Fright Night Review
Written by: deth_banger
One of my all time favourite movies ever, this has everything that makes not just a good horror movie, but a good movie in general. Fright Night is about your average American teenage boy, who loves horror movies, with a vivid imagination. Well Charley Brewster played by William Ragsdale believes a vampire has moved next door to him, and his suspicions are only magnetized when he witnesses prostitutes enter his neighbours house Jerry Dandridge played by Chris Sarandon, only never to see them leave.
Soon enough news reports confirm that these prostitutes have in fact disappeared, and when Charley witnesses large black bags leave Jerry's house, only one thing comes to mind and that his neighbour is in fact a vampire and he has murdered these women.
Charley's friends think that he is jumping to conclusions too soon, and that it is just his vivid imagination playing tricks on him. Charley being adamant, he enlists the help of local horror presenter for the show 'Fright Night' Peter Vincent played by Roddy McDowall, who believes his story is preposterous.
Fright Night chugs along at a nice speed and the story slowly unfolds and thanks to the strong cast, they all work together well and you become involved in the characters lives. I must say I think 'Evil' Ed Thompson played by Stephen Geoffreys definitely steals the show as he plays the role of a geeky unwanted teenage boy, who is a bit of an outcast, that is until he meets his demise by the charismatic Jerry Dandridge and he finally gets the attention he so craves, but at a price.
The relationship between Charley's girlfriend Amy Peterson played by Amanda Bearse and Jerry Dandridge is so electric, i still get chills when they are alone together, I just felt sorry for Charley, but who can blame Amy when your seduced by Jerry Dandridge.
The movie uses all the vampire cliches, which is great, just old-school rules and it works really well, and thanks to the awesome effects this movie looks amazing. The gore is plenty and really picks up in the last half of the film especially the awesome transformation 'Evil' Ed goes through, in witch I actually almost cried, as you see and feel the pain he is going through and thanks to the great character development played throughout the film, you don't want 'Evil' Ed to be hurt.
Roddy McDowall puts on a great performance as the 'Vampire Killer' only thing is he is so afraid of vampires and he pulls it off so well and the movie really works better for it. We see him conquer his demons and become an actual 'Vampire killer' and it's brilliant to watch.
Fright Night perfectly mixes, horror, comedy and romance into one and I honestly don't think I've seen a movie blend those elements together better than this one, truly amazing.
Then we move onto the awesome soundtrack, Brad Fiedel's instrumental and vocal work on Fright Night really brings the movie together, especially his track 'Come To Me' it's so good it almost sounds like it belongs in a porn film but trust me it really works in this horror movie especially during the scenes with Amy and Jerry they are golden.
Here's a bit of trivia for you, speaking of porn 'Evil' Ed Thompson (Stephen Geoffreys) went into gay porn in the early 90's and had done ever since, but not that I've seen any.
So if you have never seen Fright Night I insist you hunt this gem down, this is classic 80's horror at it's best and one of the greatest vampire movies of all time.