Frank's Movie Log

Saturday the 7th of July 2012

★★★★★ Sexually frustrated Charlie can't get to second base with Amy, his girlfriend of almost a year, while his vampire neighbor Jerry is a veritable stud, able to command the sexual attention of any women (including Amy, and even Charlie's mom) with little more than a look. There's also a homosexual subtext hinted at with Jerry's male roommate, and again with Jerry's seduction of Charlie's teen friend Ed, played by Stephen Geoffreys, with Jerry almost cooing that he, “knows what it's like being different”. And is it too much of a stretch to consider the effete Peter Vincent's lack of faith as a metaphor for facing his own buried homosexuality? Perhaps. But filmmakers have long used the horror genre to explore issues of sexual identity, and just as Dracula mined Victorian sexual repression, Fright Night plumbs 1980's teenage sexual angst, though in a far more subtle manner manner than many of its contemporaries, most of which consisted of little more than, as McDowall says “Demented madmen running around in ski-masks hacking up young virgins.”

Saturday the 28th of January 2012

★★★★★ Suburban teenager Charlie (Ragsdale) glances out his window during a late-night make-out session with his girlfriend (Bearse) and sees two men carrying a coffin into the basement of the vacant neighboring house. Intrigued, Charlie begins spying on the nightly goings on next-door, and soon discovers that his suave new neighbor Jerry (Sarandon) has fangs. After failing to convince his family, friends and even the local police of the danger in their midst, Charlie turns to the local creature feature host, Peter Vincent (McDowall).

After opening as a teen comedy, with Ragsdale equally frustrated by the lack of action with Bearse and a recently sprung pop-quiz, the film steadily ratchets up the horror and suspense, often segueing between the two via some choice dialog from Sarandon, who mixes equal parts charm and menace in a memorable performance. For his part, McDowall has a lot of fun channelling Peter Cushing, hamming it up in the movie-within-a-movie early on, and dialing it back just enough in the second half to make things work. The resulting film is not only a tremendous amount of fun for horror fans, but one that takes its place as a classic alongside the very films it pays tribute to.