Where to begin in dissecting this one...
I've been looking forward to this for over two years with equal measures of dread and anticipation. Despite my best efforts to keep expectations low, this one still disappointed. If they had just made a "vampire comes to a small town" movie, this would have been pretty decent. But they tried to make it a 'Salem's Lot adaptation, and it fell woefully short of doing the source material any justice.
First, some very interesting casting choices. Lewis Pullman as Ben Mears was...okay but uninspired. Alfre Woodard as Dr. Cody should have worked but I think she fell victim to the poor writing. She came across as too frazzled throughout the film. Jordan Preston Carter as Mark Petrie was fine, but again, it felt very detached. The same goes for John Benjamin Hickey as Father Callahan. The worst choice, in my opinion, was Pilou Asbaek as Straker. King's character is at times regal and charming, and alternately terrifying. Asbaek was neither. He was almost comical and inept and not at all scary.
On to the movie itself. Most damning is the helter skelter pacing. What should be a slow, insidious takeover of the town is, instead, a mad dash to just get to the end. To be fair, it was reported that the film was originally much longer but edited down to under two hours. The result is a drastic lack of any character development and some leaps of faith where characters just seem to "know" things without anything leading to their knowledge. Most noticeable is the complete elimination of the backstory between Ben Mears and the Marsten House. It is never mentioned.
There are some scenes that were filmed beautifully, most notable is the Glick brothers' taking the shortcut home. The cinematography is visually stunning. The sunset showdown at the drive-in (a very different climax from the book) is done well and has some great moments of dread. To make this scene work, liberties are taken with traditional vampire lore, which will probably turn off a lot of folks. Another failure was the overuse of the glowing cross, they are everywhere in this version, taking away from the power of the scenes.
I would be very interested to see the original cut. I think the additional scenes (if done right) might fix a few of the glaring issues (lack of character development, characters knowing things they shouldn't, the frenetic pace).
I'm giving this version a C-, but if you can pretend it wasn't an attempt to be 'Salem's Lot, it would be a B. Streaming on MAX.
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