Up late the
other night—of course I regretted it the following day, but the reason I stayed
up late was to watch the vampire film The
Hunger from 1983 (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085701/) on TCM. I can never really pass up
an opportunity to watch yet another stylishly-made horror film, and TCM is a
great channel to find all those kinds of classic films, horror or otherwise. I
won’t say I was enthralled by the film, but it didn’t disappoint either—it had
its moments. It is definitely a film from the 1980s—I read somewhere that a
critic had said it was like watching a long MTV video—chic and stylish with
cool music, but without much substance—that was the gist of it. The Madonna
song Vogue came to mind when I was
watching it. The actors and actresses (David Bowie, Catherine Deneuve, and
Susan Sarandon) did a lot of posing for the camera, but that was the way things
were done then. The film was about modern-day vampires in an urban setting, who
frequented New York City nightclubs looking for potential victims. These
vampires were unlike most of the vampires we’ve come to know about--they could tolerate
the light of day, they murdered their victims with small knives shaped like
Egyptian ankhs, and they could see their reflections in mirrors. The story had
to do with David Bowie’s vampire John trying to find a cure for his rapid aging
that had suddenly set in and that would doom him to eternal life without his
vampire lover Miriam (Catherine Deneuve) who had made him a vampire in the
first place. The film was probably controversial when it came out due to some graphic
scenes of violence and sexual (lesbian) activity. I don’t recall much talk
about this film from that time, nor do I remember that it opened in many
theaters (according to IMDB it opened in 775 theaters nationwide in the USA, approximately
15 per state if it opened in all of them—that’s not many). Perhaps it was
considered an ‘art film’, in which case it would have opened at one or two
theaters in Westchester County where I grew up.
I’ve seen
many vampire films in my lifetime—starting with the House of Dark Shadows from 1970 directed by Dan Curtis, with Jonathan
Frid as the vampire Barnabas Collins (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065856/), followed by Scars of Dracula and The Satanic
Rites of Dracula (among several others) from 1970 and 1973 respectively (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067713/; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070634/) with Christopher Lee as the vampire (he made
many Dracula films). These were followed by the original Nosferatu film from 1922 directed by FW Murnau with Max Schreck as a
very scary Nosferatu (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0013442/), as well as Nosferatu the Vampyre from 1979 directed by Werner Herzog, with
Klaus Kinski as Nosferatu (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079641/).
I remember the New York Times review of the latter film talking about the furor
in the Netherlands (where the film was partially shot) over Herzog’s wanting to
release tens of thousands of rats for one of the scenes in the film. Talk about the quest for realism on the part
of a director.
The classic
Dracula from 1931, directed by Tod
Browning, with Bela Lugosi (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0021814/), and Dracula
from 1979, directed by John Badham, with Frank Langella http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079073/, are very good films, as is Interview with the Vampire from 1994,
directed by Neil Jordan, with Tom Cruise as Lestat (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110148/). But in my opinion, the best vampire film I’ve
ever seen is the 1992 film Bram Stoker’s
Dracula directed by Francis Ford Coppola (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103874/). I remember watching it for the first time when
it came out and being totally drawn in by its mastery and haunting atmosphere.
I’ve since seen it several more times, and each time I watch it I admire it
more and more as a nearly-perfect Dracula film. Gary Oldman as Dracula was
brilliant casting—he did an incredible job, as did Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder,
Anthony Hopkins and all the others. It is the specific scenes in Coppola’s film
that are unforgettable and haunting and that make it my favorite vampire movie—when
Jonathan Harker (played by Keanu Reeves) arrives at Dracula’s castle and the
shadow of the vampire precedes his entrance, Dracula crawling down the walls of
the castle on one of his nightly outings, the appearance of the female vampires
in the castle and their seduction of Jonathan, Dracula’s meeting with Mina, and
so many more.
Besides Gary
Oldman’s Dracula, I have to say that Jonathan Frid’s Barnabas Collins is my vampire
of choice. I’m not a fan of the Twilight
vampire movies; I saw the first film after reading the book and it was not for
me, but I understand that many people do like it. I might have liked the series
as a pre-teenager, but somehow I have the feeling that my entrance into the
world of vampires was forever shaped by Dark Shadows. However campy the series
might have been at times, it took itself seriously and has amassed a large
number of fans through the years. I’m looking forward to Tim Burton’s version
of Dark Shadows and Johnny Depp’s portrayal of Barnabas, but I doubt that
anyone could ever surpass Jonathan Frid’s portrayal of Barnabas Collins.
