Review by C.J. Bunce
That Halloween movie you’ve been waiting years for, the one that has all the right beats and evokes the best of the horror from the ’70s and ’80s? It’s finally here. It’s the latest remake and adaptation of Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot, and this one is the best of them all. In fact it surpasses most of the catalog of adaptations of King’s novels and stories, except the perennial favorite Silver Bullet, The Dead Zone (the movie and the series), and the series Haven–yes, it’s better than The Shining (which even King said he didn’t like) and Carrie.
Writer-directed Gary Dauberman, known for his Annabelle movies and Swamp Thing, has a sure-fire hit that would have made a fantastic theatrical release. He found a way to make a movie set in the 1970s with all the beats of classic John Carpenter, with cinematography and music to match. It approaches the kind of Halloween horror hit we loved with The Fog, Silver Bullet, and The Black Phone, and if you love those movies you’re going to have a load of fun watching Salem’s Lot.
If you saw the 2021 movie Black Phone, derived from a story from King’s son Joe Hill, you’ll recall the incredible attention director Scott Derrickson gave to the historical setting, from the clothes to the cars to the houses and neighborhood. Salem’s Lot doesn’t match that pristine handling, but it comes close, enough to completely immerse viewers in the time period and the town of Jerusalem’s Lot (the shortened movie title is never explained, and doesn’t really matter). Salem’s Lot is a vampire story, complete with a Nosferatu-meets-Marilyn Manson creature, and that monster makes it a really good bookend with Silver Bullet, which featured a werewolf posing as a priest. Dauberman would do well to get with King and continue the King Classic Monsterverse, and the ending almost sets us up for the possibility.
Rising star Lewis Pullman adds another superb leading-man role to his portfolio, starring as author Ben Mears. What does he write? We never find out, and don’t really need to know. Like Nick Castle in The Fog, he has a tie to the town, but really is just a pawn and potential victim to a line of murders of young boys that happens as soon as he returns to town after years away. Nearly every character–and many scenes–influenced later King projects, and it’s a bit boggling noting all the elements that play out over and over in King horror stories. At the same time the movie copies beats from John Carpenter movies. Was this conscious on Dauberman’s part? A quick glimpse of zombie-like vampires might flash you back to a similar scene in Carpenter’s Prince of Darkness. John Benjamin Hickey’s unworthy priest may conjure Hal Holbrook’s Father Malone in The Fog.
As for casting, Pullman looks like a 1970s lead actor in a horror B-movie, which is perfect here. For street cred, Alfre Woodard plays Dr. Cody, the town doctor who first encounters a missing body in the town morgue. Her character is a strong update to past versions of the doctor, as is Jordan Preston Carter’s young Mark Petrie, a powerful character performed brilliantly by the young actor. Carter truly is the co-star of the movie, portraying for all it’s worth that rare kid character that acts like a real kid–on par with the two stars of The Black Phone and the late Corey Haim’s young hero and his sister played by Megan Follows in Silver Bullet.
Makenzie Leigh plays the daughter of the town librarian, William Sadler is the town cop, and Unbreakable’s Spencer Treat Clark is a guy who takes on what appears to be a routine job. But it’s The Queen’s Gambit’s Bill Camp and his distinctive baritone voice that grounds this as a deliciously creepy horror tale. He is a great stand-in for Donald Pleasance and Hal Holbrook if you’re trying to evoke the best of 1970s and 1980s horror movies.
Is it scary? At times Dauberman’s pacing and Michael Burgess’s cinematography will give you a good start or jump, but this movie is really about a creepy mood, one of those cautionary tales where you never want to get stuck being in the wrong place at the wrong time, like a basement with a big-time vampire, or in your room with an undead ghost trying to break in via your window, or a foot away from a vampire without at least two popsicle sticks to make a cross with to ward him off. The special effects aren’t particularly grisly, keeping the movie out of slasher flick territory, although the sound effects are cranked up for the death of one of the kids at the hands (and fangs) of one of the big bad vampires. The main vampire played by Alexander Ward might be shown a little more than necessary. He’s an update to the character in the past movie and series, who intentionally is a ringer for the original Nosferatu. It might have been a bit better to keep him away more, like the shark in Jaws.
The drive-in theater scenes and all the great 1970s cars are a nice bonus. The nice incorpration of Gordon Lightfoot’s Sundown might put the movie in modern classic territory.
Director Tobe Hooper’s adaptation of the story in 1979 starred Starsky & Hutch’s David Soul and James Mason and a host of actors we’d get to know later like George Dzundza and Bonnie Bedelia. The 2004 mini-series included Rob Lowe, Andre Braugher, Donald Sutherland, Rutger Hauer, and James Cromwell. This story didn’t need to be a mini-series, and is much better for not having a cast made primarily of major stars. And you’ll probably applaud every time Jordan Preston Carter is on the screen.
Salem’s Lot is as good as you’d hope for in an adaptation of a Stephen King story. It’s a perfect Halloween movie and you’ll wish you’d seen it in a theater, especially a drive-in back in 1979 or 1980. One of the year’s best, most surprisingly fun movies, it’s streaming now on Max.
