Musical Monday!
FRIGHT NIGHT: THE MUSICAL("AMY AWAKE")
The Kaplan brothers are a couple of my favorite youtubers.
Jon and Al Kaplan's Website
I remember the first time I saw one of their videos on youtube. It was
Silence! The Musical: Put the F***ing Lotion in the Basket. Silence! The Musical actually got a full treatment. The Brothers Kaplan generally stick to doing spoof musicals of such action films like Robocop and Rambo but Arnold Scwartzenegger is their favority subject. In fact, my favorite youtube video of last year is probably their video, Conan: The Musical.
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CHECK OUT CONAN THE MUSICAL!
Maybe some day I'll do a top 11 or top 6 countdown of my favorite Kaplan Brothers "The Musical Videos" but for now I want to talk about Fright Night.
Fright Night just got a remake treatment and the reviews are generally positive with a Rotten Tomato rating of 76. I still haven't seen it, but maybe I'll be able to catch it soon. The Kaplan brothers dedicated their newest video to their father and are obviously huge fans of the film. Yet, why is it that so few people have seen the original?
To be fair, I only saw it for the first time last year, and at first I was kind of uninterested. What won me over was the humor and a few excellent (but perhaps a little hammy) performances. The special effects are decent enough and the story is pretty interesting. The story is based on the archetype of the boy who cried wolf (or in this case, vampire). Charley Brewster is a teenager and horror movie buff. When he spots the new neighbor doing strange activities like moving a coffin into his basement and biting prostitutes (who soon go missing) he becomes suspicious. He tries to tell everyone else, including his girlfriend, best friend "Evil Ed" and even the police but the neighbor hides his true nature to well. Things get serious when the vampire attacks him and Charley is forced to turn to help from a horror movie star and his idol, Peter Vincent.The movie is really driven by its characters. The main character, Charlie, is a little bit dull and his girlfriend, Amy (wjo in no way seems like a teenager in this film), as well as his Mother, are unbelievably wooden. Yet, three characters not only make this movie great, they make it
my favorite vampire film of all time!
First, lets talk about the best performance in the whole film. Chris Sarandon's performance as the vampire, Jerry Dandridge. Jerry is not your typical vampire. He is attractive and charismatic, but he is not obvious. He is not at all eccentric either. He is an antique salesman (his alibi and career). He lives with his friend, Billy, an in-house carpenter, and keeps to himself. Once Charley sees him acting suspiciously, Jerry goes over to meet Charley's mom, befriending her and getting permission to enter whenever he pleases. After Charley calls the cops on him, Jerry attacks him in his room, and threatens to kill him if he interferes again. Despite the fact he kills prostitutes to live, Jerry seems to be able to control his bestial nature and he understands Charley's curiosity.
He wasn't some charismatic bad boy before becoming a vampire. He reveals he was much like Charley. He exposes that, in many ways, he embraces the fantastic nature of vampirism, he even watches vampire films. He covers up his secret in a lot of interesting ways. For example, he explains that he is a born again Christian and thus finds the idea of holy water to be offensive. He has lots of great alibis but his best defense? He eats fruit. In almost every scene, Jerry is casually peeling and eating a piece of fruit. Sarandon explained in a recent interview that he saw this as an extension of the idea of a vampires as having bat ancestry. Yet, he is no wimp. He has super strength, mind control powers, and his only true weaknesses are direct sunlight, holy water and real "faith". When threatened and pushed into a corner, he becomes the monster that he has hidden.
My next favorite performance came from Roddy McDowall as Peter Vincent. As much as people are fascinated with vampires, I am more fascinated by vampire hunters. But I am more a fan of Dr. Van Helsing from the Bram Stoker's Dracula than Marvel's Blade or that other Van Hellsing. Peter Vincent is an actor. He has just been fired from his job of hosting horror movies on a tv program called, "Fright Night." When, Charley comes to him for help, Peter ignores him as a rabid fan or perhaps someone trying to take the mickey out of him. McDowall really does a great job with the role, and is even, somewhat, self parodying.
When Charely's friends asks him to prove to Charley that Jerry is not a vampire Peter agrees, only after being bribed and joins their plan. When Peter discovers Jerry does not have a reflection, he tries to flee. In the end, he reveals he is all the hero that he was in his films and transcends the myth.This is a truly awesome character that parodies the hammy acting of horror movie stars of old. Peter Vincent would have never discovered his true calling if not for the third character.
"You're so cool, Brewster!" -Ed, Fright Night (1985)
Evil Ed is a bit of an oddity. His performance is the hammiest of all and yet, I find myself quoting him every time I play a minion to a great villain. He is just, well, special. He is what most people would call a "dork". I think most nerds have been like Ed or known an Ed at some point in their lives. He is obnoxious, annoying, creepy, perverted and even a bit cruel, but somehow Charley is still his friend. Ed isn't really a bad guy. He is just a teenage outcast. He wants to be popular but doesn't know how to express himself appropriately. I have had friends like this and have even been this guy at some points in my adolescence. His hammyness is somehow real because we all knew someone like this growing up. Yet, it is his role as the outcast that makes him vulnerable for his final transformation.
As part of his way of getting revenge on Charley, for merely being troublesome, and perhaps out of some empathy for a boy that he recognizes as being like he was once, Jerry turns Ed into his vampire spawn. Ed, now a vampire and realizing Charley was right, goes to terrorize Peter Vincent, his former idol, because he let him down. If Peter Vincent had admitted the truth, perhaps Ed's transformation could've been prevented. In the end, it is Vincent who repels Ed, thus getting the guts to confront Jerry with Charley and in the end, it is Vincent who has to stop Ed.
In a way, Ed is really the most important character in the film. Charley is a tad boring, but the two are best friends and represent the audience. Charley resists the temptation to submit to Jerry by leaving him alone but Ed becomes the monster.
If anything will stick with me about this movie is that vampire films don't need to be pigeon holed as romance films. Thanks to Anne Rice and Stephenie Meyer we have a generation of fans who only see vampires as over romanticized sex objects and only seem to enjoy films where the vampires are the protagonists. A film like Fright Night reminds me of where vampires came from and, in my opinion, is a better interpretation of the vampire story to modern culture than Twilight, because it better covers the themes of teenage awkwardness (as opposed to dullness) and horror (as opposed to sparkles). I will always prefer a story about someone overcoming a vampire than a story about someone becoming a vampire.
