Fright Night (1985 & 2011)

Fright Night

Writer & Director – Tom Holland

1985, USA

Stars – Chris Sarandon, William Ragsdale, Amanda Bearse

 

A quintessential, trend-setting horror of the ‘80s, with this and especially ‘The Lost Boys’ bringing the John Hughes sensibility to the genre and making vampires teen-friendly and a rites-of-passage ordeal. The other one: ‘Near Dark’ was for the counter-culture kids. This may be the lesser of the three but Holland, though nowhere near as distinctive as Bigelow or Schumacher, nevertheless exhibits a sure grip on tone between genuine horror treats and the slightly tongue-in-cheek/satirical leanings. This was true of Holland’s ‘Child’s Play’ too.

 

Sarandon is sinister, seductive and svelte as old-fashioned Gothic vampires tend to be when they move in next door, and yet also assuredly modern; Roddy McDowell gives a little of retro-horror class; and Stephen Geoffreys manages to bring pathos to the Annoying Friend role, its excessiveness becoming a tragedy of loneliness. The link between death and sex sets it off – losing virginity is interrupted by spying the neighbours disposing of a body – and the obsession with this inspires our all-American boy protagonist’s neglectful behaviour towards his girlfriend. He needs to overcome this association to get on with his life; and/or he must overcome his voyeuristic fascination with the somewhat queer-coded neighbour and his “live-in carpenter” to get on with his sexuality.

 

There’s also an agreeably tendency towards the kinds of practical effects showcases that were defining 80s horror, dipping into werewolf transformations. It’s all very entertaining and enjoyably dated and silly, if nothing more, and features just the most 80s soundtrack.

 

 

Fright Night

Director – Craig Gillespie

Writers – Marti Noxon (screenplay) Tom Holland (story)

2011 – USA, India

Stars – Anton Yelchin, Colin Farrell, David Tennant, Imogen Poots, Tony Collette

 

If you’re going to do a re-mix, an updating, this version of ‘Fright Night’ does many things right. The cobalt blue of the Eighties has been contemporised for Twenty-First century blue-green night and the vampire certainly has more modern serial killer trimmings. Farrell is mostly menace over charm. Here the vampire called Jerry doesn’t have a “live-in carpenter” and his house is modern chic. In fact. It’s the charlatan/illusionist Peter Vincent who has all the Gothic décor (and in one of the film’s chief gags, a whole armoury of antiques); and in this version David Tennant’s Vincent is crude where Roddy McDowell was hammy.

 

Starts with a good home invasion. Like the original, doesn’t waste too much time with Charley’s nearest-and-dearest disbelieving him: in fact, it’s his disbelieving Ed that is a plot-point, although Ed is probably the most unconvincing portion here. The film finds its own set pieces, the most impressive being when the vampire starts digging up the garden and it escalates from there. The script is savvy enough to have neat touches like when you can’t ride the bike, just hurl it at the escaping car. There’s some under-impressive CGI. There’s the sensation, around this time, that this may actually improve on the original… but it doesn’t quite get there. Nevertheless, it’s decent undemanding horror fun with an above-average cast.