Salem's Lot

This is one of the most richly atmospheric films in horror, an article of pure latenight seduction and phosphorescent darkness.

Atmospheric not in the sense that a dry ice machine has pumped a catacomb full of haze and cobwebs are strategically placed in some dark corner, but as a place lived, with naturally dark corners and tangible portents: the old dark house on the hill breathing evil, the antique shop downtown, all velvety smell and musty colors, the small town lined with porticoes bathed in the quiet of a lazy night, yet harboring secrets and vice from inside. Prying eyes staring from behind a curtain.

Oh, at some point vampires come flying through the window, and it's still fine by me, it's one of the better vampire films and at 3 hours it's better fleshed than most of them; but I am just not attuned to the whole vampire lore so I leave this part to be enjoyed best by the traditional horror fan. It is actually one of the more potent retellings of the most familiar story in this field, I was pleasantly surprised to see that it was not quite Dracula but that older film with longer shadows, so I will not spoil the discovery for you.

But the first part intrigues me in stranger ways, more suggestive, with menace that goes unspoken. The small-town facade that would later resurface in Twin Peaks.

There is a notion that matters in all this, but which is not pursued at all; the writer who feels from his perspective that it was his presence that awakened evil, it's fitting that it's coming from a writer because it's a self-centered, imaginative notion, but which from our end we know is bogus. Evil was already afoot, and was never centered around him. But he wistfully imagines himself at the center so he can write about it.

So I don't know what happened with Tobe Hooper. He was never very elegant with a camera, the way Argento was or occasionally Carpenter, but he was unmatched in his feel for the aural qualities of film. He could make a room hum with evil. My guess is that, being an intuitive maker, the feel came and went, or he forgot how to tap into it (you can see as early as Eaten Alive how he seems to be desperately trying to capture again the muse that gave him Texas Massacre). Or he plainly stopped actively chasing after the right material.

This was just right for him. Only Kubrick has better adapted Stephen King to my mind.

As it really is a wonderful and suspenseful vampire tale! Stephen King - not normally my favorite horror writer - has created one of the absolute BEST modern vampire tales in this story, and this mini-series translation is absolutely true to the feel of his tale! Instead of splatterfest effects , this show hinges itself on a high-tension spiderweb of plotlines and sets up the vampire more as a behind-the-scenes controlling evil. The terror here is not in seeing the monster, it is in NOT seeing him and knowing that he and his minions are out there, somewhere, plotting and planning with the heros stumbling blindly after them like toddlers in the dark. Give this show a chance! It may just scare you!

The story is pretty interesting and is build up well. The miniseries does an amazing job on building up the atmosphere when the vampires arrived. I really like how the vampirism spreads throughout the townsfolks. The creepiness factor really works well when the vampire shows up because it gives off a eerie vibe to it. And the climax is pretty suspenseful. There's a few flaws with this miniseries. One is that some scenes feels unnecessary and I didn't get the point of it. Also the main vampire doesn't appear a lot and only shows up 2 hours into the miniseries. While he doesn't appear a lot, he's definitely the scariest vampire I ever seen. He looks so freaky and is really threatening villain. The vampire makeup effects are really well made. I really like how the makeup looks so creepy with it's yellow eyes and Barlow blue face. The atmosphere is the best part of the movie. The miniseries does an amazing job building up the suspense to it and the vampire scenes are really effective to be creepy.

First let me suggest to see the original miniseries version if at all possible. The "movie" version is horribly chopped. The remaining pieces don't fit together and leave gaping holes (such as, "what happened to Susan?")

Salem's Lot is an almost unknown milestone in horror films. This superb combination of the talents of Tobe Hooper and Stephen King bridges the gap between the Hammer-style films of the 60's and the modern vampire films. Two things to especially note:

(1) This takes place in Everytown, USA and the cinematography reflects the ordinary turned extraordinary (which is the same effect achieved by Bram Stoker's original writing for the audience of his time.) It begins looking almost like a Rockford Files episode and goes dark from there. But even the climax in the evil Marsten house looks *real*, just as you would imagine an old decrepit house to look. You can almost smell the dust. Hey, this was the seventies, the decade of naturalistic lighting. Everything coming out of Hollywood now looks just that - like Hollywood.

(2) It is a shame that anyone today viewing Salem's Lot already knows that is about vampires because when it first aired on TV, the unknown aspect is what made the first half so creepy. Now you just sit there waiting for the vampires to show up. (If I thought that even one person might read this without knowing it was about vampires, I wouldn't write this.) The advertising for the show made no mention of vampires and the effect worked well. I was ten years old when I first saw this. I had seen at least a dozen other vampire flicks - Noseratu, Lugasi, the Hammer films - and I had no clue that this was about vampires. All I knew was that something creepy was going in this town and it was getting creepier and creepier. Only in the second episode when you see someone get bit in the neck did it finally click, "Oh my god, they're vampires." You realize it right about the same time that the main characters do. Highly effective.

Also, superb performances by David Soul, Lew Ayres, James Mason.

This movie is not for those people who want to watch busty teenager chicks get slashed and stabbed to death by tall guys with hockey masks and machetes. For that kind of elevated thrill, rent "Summer Camp 5" or something. But for those of you who want a horror movie worthy of the name, rent "Salem's Lot:the mini series". This series scared the hell out of me when I was younger, and very little has changed. David Soul gives the performance of his career as writer Ben Mears and absolutely becomes the character. James Mason is genuinely chilling as Straker, the humorous but not quite well intentioned antiques salesman and, uh...'partner' of Mr. Barlow, aka Nosferatu. I've never seen a horror movie that builds up an atmosphere of suspense and fear as effectively as this one does. It is true that King didn't like it, and as far as I'm concerned that's more to its credit--let's remember that this is the guy behind that illustrious cinematic masterpiece "Maximum Overdrive". The book is one more trashy vampire novel among many, as forgettable as it is trite. Hooper transforms King's boring,oh-it's-just-Dracula-again run of the mill vampire into a mysterious, terrifying monster in the tradition of authentic horror. Don't just watch it, buy it. A necessity.