A teenager discovers that the newcomer in his neighborhood is a vampire, so he turns to an actor in a television horror show for help dealing with the undead.
Director:
Tom Holland
Stars:
Chris Sarandon,
William Ragsdale,
Amanda Bearse
After a bizarre and near deadly encounter with a serial killer, a television newswoman is sent to a remote mountain resort whose residents may not be what they seem.
Recovering from an ambush that killed his entire team, a vengeful vampire slayer must retrieve an ancient Catholic relic that, should it be acquired by vampires, will allow them to walk in sunlight.
After an odd new medical student arrives on campus, a dedicated local and his girlfriend become involved in bizarre experiments centering around the re-animation of dead tissue.
Director:
Stuart Gordon
Stars:
Jeffrey Combs,
Bruce Abbott,
Barbara Crampton
A mid-western farm boy reluctantly becomes a member of the undead when a girl he meets turns out to be part of a band of southern vampires who roam the highways in stolen cars. Part of his initiation includes a bloody assault on a hick bar.Written by
Keith Loh <loh@sfu.ca>
Was the last movie produced and released by DEG (DeLaurentiis Entertainment Group) as the studio went bankrupt. As a result, the film did not receive much publicity during its release in the fall of 1987 which lead, in turn, to its box office failure. See more »
Goofs
In the bar, when Jesse is igniting bottles to torch the place, we see several of the bottles shatter in their hands prematurely before they're thrown, obviously break-away props gripped too hard by the actors. See more »
The musical question is, with Bigelow behind the camera and big names in front, how can you go wrong? The answer? This is, was, and always will be a B grade film done on the cheap with a small ensemble cast. As such it does offer historical interest for cinephiles especially since the idea of looking at the "human" side of vampires was at least 10 years ahead of the curve and that deserves credit. Ditto for the fact that script -- which is sharp in some places and terrible in others -- does not even use the word "vampire" which, for the era, was a sign of great restraint.
However that said, the truth is that this is not really a classic and does not hold up that well over time. There is also an internal imbalance, the first half of the film is much tighter and more coherent than the second, as money ran out during shooting which, given the era and the genre, might have actually happened.
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The musical question is, with Bigelow behind the camera and big names in front, how can you go wrong? The answer? This is, was, and always will be a B grade film done on the cheap with a small ensemble cast. As such it does offer historical interest for cinephiles especially since the idea of looking at the "human" side of vampires was at least 10 years ahead of the curve and that deserves credit. Ditto for the fact that script -- which is sharp in some places and terrible in others -- does not even use the word "vampire" which, for the era, was a sign of great restraint.
However that said, the truth is that this is not really a classic and does not hold up that well over time. There is also an internal imbalance, the first half of the film is much tighter and more coherent than the second, as money ran out during shooting which, given the era and the genre, might have actually happened.