Near Dark
Starring: Lance Henrikson, Adrian Pasdar, Jenny Wright, Bill PaxtonDirector: Katheryn Bigelow
Year of Release: 1987
This is a sort of Vampire Western. A young guy named Caleb runs into a pretty girl named Mae who just happens to be a vampire that runs with a posse of vamps from town to town killing people and lighting stuff o9n fire. Caleb gets sucked in (get it?) and tries to fit in with the homicidal crew but can’t stand the necessity to kill. Eventually he escapes and is “cured” by a blood transfusion before having the final showdown with the vamp posse and rescuing Mae in the process.
This is the directorial debut of Katheryn Bigelow who was considered a protege of James Cameron. In fact three actors from James Cameron’s Aliens (released the year before) are featured in this film - Bill Paxton, Lance Henrikson, and Jeanette Goldstein. The directing is a bit unimaginative though. There is no real energy to it and the characters never really make the leap to actually being scary. They are more dusty and jerks than anything else.
Lance Henrikson is great as the head vamp dude. His naturally creepy face is still young enough that it doesn’t just look old like it does now. Jeanette Goldstein is passable. Bill Paxton lets his full a**hole flag flie. He plays nice guy roles these days and it’s easy to forget he was an a**hole character actor in the ’80s (Weird Science, Aliens, etc.) and in this one he is the most homicidal and crazy of the bunch.
It’s a rather unremarkable movie but kinda fun in parts. A goofier and more fun “vampire western” would be From Dusk Till Dawn.
