Aug 4, 2025
Fright Night (1985)
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Fright Night (1985)
Welcome to... Fright... Night! For real.
FRIGHT NIGHT (1985) dir. Tom Holland
Vampire horror movies
FRIGHT NIGHT dir. tom holland
TJ MIKELOGAN'S HALLOWEEN HORROR 2025 EVENT | DAY 13: HORROR PARALLELS
DRACULA (1958) // FRIGHT NIGHT (1985) dir. Terence Fisher // dir. Tom Holland
Fright Night (1985) Propaganda for The Lost Boys Fans, or: Please Watch This Other Very Gay 80s Movie
If you are a fan of extremely homoerotic 80s cult classics The Lost Boys, it is possible you have already heard of Fright Night, since they're two of the most iconic vampire films of their decade. BUT! if you came to TLB through the musical or aren't super into film history, I figured it was worth shouting out. Because I find it fascinating.
Did I mention you can watch it for free.
What's Fright Night?
Fright Night is a 1985 film by first-time writer/director Tom Holland (not that one), who is probably best known for this and the first Chucky movie, Child's Play.
The plot centers on 17-year-old horror fanatic Charley Brewster, who happens to see people moving a coffin into the house next door one night. As it becomes clearer that his new neighbor Jerry Dandridge is, in fact, a vampire, Charley seeks out help from his horror expert bestie "Evil" Ed, girlfriend Amy, and local late night movie host and washed-up actor Peter Vincent (who has previously killed vampires...in movies).
The problem is that they all think Charley's delusional, which makes it easy for Jerry to focus on ruining the life of the teenager who briefly inconvenienced him. I'll tell you right now that Jerry is a significant percentage of why one should watch this movie. Nobody does petty bitch shit with as much aplomb as Jerry Dandridge.
IT'S ABOUT THE THEMES
I've banged on ad nauseum about how interesting I find the disjunction between Joel Schumacher's direction and TLB's base script vis a vis how it frames queerness (TLDR, the movie could easily be about rescuing the normative family unit of Michael, Star, and Laddie from the clutches of the scary queers, but Schumacher laces in so much sympathy for the boys and ironized suspicion of Americana that it complicates the text compellingly).
But Fright Night is just kind of....doing gay panic, even if I think it's probably mostly inadvertant (WAIT COME BACK, IT'S REALLY INTERESTING.) Jerry is a very well-groomed guy in a cable knit sweater moving in with his partner in antiquing amd "roommate," Billy (who is his familiar, and they are definitely fucking). The antiquing is not a joke. That is Jerry's actual cover. Possibly even a thing he really does for funsies, I don't know. The entire purpose of his 1000 years of unlife is to be a troll.
Jerry also has the standard air of vampiric sexual menace, which he mostly uses to terrorize teenagers. Yes, he gets chummy with Charley's mom, but it's more to prove a point to Charley that he can come and go as he pleases. Then he turns Charley's friend Ed (more on that in a moment) and goes after his girlfriend Amy (supposedly because she looks like a long-dead lover, which does not gel with his character up to that point at all tbh; this is a guy who lives and dies by the bit). This dude is 100% the queer menace invading the suburbs who must be slain.
Let Me Tell You About My Sad, Horrible, Annoying Son
....and so is Evil Ed. Goddamn, I am-and-ain't surprised that Ed Thompson isn't a Tumblr blorbo. He's a weird horror nerd who feels like his one and only friend has ditched him for a girl and only comes around when he wants something. He is queercoded as fuck--something that his actor, Stephen Geoffreys, purposefully brought to the role as a gay man--and the scene where Jerry corners him feels like it comes out of a different, more deftly made movie.
That shit is fucking SAD and TENDER and HEARTBREAKING. I have an immense soft spot for Ed that's never graduated to full-out blorbodom because unfortunately he is being directed into doing this deeply grating line delivery for a lot of the film (this is not just him, all the young actors are a bit adrift, ESPECIALLY Amy. Holland did not have the directorial expertise to bring out their best).
That does not change that I am still gutted when he dies (don't worry he gets better in that last-minute-stinger way), or that the emotional resonance of the turning scene sticks out wildly against a film that's otherwise a lot of FUN but not very feelsy (which is perhaps why it's so easy to revel in Jerry's fuckery; sure, he's awful, I cannot emphasize enough that he is pretty blatantly assaulting multiple teens in addition to the murders, but the world around him is largely made of cardboard people and so there's a feeling of weightlessness and camp to his smarm).
I must also give a shoutout to Peter Vincent, the weary B-actor who is like a beautiful old queen tired of your shit, played by gay icon Roddy McDowell in a role that's partially a nod to bi icon Vincent Price. There is a general VIBE, is what I'm saying, not unlike TLB but without a sure hand to guide its implications.
Also, while some of them aren't shown off to their best framing/lighting-wise, there are some really incredible special effects and concepts in here. Lots of very lumpy, asymmetrical vampires (though it's baffling they made the vampire teeth SO long the actors can't close their mouths around them).
(NBD just the horrific subtext of failing the next generation in the 80s nbd nbd)
I kind of love it. If nothing else, I need other people to experience a vampire so petty he decides to systematically destroy a teenager's life because said teenager (checks notes) requires Jerry to have exactly one conversation with the cops to shake them off. He's a nightmare. He's a vampire of all time. He's like if Max wanted to have fun (I like to think they knew and hated each other). The people have to know.
If nothing else, it really emphasizes how different two films can look with roughly similar budgets, based on the expertise and experience of a director.
....and then you can watch Fright Night Part 2, which against all odds is a really incredible sequel. How often do you open by gaslighting your protagonist into thinking he's remembering the whole first film wrong. Also there is Belle, an 80s-haired trans lady who kills people while on roller blades and then goes vampire bowling with the rest of the vampire posse. Peak filmmaking.
I just watched Fright Night (1985) and man before the internet if you thought some guy was a vampire you couldn't even google the word "vampire" about it, you had to physically go to a movie studio and harass Vincent Price. Fucked up.
The Lost Boys Novelisation: Michael's straight. He's straight. He's straight. He's straight. The saxophone man didn't happen. He's straight-
Fright Night Novelisation: Charlie Brewster can't help admitting that Jerry Dandridge is Hot As Fuck. God damn. What a handsome man.
