59. Fright Night (2011)

59. Fright Night (2011)

Rotten Tomatoes: 72%  IMDB: 6.4

Plot: Charley learns from his former best friend Ed that his new neighbor Jerry is a vampire. He seeks the help of Criss Angel like stage magician and self proclaimed vampire expert Peter Vincent to put Jerry in the soil in this remake of the 1985 original (see movie post 54).


My Thoughts: Remakes are a tricky business, you have built in name recognition and a built in pissed off fan base that no matter what you do you want please so why do them, well sometimes it's a cheap cash grab and sometimes you have something to say with the material, good examples of the latter being The Fly and The Thing. This one falls into the camp of taking the major themes and building blocks but constructing something new from them. Colin Farrell's version of Jerry is not the smooth charming gentleman of Chris Sarandon, watch for a cameo by him as well in the car accident scene, he is rather a tough but good looking charming douchebag type of modern man's man. These are very different films, the biggest change of course is in David Tennant's Peter Vincent, gone is the hasbeen sophisticated actor and in his place is a vegas stage magician ala Criss Angel with his goth flair. This could have been a train wreck but what is on screen works, I love it, I think the creatures look great, some of CGI is a bit ehh, but it all comes together well with a great final fight. There are enough nods to the original to please this fan without being slavishly devoted to a reshoot. I recommend.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Purple People Eater

Image
Purple People Eater (1988) IMDB: 4.5 A long time ago in a department store far, far away a six year old me was browsing through the display of Halloween titles on video tape the store had set up, and there amongst the Jasons and Freddies was a movie based on a song starring TV's Doogie Howser, I walked out of that store without purchasing this film a mistake that has hung over my life for decades, a mistake that thanks to the glory that is youtube has now been rectified. Dear readers I give to you Purple People Eater starring Ned Beatty, Shelley Winters, Neil Patrick Harris, Dustin Diamonds, Thora Birch and Sheb Wooley. Billy Winters (Neil Patrick Harris) has been left at home with his older sister whom we never see again and his younger sister Molly (Thora Birch) in the care of their Grandpa (Ned Beatty). Grandpa enlists Billy's help repainting his apartment, planting flowers and laughing...laughing at everything no matter how funny it may or may not be in that bi
Read more
Image
3. Cabin in the Woods Plot: 5 teens go into the woods and some bad stuff goes down My thoughts: I freaking love this movie, it is one of the best horror films of the past decade. It is loaded with injokes and forces you to examine who exactly you root for in these types of movies. Joss Whedon's brand of humor really shines in this film. High Recommend. 
Read more
Image
2. Event Horizon Plot: A ship with the ability to bend time and space was lost 7 years ago a crew head out with the scientist that built the engine to find out where it went and what happened to it's crew. My thoughts: I saw this movie in either 98 or 99, I remember being told then that it was the scariest film by several of my friends. I remember really liking it and being freaked out by it would it hold up now after all I've seen? Yes and no. Now I can see the bits that were borrowed, for instance the interior of the ship, especially the gravity drive/gateway is a copy of the  Lament Configuration from Hellraiser and I imagine that this may well be what happens inside that infamous cube. That being said I still really enjoy this film, Sam Neill is one of my favorite actors and when you toss in Lawrence Fishburn as a tough but compassionate Captain then you got pure win. The early CGI is obvious and cartoony but that is a testament to our advancements in graphics ra
Read more