By JT REID for the Keizertimes
I have never found vampires particularly frightening. Perhaps it is because I have always been a religious person and religious stuff is kryptonite to the bloodsucking undead.
Perhaps it’s because vampires are subject to a bunch of comfortably convenient rules, like not being able to go out in the day or not being able to enter someone’s dwelling unless invited. Whatever the reason, I was not expecting Salem’s Lot to frighten me half as much as it did, at least in the first half, but as the film went on it became apparent that a whole Lot of problems were going to keep it from becoming a genuine horror classic.
A fresh-out-of-the-coffin adaptation of Stephen King’s classic novel, Salem’s Lot was actually filmed years ago with a theatrical release in mind, only to be shelved and then quietly released on Max (formerly known as HBO Max). Like a couple of bloody puncture wounds on a pale neck, this was not a terribly good omen of things to come, but I forgot about the film’s tortured past as I jumped straight into some unexpectedly spooky vampire action that was greatly complemented by some solid direction and style (thank goodness they set the story in its original year of 1975 instead of doing the boring thing and updating it to today).
I am not a connoisseur of horror films by any means, but the first hour or so of Salem’s Lot was highly effective for me, with plentiful scares and an unsettling atmosphere to boot. The music is forgettable but does its job well, and the cinematography has a creative flare behind it that leads to some truly fantastic shots. Salem’s Lot, much like the titular town, looks great on the surface, but also like the town it turns out to be a bit dead inside on closer inspection.
The biggest knock against Salem’s Lot is a distinct lack of characterization and world building. The original novel, which happens to be one of my favorite works by Stephen King, is considerably shorter than most Stephen King books, but there was still so much cut out of it as to be unrecognizable.
The characters are as one-dimensional as can be, particularly the bad guys, who we learn absolutely nothing about, and the ending is so different from that of the novel that I briefly forgot that I was watching an adaptation of something that I had read before. Like a vampire, Salem’s Lot doesn’t have any real spirit to it, and even the creative camerawork gets exhausting as the film continuously returns to its favorite tricks over and over again. Perhaps a mini series would have been the way to go. Or maybe we just needed another scene or two to flesh characters and the story out. As it stands Salem’s Lot is a passable summary of a much greater novel rather than a great story itself. You could do much worse, though.
Salem’s Lot is now available on Max.