old man who claims to be his cousin from the Old World. Together, they travel by another train to the town of Braddock, a dying industrial suburb. They walk to Cuda's large house where he shows Martin his living quarters. Cuda then accuses Martin of being an 84-year-old vampire from his old country. He has taken in Martin because he is family, but tells him, "First I will save your soul. Then I shall destroy you." Martin denies being a vampire and implies that Cuda is merely his uncle rather than his cousin. Cuda then puts up strings of garlic on the doors to his and his granddaughter's room, and then holds up a small cross when Martin approaches him. Martin takes away the cross, and even takes a bite of the garlic mocking these attempts by saying bitterly, "There's no real magic... ever". Cuda tells Martin that he can come and go as he pleases. But he also warns Martin that he will kill him if he kills anyone in Braddock. He also tells Martin to stay away from his granddaughter Christine (Christine Forrest), whom arrives home from her job that evening.
Cuda introduces Christine to Martin, but also warns her to stay away from him. But Christine instead strikes up a friendship with Martin who confides in her about his vampire heritage. When Cuda later confirms Martin's claims to be a vampire, Christine, not surprisingly, refuses to believe either one. She thinks that Cuda and the other members of her family have driven Martin to insanity by making him think that he is a vampire. It is never revealed if Martin really is a vampire, or just a shy and lonely youth with troubled issues. Christine is the only person that Martin gets the courage to talk to. When Christine's boyfriend Arthur (Tom Savini) arrives at the house for dinner, Martin stops talking and backs away despite Arthur's attempt at a conversation. Christine later confides in Martin that she hopes to leave Braddock someday with Arthur, even though Martin points out that Arthur treats her badly and is both verbally and physically abusive towards her.
When Christine sees that Martin won't talk to anyone else, she buys him a phone which he installs in his room. Martin begins to repeatingly call a radio talk show where he describes what it's like to be a vampire. He becomes known on the radio as "the Count" to all the listeners. But the patronizing host (Michael Gornick) thinks he's just crazy.
Martin gets a job at Cuda's grocery store of stocking shelves, hauling boxes around, and even gets to be a delivery boy for some of the customers. One of his customers is a certain Abby Santini (Elyane Nadeau), who becomes taken in with Martin. She is a very friendly young woman who is depressed when she tells Martin that her husband is unfaithful. But Martin still does not have the nerve to talk with her, so she is happy to have someone to confide in with her life problems. Martin phones the radio show host to describe his infatuation with the housewife and senses that she wants to have sex with him. When the radio show host asks Martin if it is a sexual problem that he has involving women criticizing him during sex, Martin replies that he has never had sex with a woman who was awake.
One day, Martin travels by train to outside Braddock to look for victims. At a supermarket, he follows a young woman (Sarah Venable) home to her posh suburban house. He sees the woman's husband (Richard Rubenstein) leave for a long business trip, and Martin decides this would be the right time for more feeding. Martin returns to the house after dark and breaks in through the garage door. But it is Martin who gets the surprise when he bursts into her bedroom to find her in bed with her adulterous lover Lewis (Al Levitsky). After a vicious struggle, Martin jabs both of them with hyprodermic needles with narcotics, and waits for the drugs to take affect. He drags the unconscious body of Lewis from the house to a clump of trees across the street where he kills him by shoving a broken tree branch into his neck and drinks his blood. Martin returns to the house where he has sex with the unconscious woman. But out of compassion and pity, he decides to let her live.
Martin begins to have romantic monochrome visions of his vampire past (real or imagined), where he drained blood from a young woman and was chased through the streets of a nameless European town by a torch-lit mob.
During one Sunday at church, Cuda brings home Father Howard (George A. Romero) who asks him about the possibility of exorcism and demon possession. Father Howard calls upon the elderly Father Zulemans (Clifford Forrest, Jr.) over at Cuda's request. Together, Cuda and Zulemans confront Martin his bedroom and attempt to perform an exorcism on him. At this point, Martin remembers (another real or imaginary flashback), in the Old Country of people trying to perform an exorcism on him, and he flees them. Martin then flees from Cuda and Zuelmas as well. A little later that night, Martin terrorizes Cuda in a children's playground when he puts on a Dracula cape and puts false fangs into his mouth to pretend that he really is a vampire.
