Hello, welcome back to my monster- fest!
Sorry I haven't done as much with it this year, I've been intensely busy this month, I should b able to get in a few more reviews, though.
Tonight, we have a double- feature lined up, and it's a good one: ‘Fright Night,’ 1 and 2.
I intended on reviewing ‘Fright Night’ last year, but wasn’t able to. Premiering in 1985, it was directed by Tom Holland and stars Chris Sarandon, William Ragsdale, Roddy McDowall, and Amanda Bearse.
The story centers around a teenage boy named Charley Brewster, who is a big horror movie fan. He is seeing his girlfriend Amy, but she’s reluctant to go all the way with him, and unofficially breaks up with him after he begins ignoring her in favor of obsessively spying on his mysterious new neighbor, Jerry Dandridge, and reports of a series of murders that are happening in the area. Jerry is a charming enough guy, but Charley soon suspects that he is a vampire. Of course, nobody believes him, and they think he’s either joking or nuts. When Dandridge realizes Charley’s on to him, he begins targeting Charley and his loved ones.
Amy, and Charley’s sort- of friend “Evil†Ed, upon learning that Charley plans on trying to stake Jerry in the morning, realize that he could potentially wind up committing murder, so to try and break him out of his delusions, they enlist the help of Peter Vincent, a horror film actor who in his prime played a Van Helsing- esque horror film hero called ‘Peter Vincent, the Great Vampire Killer,’ but is now a washed up has- been reduced to hosting a late- night monster- movie marathon show called ‘Fright Night.’ Charley had previously tried to get Peter to help him, but Peter dismissed Charley as nuts. Amy and Ed pay Peter to do a phony “Test†of Jerry to make Charley realize he’s not a vampire, by having him drink “Holy Water†that’s really just regular unblessed tap water. After the test is performed, Peter accidentally notices that Jerry casts no reflection in a small mirror he brought with him, and realizes Charley was telling the truth.
He discovers the truth just in time, as Jerry steps up his attempts to silence Charley. He bites and vampirizes Evil Ed, then kidnaps Amy. So, it’s up to Charley and Peter (Who has since found his courage and is ready to become the kind of hero he’s played in so many of his films) to destroy Jerry and his equally evil roommate Billy Cole, save Amy before she permanently becomes one of the undead, and ensure the safety of their whole town.
Upon rewatching ‘Fright Night,’ it certainly has its problems. One problem it has is, while it’s still a good movie, it’s seriously showing its age. Late- night monster- movie marathon shows were cool, but are sadly a thing of the past nowadays. The characters’ fashion, the music used, and even the goofy- looking car that Charley drives all firmly set the film in the 80’s, so it doesn’t carry over into the modern age very well. Its remake that came out last year did a good job modernizing it, though, as I’ll talk about in more detail in the next installment. Another issue I have with ‘Fright Night’ is that Charley frequently comes across as being quite stupid/ tactless in how he handles everything for the first half or so of the film. He openly says to pretty much everyone that he thinks Jerry’s a vampire, then acts all surprised when nobody believes him. It’s especially obvious in one scene early on when Charley brings a cop over to Jerry’s house. The cop briefly talks to Jerry’s roommate Billy, but rather quickly Charley openly tells the cop (And in a ridiculously dramatic way, to boot) that he thinks Jerry’s a vampire. It’s like it seriously never occurred to him that most people don’t believe in vampires, and think that anyone who claims to have seen one is either insane or pulling a prank. An additional problem I had is that there’s a pointless little subplot about how Jerry apparently believes that Amy is the reincarnation of his own long- lost love or something similar to it. Nothing ever comes of it, it could easily have been cut from the film. However, even more so than all of these, the #1 main problem I’ve always had with ‘Fright Night’ is undoubtedly the character of Evil Ed. He’s supposed to be the comic relief of the film and a lot of the fans of the film like him for that reason, but I personally consider him to be easily one of the most obnoxious characters I’ve ever seen in any movie, he makes Jarjar Binks look quite bearable in comparison. His nasal voice and shrieking laugh are like nails on a chalkboard, and his alternately mocking and whiny nature further enhances how irritating he is in every scene that features him.
Now that all that is out of the way, I still very much enjoy ‘Fright Night.’ It is a very good blend of scares and laughs, with a lot of memorable characters and scenes.
The special effects in it are freaking awesome for a film from that time. Very good use of puppeteering, and absolutely incredible makeup for the vampire characters. In particular, for the scene around the climax of the film in which Amy is briefly turned into a vampire, the makeup effects they used look absolutely terrifying.
Although, as I said, Charley is a bit too dumb and tactless in how he goes about things, it’s still a good performance. He shows the fear and concern that Charley feels towards himself and especially his friends and loved ones.
Chris Sarandon makes Jerry Dandridge into a great, well- developed villain. At times, he is quite friendly and charming; Other times he is genuinely scary, sometimes even pulling off both simultaneously (i.e. In a scene early on when Jerry sneaks into Charley’s room to confront him, he grabs Charley and the boy is about to scream for help; Jerry quickly says, “Now we wouldn’t want to wake your mother, would we Charley?†Then, with a positively gleeful smile on his face, he continues in a cheery tone of voice, “’Cause then, I’d have to kill her, too! RIGHT?â€)
Roddy McDowall is absolutely wonderful as Peter Vincent. His theatrical- sounding voice fits the character perfectly. In spite of the fact that he is a has- been, he still has a rather large ego (i.e. There’s a semi- recurring joke in the film that whenever one of the teens approaches him and says that they have something important to talk to him about, he initially assumes they want his autograph, then appears rather offended upon learning that isn’t the case), yet beneath it is a coward who’s obviously never confronted anything supernatural in his life up to that point. Even then, though, that just makes it all the more rewarding when we see him in the climax learning to be brave and helping Charley stand against these dark forces. Peter turns out to be a perfect unlikely hero.
