TW reviews Salem’s Lot 2024

By Owen Quinn author

So I left for a long deserved holiday in Turkey on the day Salem’s Lot was broadcast so with limited internet I couldn’t resist checking YouTube for clips and to see what people thought.

Now we all know that this almost never got released due to so many issues and sad to say they are plain for all to see on screen. Everyone knows Salem’s Lot is like a favourite child to me. The original mini series is just perfect and terrified me as a kid. Those fears continue to this day especially the scraping at the window and the “Look at me ” scene. The Rob Lowe version is weak and we are not even going to talk about the woeful Return To Salem’s Lot movie. The David Soul version is terrifying and told beautifully by director Tobe Hooper.

So when this delayed version was announced for transmission, I was excited. Could they match the terror of the original? Would a noise at the window make me slip even further under the quilt?

Sadly, no.

Anyone approaching this project surely knows that this story is too big for a two hour movie. The original was edited for a DVD release and lacked any impact it had on first viewing. It was chopped to bits losing the character nuances and flow of the story. Salem’s Lot should have been handled like It; two movies or a four hour mini series. The story is too big and complex for two hours. And it shows.

The editing and rush to broadcast is so obvious leaving me scratching my head at parts. Everyone came to the firm conclusion that vampires were real very quickly. The characters are mere ghosts of what they should be and we simply do not care. Some are reduced to mere cameos. The only exception is teacher Matthew Burke whom seems to be a three dimensional figure until he decides to go and research Barlow by going into Barlow’s basement. Bill Camp does a great job of making Matthew the most human character in the entire movie yet his end is steeped in dumbass. There he meets Mark Petrie who from the outset seems a little violent for a boy his age. Beating the bully is one thing but torture is something else. Before you know Burke is dead and Mark is out as a one boy killing machine whose research for killing vampires comes from his comic books. But as a horror fan, he would have already known all vampire lore. This scene makes it look like he only became interested in horror the week before transmission.

But before I tear it apart I will admit there were some great attempts at originality and making it scary.

Ralphie’s abduction by Straker is almost Tim Burtonesque in nature via the silhouettes. Similarly Ralphie seeing Barlow creep towards him from inside the sack is unnerving but why do Barlow’s reveal so early and so matter of factly?

Mike Ryerson and Matthew Burke in the bar. Sickly Mike on the verge of becoming a vampire is scary thanks to the lighting and direction. When you think he has turned is a genuine heartstopper as you fear for Matthew Burke’s life. You’re waiting for the rocking chair scene in his house and those words that haunt horror fans since the original transmission.

“Look at me teacher!”

The new battle is almost as good as vampire Mike shows a cunning side to the vamps but it fails to match the original.

Seeing the vampires on the rooftops is freaky but that shot in the trailer is really it.

The drive in with coffin cars was clever and scary, a good idea that wasn’t used to its full potential.

But for fans the most iconic scenes from the original were when Mark receives a midnight visit from his buddy Glick. This was the first scene I saw on holiday and immediately shook my head.

The scare factor of a vampire invasion is the fact it is insidious and silent. It happens in the night leaving us thinking there is a bad flu going round. Do we really check on our neighbours as much as we talk of how we carer about our friends and neighbours? No we don’t which allows Barlow to infect so many so quickly. In the original Danny Glick is whispering to Mark to open the window, lightly scratching with those nails. If you were in a deep sleep in the same room, you wouldn’t even know it was happening. Silence, stealth and hiding behind normality because we would never believe such a thing as vampires was possible is how the town falls.

But not here.

Ralphie bangs on the window so loudly it’s like the bailiffs are at the door and shouts at Mark to let him in. If that were our house, everyone would be up asking what the hell all the noise was. Even vampire Glick entering the room is too fast; there is no tension, no horror, no drama as this thing enters the room. Then it gets a cross in the face and screams out the window. All I can say is Mark’s parents are a pair of really deep sleepers, bless them.

But this again is the rushed editing and loss of story that cripples this scene. There are moments where even the audience were saying “Oh come on!”

In the climatic drive-in vampire emergence, Ben Mears is bounced on by three vamps and yet doesn’t get bitten once. What are they waiting for? His neck? Oh no, we can’t bite any other part of your body bar the neck.

Ben and Mark drive out of the town as all the vampires apparently burned when Mark collapsed the big movie screen catching the vamps in the sunlight. The impression is that all the vampires are dead and they drive off to who knows where. Really? I didn’t see any kid vampires there and we know there are lots of them as demonstrated by the treehouse scene. It’s just over and that’s it. First thing I’d be doing is dropping Maniac Mark off to the nearest rehab for counselling. That kid went super-killer too fast for my liking.

The bottom line is, aside from Matthew Burke, I didn’t care about these characters at all. Speaking of which, I am quite sure that James Mason is turning in his grave with the version of Straker presented here. Who on that team thought this was a good move? He talks like he’s trying to revive Young Frankenstein. I actually cringed at how Straker was portrayed. He is so OTT it is laughable; e.g. the scene where he tries to get the Glick boys into his car. The acting of Pilou Asbaek is so shockingly bad as Straker is reduced to a mere caricature. The beauty of the character when James mason played it, is that Starker is so friendly and seemingly open, that you cannot help but be drawn to him. He is the quintessential gentleman that you would happily have tea and scones with. Yet beneath that exterior, you can see his malevolence especially when dealing with the police. He knows full well the fate of everyone in the town and is smugly seething with triumph that he has served his Master so well and delivered the townspeople literally into Hell. This Straker is mere pantomime to the point of embarrassment.

I don’t mind the new Barlow and his death didn’t seem as easy as the original. For me it was very 30 Days Of Night but his scare factor was ripped away with poor direction and an all too early reveal.

Salem’s Lot 2024 is simply a rush job that was made by people that hoped the name alone would bring in the bucks. They failed to understand what makes Salem’s Lot so scary. They failed to understand how big this story is and while they took some parts of the original as templates for this new version, it fails due to rushed editing. Take the scene where the heroes enter the Marsten House and it is the morning. They are no sooner in the house that they run out of it. It is suddenly night.

The inconsistencies are there for all to see. When Doctor Cody stabs vampire Mrs Glick in the face with a scalpel, she says that there is no blood yet when Ben Mears falls on top of a vamp, it explodes in a shower of blood. Come on guys, is it any wonder that they were hesitant to release it?

As it stands now, there is nothing to match the terror and pure genuine, palpable fear generated by the original. Maybe it is time for James Wan to put his spin on it. In the meantime, David soul and James mason can stand undefeated champions of childhood terror.