One day, Martin finally musters the courage to talk with Mrs. Santini during a routine delivery to her house where he tells her that he's aware of her attempts to seduce him and wants now to have sex with her. After having sex for the first time, Mrs. Santini becomes more depressed for she tells Martin that her husband just left her because she discovered that she cannot bear children, and that her desires towards him are based on sex and nothing else. But Martin wants to stay with her and help her move on with her life. Martin tells the radio show host about his affair with the housewife and that he no longer has the urge to attack other women.
Meanwhile, Arthur meets with Cuda and tells him that he wants Christine to leave town with him so they can get married and start a family. But Christine becomes angry at Cuda when he tells Arthur that insanity runs in their family and he shouldn't consider having children with her. Shortly afterwards, Christine packs up and leaves Braddock for New York with Arthur despite Martin telling her that Arthur is abusive towards her. But her mind is made up. Before leaving, Christine tells Martin that she really has no ill feelings towards him and just wants to make a fresh start with her life. She says goodbye to him and promises to write. But Martin knows that with an abusive and possessive man in Christine's life, she probably won't.
Depressed over losing his one true friend, Martin phones the radio show host and tells him that he's getting "shaky" and wants to go out looking for more victims. That night, Martin travels to a rough crime-ridden area of Pittsburgh and attacks two derelicts in a alley, injecting them with narcotics. He kills one of them by silting the bum's wrist and drinking his blood. Martin is about to kill the second one when a police car shows up and gives chase. Martin narrowly escapes during a long chase on foot which leads from the garbage strew streets and through a local store. Martin runs into an old warehouse where a drug deal is going down. A shootout between the two cops and the three thugs begins where all of them are killed, leaving Martin as the sole survivor who casually walks away from the carnage.
