Fright Night - the recent remake of the 1985 thriller- has quite a few merits: a star-studded cast with David Tennant, Colin Farrell, and Anton Yelchin; a good sense of humor, and a rather decent plot for a horror movie. Its greatest strength, however, is its use of the figure of the vampire.
We're all a little too used to the sparkly, sensitive vampire who is redeemed by his love for an innocent woman. He's gone from being a mysterious, meaningful figure to another angsty teenager. But before Twilight, the vampire was a metaphor for our deepest fears. Dracula was an aristocrat, an outsider, and also a male who threatened the virginal purity of the book's female protagonists. And in Fright Night, Jerry, the vampire next door, is terrifying - and that's what makes the movie meaningful.
Fright Night begins with a TV advertisement for "vampire slayer" Peter Vincent's show Fright Night. It features just about the most stereotyped view of vampires possible, including the usual Gothic costumes and virginal maidens. Juxtaposed with that is the normal suburban life: the protagonist, Charley, going to school, his inevitable teenage worries and high school drama. And in the midst of that everyday reality, there's Jerry. He doesn't have a gloomy castle in the mountains; he's the normal - and even quite approachable - guy next door. Played by Colin Farrell to perfection, his suave, smooth demeanor is made absolutely terrifying by the knowledge that he's hiding his fangs - and his mercilessness.
Jerry has no redemptive features, no soft side. He is evil. And, as such, he shows the fears we hold in our complacent suburban lifestyles. What if the nice man next door is really a monster? Not an actual vampire, that is, but a murderer, a rapist, a sexual predator?
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Article comments
1 - Dan O.
Nice Review! The tone may be all over the place, but it still has a lot of fun to it with blood, guts, and gore flying at you with good performances from the cast, especially Farrell who seems like he's just having a ball with this role.
2 - Anastasia
Thanks! I actually didn't have a problem with the tone, I think it did a very good job of mixing comedy and horror. That's something horror movies don't do and it gives you two different ways of enjoying it. I'd also suggest it differentiates it from other horror movies - it doesn't give it a pervading feeling of doom, which can be rather nice.
3 - roger nowosielski
"I tend to have the nagging little problem that I think too much."
Reminds me of Shenonymous, that was here email address, "I think too much," before it was compromised by a Trojan. Ever since, she's been a missing person.
Surely miss her would-be contributions.