Near Dark [DVD]

Katherine Bigelow's masterpiece has aged very well and could almost be set in today's world. The direction is faultless, Tangerine Dream's score is meaty, yet ethereal, Eric Red and Katherine Bigelow's script is superb. Jenny Wright is unforgettable as the feminine, seductive and dangerous predatory Mae. Lance Henrikson (Jesse) is complex, riveting and haunting as his vicious vampire clan's patriarch, all the actors are perfect in their roles, especially the late great legendary Bill Paxton 😎, who is unforgettable in one of his best ever screen roles as Severen. When we the audience and the movie's pure soul, Adrian Pasdar (Caleb), see Severen, Jesse and his vampire clan enter that bar and lay the unfortunate inhabitants to waste it's a movie scene has been often lovingly homaged in other movies, but rarely as memorably as shown here. This 2003 Studio Canal two DVD disc special edition has an amazing THX transfer that cleans away all the previous dirt and flecks present in the old 1987 VHS version so we can fully appreciate master cinematographer Adam Greenberg's sublime sunrise vistas and all compositions he lenses. The DTS track adds extra oomph! to the motel gunfight scene and physical sound effects. A beautiful movie😍.

Just a heads up for anyone looking at this one, ASIN B07DS3DJPD, the Studio Canal Blu-ray from France, the French subtitles are forced, as part of viewing in English, for both audio tracks (5.1 and 2.0). They are actually incorporated into the title of the film on the menu page, which should have been my first clue. The subtitles disappear when viewing with the 2.0 French language track. All attempts to remove the subtitles or block them on the disc, using both Blu-ray player overrides and computer overrides, have failed. As such, I can't recommend this release, unless you just can't find a copy on either Blu-ray or DVD to view. Given how incredibly distracting the bright white subtitles are on this unfortunate Blu-ray, I would say go with a DVD before this. Good luck.

Finally got to watch this 80s vampire film recently after years of wanting to watch it after seeing it on vhs in my local video shop way back in the early 90s aged about 16. It was worth the wait. Love Lance Henrickson as the lead vampire, and was good to see the late Bill Paxton (RIP Bill) in a very different role as the evil Severan. Adrian Pasdar, who I watched recently in the TV series Heroes as the president of USA was likable as the hero Caleb who falls for the beautiful and seductive Vampire Mae. Yeh would recommend this flm, hard to believe it's over 30 years old now, it's aged well

There's a reason why this film features in almost all lists of "best vampire movies". Which is because it deserves to. If you think being a vampire is about having power, lots of sex and money, a great wardrobe and having an all-round cool lifestyle for eternity you should probably see Near Dark. Being undead maybe isn't all it's cracked up to be.Why it's so hard to get hold of a copy I've no idea, it really is up there with the best of the genre.

A strange, sombre film, there's a reason why Kathryn Bigelow's Near Dark has a cult following. It tells its linear story with strict fidelity, mixing horror, western and romantic tragedy to haunted effect. You may be surprised by how moving it is. It's not a typical 80s horror film - there's no real jump scares or busty teenagers - aiming instead for a more emotional tale which, like some of Wes Craven's best work, explores family dynamics, juxtaposing a savage, murderous unit against a traditional one.Adrian Pasdar plays Caleb Colton, a small town farmer's son. One night he meets Mae (Jenny Wright), a young woman who claims to come from a local trailer park. She's really a vampire, and in a moment of passion bites him. As he begins to lose his humanity Mae begs her "family", a gang of fellow vampires, to let him join them. The gang's led by Jesse Hooker (Lance Henrikson) and includes his wife Diamondback (Jenette Goldstein), psychopath Severen (Bill Paxton) and Homer (Joshua Miller), a child with an older soul. Meanwhile, Caleb's dad (Tim Thomerson) and sister (Marcie Leeds) go looking for him.What's interesting about Near Dark is that it needn't be about vampires, necessarily. It plays like a serial killer film along the lines of Badlands and Natural Born Killers, where disaffected psychos roam across a lonely world. Caleb's reluctance to kill for sustenance threatens his life while the family, except besotted Mae, tire of him. The gang, particularly its male members, are characterised as heartless sadists. Jesse's a Charles Manson-like figure and Severen's an obnoxious nutter, a role Paxton seemed to specialise in during this phase of his career (see also: Aliens and Predator 2). The most intriguing character is Homer, whose torment is that he's a boy with a man's needs. Diamondback serves as his mother, but what he desperately wants isn't a parent but a mate. The idea that while physically you don't age your personality does is one I hadn't seen before in vampire films. It's a Dorian Gray-ish conundrum. Diamondback isn't greatly distinguished, existing mostly, I think, to provide a matriarchal figure, but she still serves that purpose well.The acting's uniformly excellent, especially from Wright and Miller. Miller makes you believe he's a man inside as opposed to just a child talking tough, while Wright is a deeply sympathetic heroine. She's sad, lost and lonely, not quite sure of herself in a life she doesn't enjoy. Caleb's clearly her salvation. Their love story's touching in a way which recent supernatural romances don't understand. They're not wealthy, beautiful, priviliged mopers who scowl and whine; they're people adrift in a strange, barbaric world, bound together by chance.

This is a competent and I would say good film. It is not spectacular, nor is it a massive action film with huge stakes. However the atmosphere is very well built and the characters stick in the mind for a long time.It is haunting and does what it aims to do. Not everything is great, and at times it can seem a little bit amateur and rushed, however I think it stands up well to the rest of Katherine Bigelow's work and definitely is worth a watch.It is certainly one of the more interesting takes on vampirism I have seen, without ever coming right out and saying so, therefore it works as a parable to all the other things Vampirism stands in for, addiction, sex, ennui.Overall a recommend this to all fans of genre film, however be aware that it is an older film and needs to be judged in that context.