One day, Martin finds Mrs. Santini dead in her bathtub, after she had slit her writs with a razor blade. Martin anonymously calls the police to report the body and leaves. He phones the radio show host one final time to say that he really doesn't need friends or people to talk to for he is his own person. But when Cuda learns about Mrs. Santini's suicide, is mistakenly thinks Martin killed her and made it look like a suicide as he's done before. Cuda walks into Martin's room while he is asleep and kills him by hammering a wooden stake through Martin's heart.
Cuda buries Martin's body in his back garden, while over the closing credits various voices from people are heard talking to the radio show host asking the whereabouts of "the Count".
彼此和解，
青春期的痛与撕扯最大的难题，是父母愿不愿意放手，孩子愿不愿意离开，通常孩子是急着离开，但也有人心怀内疚。
原来导演和编剧是一位加拿大华裔女性，从结尾提到「2002年演唱会大熊猫事件」推算时间线，13岁主人公李美玲应该就是1989年出生，这和导演的出生年份不谋而合。看来这不是一个充满中式印象的迪士尼动画，而是一个华裔女孩自己的青春成长故事。女孩李美玲的家族在青春期时会因为情绪波动而迎来浣熊变身，需要控制情绪并且进行仪式才能将这个大野兽封印，最后在女儿心爱的歌手演唱会上 完成了母女和解以及收怪兽仪式（道士和粤语咒语口诀真的太好笑了 哈哈哈哈哈），中式儒家思想+狼族+美少女战士变身的多重元素融合在里面。「我们的身体里都有潜在的野兽，我们都隐藏着一个邋遢、吵闹、怪异的自己，只是很多人从没让她曝露过，但我做到了，你呢？」我知道她想通过浣熊变身这件事来比喻青春期的叛逆和成长，但是这个故事显然还是太西式了，让我少了共鸣。
出乎意料的好看。形象设计、剧本创意和对亚洲家庭关系的剖解都很有意思，后半段名场面频出，观影体验爆表，不愧是皮克斯。
华裔小孩的家庭冲突，和朋友们的冲突，女性成长为女为母，初潮变红的设定乖乖的。
2.中国家长（近两年对女性对家庭贡献的再发掘）母亲，对子女的控制欲
+0.5 red is period or…red just period?! 前面多好后面多烂，天马行空好坏参半。perfect主题放在现在其实又土又没共鸣，但是对子供意义很大，欢迎中国小孩按头观看。隐喻太多了，自信的女生永远最酷。以及我相信这部电影只有女生能完全读透
感觉只有东亚人能共情，因为我们都需要为自己辜负了母亲的期待而道歉。
喜欢的原因在于：它对上海近乎吐槽式的刻画，跟我想吐槽上海的东西，一模一样。它太上海了（鞋匠就可以代表全体上海人），可以作为城市情景剧看，所以很开心，不用想其他。
居然精准捕捉到了东亚母女之间又有毒又有爱的羁绊。可惜真实生活中撕下乖女儿面具的一刻一般都发生在女儿30岁以后而不是13岁时
又恢复到了皮克斯一贯水准，女性成长与解放自我的故事，可惜没有进影院直接上线，红色熊猫又能卖一波了！
说你不贴近生活吧，把字打出来又删掉，看到别人给点的赞立刻心花怒放，这事我都干过。说你贴近生活吧，一个大老头子，天天去喝奶茶，就算是上海老头子也跟开玩笑似的。
在北美文化语境中处理东亚文化，孝文化包含着“服从，顺从，不忤逆”的成分，它绝不是一个平等文化，因此随着主角的成长，它势必与主角的个体性爆发激烈的冲突，主角美美也非得容许这种暴怒（反抗、反叛）情绪与自己永远相伴，才能摆脱一味顺从的孝文化的控制，获得真正的成长。
三星给制作 故事逻辑太差了 还都是刻板印象
好可爱（深呼吸）元气小姑娘女主宝贝毛茸茸小熊猫心连心姐妹团追星女男团人男团魂都好可爱，从头到尾乐得停不下来，也是皮克斯地域文化元素的作品之一，反正本东亚女是共情到了，端着一盘切好的橙子进来也太真实了，literally我妈5 mins ago🙀要说深度其实也还好啦，主题是华人家庭/母女关系而已，不过在动画电影里谈到period还蛮惊喜的，小熊猫作为一种迈入青春期的成长隐喻，实在是可爱得过分🥺💕
看出来了导演是真的有父母造成的心理阴影。这次迪士尼在亚裔文化上的表现是OK的，对相当一部分亚裔二代来说应当很有共鸣…虽然看完也不知道为什么是小熊猫但是后面念咒和流行歌合二为一的时候真是非常好笑。
3.中国符号，神话故事、熊猫、宗祠
经历过令人窒息的宗族式家教，都会感同身受！母亲意外撞破女儿的恋爱幻想对象，并前去质问，是在致敬《盛夏未来》啦，可惜那个店员小哥后来直接写丢了，倒是另一位看似蠢直男的同学是真姐妹。
整个过程观感很 五味杂陈，细节太好笑又可爱又有新颖之处(是不是第一部出现了日漫星星眼的迪士尼)，女孩们太好了，但同时又是迪士尼观影经验里第一次唯一次在很大的时长里感到真实的压抑难受的一部。要乖要听话，不能放纵狂喜暴怒保持矜持戒断欲望要知羞耻，尤其是一个性别是女的人，从小到大被迫引以为耻的天性 被迫驯服封印的力量 被迫习得的无助可不要太多了，而假如你性别为女还那么不巧生于一个黄皮肤黑头发的原生家庭还进入了青春期的人，那恭喜你抽中特等奖中奖中奖了。那么你经历的羞耻压迫，承受的内外双重夹攻的情绪核爆，加上没法独立分割的情感负担和一代传给一代的不安全感和控制欲，要是在三次元世界里具象成野兽，哪有这么cute。
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