Amanda Bearse (Who would be more well known for playing the Bundys’ shrewish neighbor Marcy on the TV show 'Married with Children') is pretty good as Amy. She cares deeply for Charley, but is angry at him for not paying enough attention to her, and also becomes quite scared over how obsessed he became.
All in all, ‘Fright Night’ is still a vampire classic that’s always a lot of fun to watch.
A few years later, a sequel premiered, ‘Fright Night Part 2.’ Directed by Tommy Lee Wallace. It has William Ragsdale and Roddy McDowall reprising their roles as Charley Brewster and Peter Vincent, and also Tracy Lind and Julie Carmen.
At this point, Charley is in college, has a new girlfriend named Alex (Lind), and has through many therapy sessions come to believe that Jerry Dandridge in the first film was just a psycho serial killer posing as a vampire and there are no such things as real vampires (He feels that back then, he just THOUGHT Jerry was a vampire as a result of the trauma brought on him by Evil Ed’s death and Amy’s kidnapping). In contrast, Peter Vincent still knows that vampires do exist, often tries to use his position as host of ‘Fright Night’ to warn viewers that vampires are real, and soon discovers that the new resident of his apartment building, a performance artist named Regine (Carmen), is a vampire. She’s apparently Jerry Dandridge’s sister, and has come along with her three weird henchmen to gain bloody revenge against Charley and Peter. Regine begins using her seductive power to bring Charley under her spell and drinks some of his blood through a rather large cut on Charley’s neck that conveniently was already there due to Charley cutting himself shaving that morning. As a result of this, Charley finds himself very slowly turning into a vampire, and re-realizing that vampires are real, before being captured by Regine’s thugs. Peter is fired from hosting ‘Fright Night’ and replaced with Regine, and soon afterwards is shipped off to a nuthouse. Charley and Amy break him out of it, and they set up to try and destroy Regine and her minions before Charley completely turns into one of the undead.
‘Fright Night Part 2’ is definitely not as good as the original. Regine, while a decent enough villain (With Julie Carmen making her appropriately seductive and menacing), can’t hold a candle to Jerry from the first film, she’s nowhere near as interesting, as well- developed, or as scary as him. She’s pretty much upstaged by her own henchmen, who I’ll talk about momentarily. Also, there is a possible flaw in terms of the subplot involving Regine taking over as host of ‘Fright Night’ from Peter: I was under the impression that vampires can’t be seen in photographs or recorded videos (For the same reason why they cast no reflection in mirrors), yet Regine appeared in the recorded TV broadcast just like any human would. Lastly, ‘Fright Night 2’ just doesn’t feel as interesting or entertaining as the original, it had some laughs, but was mostly lacking in scares and had none of the tension of the first film.
Now, for what I liked about ‘Fright Night 2.’ It had a pretty good story, and a very good amount of humor to it. A particularly funny scene occurs when Charley and Alex’s therapist turns out to be a vampire (You have to see it to get why it’s funny). It’s interesting the way that Charley and Peter’s roles are reversed this time, as now Peter is the committed believer and Charley is the skeptic who needs to be convinced that vampires exist.The special effects (Especially for the climax) are pretty impressive for the time, though not as much so as the first film’s effects.
William Ragsdale is as good as ever as Charley. He is likable, shows real fear as he begins to notice what he is turning into, and even though he doesn’t believe in vampires for much of the film, he seems to demonstrate a love of fictional vampires in films and books, that’s kind of fun to see (Especially a scene in which he chews out Alex for ridiculing his love of the genre).
Roddy McDowall likewise brings his same eccentric charm that he used for playing Peter Vincent the first time back again in this one. He’s still a bit of a ham with a major taste for the theatric, but now he also demonstrates frustration over the fact that he knows very few people believe his claims that vampires exist.
While Regine wasn’t much of a villain, her three henchmen were all pretty cool. There’s a constantly- rollerskating vampire, a hulking blonde guy who eats bugs like Renfield in ‘Dracula,’ and best of all is a goofy werewolf named Louie (Played by Jon Gries, who coincidentally also played the Wolf- Man in ‘The Monster Squad’ for the scenes in which he’s human) that tries to steal Alex away from Charley. He is scary, but also extremely funny to watch. It’s almost sad when Louie inevitably gets killed in the film’s climax. The three henchmen play off each other pretty well, and their scenes are fun to watch (Including a flat- out ridiculous but hilarious scene in which the three of them randomly decide to go bowling).
And so, that’s ‘Fright Night Part 2,’ nowhere near as good as the first, but still with some redeeming parts and certainly watchable enough. It’s all up on Youtube (And pretty much only there, as both its VHS and DVD are nearly impossible to find.
Come back tomorrow when I look at ‘Fright Night’’s remake!
