Part 2 Week: A Return to Salem's Lot

Howdy boys and girls and behold Day 1 of Part 2 Week.  I would like to point out at this time I just finished viewing this movie in question so this is coming at you at about 900 mph so you have been warned.  Okay for starters our film today harkens from Jeruselum's Lot where we saw David Soul and Lance Kerwin fled to the fictional town of Ximico Guatemala... so why are we back?  Didn't the Marsten house and its vampiric scourge burn like so much kindling?    How do you carry the story further?  Will Ben whip the jeep back around and just start torching every house in Salem's Lot or could you in fact start anew with a fresh new cast but the same town?  Impossible some may say but we will see.   This is A Return to Salem's Lot.

We don't take kind to no book learning around here, mister!

Van Meer: I am not a Nazi spoiler.  I'm a Nazi killer!










Dropped into the lap of experienced writer and directer of exploitation/TV/TV Movie and feature films Larry Cohen (Hell Up in Harlem, Black Caesar, It's Alive, It Lives Again, Full Moon High, See China and Die, It's Alive III: Island of the Alive, As Good as Dead and Phone Booth) opens our picture in a remote village in South America (Florida Glades and sound stage *cough cough*) as anthropologist Joe Webber (Michael Moriarty of Who'll Stop the Rain, Too Far to Go, Reborn, The Stuff, Odd Birds, Law & Order, Courage Under Fire and the 4400) as he documents a human sacrifice still being performed and true to his ethics and oaths he dare not directly interfere with another society.  After that round of seemingly distasteful footage, our hero heads to Maine after receiving an argent telephone call from his ex-wife about Jeremy (Ricky Addison Reed of A Return to Salem's Lot) his very strained and delinquent son.  Joe is given the ultimatum of tend to your son or we shack him in the wacko basket by his loving mother and her new anal retentive husband.  Seriously you could sharpen pencils with this man's rump.

You kids today; with you being out of focus and your hula hoops!!

Together they head to Salem's Lot to inquire about the inheritance of this cozy house in Maine...  the town that had more than a few vampire murders, vicious attacks and at least one manor house that WENT UP LIKE A FRICKIN' ROMAN CANDLE but I digress.    Our foul mouthed youth haggles a used car quite well and the two head to Salem... where everything looks intact.  I mean no hint of the Marsten house and frankly we are almost in a completely different location.    Spoiler!  It was not shot in California this time around so the town is both completely different but similar appearance so hello to Salem's Lot Vermont locale.  

The town's shops, gas station and other such establishment seems to be run by doughy pale white folk and normally I am not disturbed by this but this folks look beyond the pale.  Almost as if they are not running on enough pints.   Joe tries to bond with Jeremy and they are actually making decent headway over all so you get the vibe this is supposed to be a father and son reunion and reconciliation vehicle... in a vampire movie.

The suspense of disbelief is a bit difficult as you can clearly make out how sallow and anemic these folk appear to be.  Joe is roaming around town and gosh golly more folks appear out and about but only at night.   The vampires finally come clean and feel that Joe is the man to transcribe their town's legacy for generations to come and you witness a community that accepts vampires but it is also the norm.

Okay now we get to a few tidbits of griping, WTF moments and plot holes.   Our vamp town survives primarily on cow's blood rather than feed on their Reinfields which hey good for them.  The editing comes off as choppy and amateurish as you see people skip frames, arrive in areas they were not traveling to or from prior and you are scratching your head thinking several frames were removed hastily.   It almost looks like there wasn't enough footage to cover the action or the editor was huffing ether during the gig.

 Dialogue gets spouted at random intervals and feel out of place and sync to what you are seeing and feels comical without the intent.  Overall I came away feeling like Larry Cohen got rushed all the way through this and did not give him adequate time, budget and FX makeup to create a scary flick.   The jump scares feel forced and I damn near fell out of my seat laughing as senior citizens with plastic fangs pop out into the day for night shots.  IT'S A CRAP FILTER, PEOPLE!!!  LOSE IT!     Coupled with the fact I can see clouds clear as day I cannot make out which actor is talking half of the time.   With Hooper's rendition of Salem's Lot I felt terror, fear and became easily frighten by kids with the Shawn Cassidy haircut.   This movie made me appreciate that I have a comfortable chair to sit in while viewing so I didn't have to apologize to my neck or butt for going dead.
On the up side it had an amazing musical score by Michael Minard (Losing Ground, Tales of the Unexpected, Special Effects, The Mutilator and Deand on the Money), the location and aerial shots were breathtaking but at the end of the day I really could have found much better film.

Uncle Jesse!!!  NOoOoOoOOOOooooo!!!!