Salem's Lot (1979 TV mini-series)

Infobox Film
name = Salem's Lot


caption = Standard artwork for Salem's Lot
director = Tobe Hooper
producer = Richard Kobritz
writer = Novel:
Stephen King
Teleplay:
Paul Monash
starring = David Soul
James Mason
Lance Kerwin
Bonnie Bedelia
music = Harry Sukman
cinematography = Jules Brenner
editing = Tom Pryor
Carroll Sax
distributor = Warner Bros.
released = flagicon|USA 17 November, 1979
flagicon|UK 7th & 9th September 1981
runtime = 184 min.
language = English
budget = $4,000,000
imdb_id = 0079844
preceded_by =
amg_id =
followed_by = "A Return to Salem's Lot"

"Salem's Lot" is a 1979 horror television mini-series directed by Tobe Hooper, from the Paul Monash teleplay, and starred former Starsky & Hutch actor David Soul and English actor James Mason.

Based on the novel of the same name by Stephen King, the plot revolves around a small town that slowly becomes infested with vampires. However, the mini-series is necessarily toned-down from its source material, removing several characters, sub plots, including the social commentary within the novel, and instead focus primarily on visual scares, atmosphere and tension. The appearance of the lead vampire was inspired by the motion picture "Nosferatu". As in that film, vampires are portrayed as monstrous and repulsive in keeping with legend and folklore. The much later Hollywood version of the vampire as charismatic and misunderstood is eschewed.

The 1979 mini-series attracted a large viewing audience and received positive reviews from critics. It has garnered a considerable cult following due to its adherence to King's original novel and the film's relatively high production values.

Plot

Writer Ben Mears, a former resident of Salem's Lot, returns to the town of his childhood due to his fascination with the Marsten House, a sinister old mansion that overlooks the small town. Both interested in and fearful of the house, Mears attempts to rent it, but finds that another new arrival has beat him to the property; the mysterious Richard Straker, who opens an antique shop and reveals to the townsfolk that an even more mysterious silent partner, Kurt Barlow, is also set to move into the Marsten House. Mears during his visit, develops a romantic relationship with a local woman, Susan Norton, and befriends her father, Dr. Bill Norton. Mears also renews his old friendly relationship with his former school teacher, Jason Burke, and reveals to him his view that the Marsten House is somehow inherently evil.

During the course of the mini-series, strange events begin to take place after a large crate is delivered to the Marsten House, which turns out to contain Barlow, actually an ancient master vampire, who has come to the town after having sent his servant (Straker) to make way for his arrival. Various sub-plots are woven into this, including the story of an affair between the real estate agent Larry Crockett and his secretary. Straker cryptically informs Crockett who sold the property to him that he will be rewarded, and Crockett is later attacked by Barlow. Mears and Straker's arrival coincides with the disappearance of a young boy, Ralphie Glick, and the two (along with Barlow) becomes suspects by Constable Gillespie. The Glick boy returns as a vampire to claim his brother, Danny, who rises from the dead and strikes first at Mike Ryerson and then a friend, Mark Petrie. However, Mark is familiar with the properties of movie vampires, and is able to resist Danny's hypnotic control.

Slowly, the vampires spread as Mears and Burke figures out what is happening to the town and attempt to do something to stop it. Burke, however, falls prey to a heart attack, following a visit from the vampirised Ryerson. In the end, Susan, along with the Petrie boy have been both captured by Straker after breaking into the Marsten house. Mears and Dr. Norton heads over to end the town's takeover. Inside the house, Norton is killed by the daily guarding Straker, who is then shot to death by Ben. Afterwards, Mears with Petrie finally destroys Barlow, but Susan is nowhere to be found. Both flee the town after setting it ablaze in the hopes of 'purifying' the evil that has engulfed the town.

The mini-series ends where it opened; Mears and Petrie seen two years later at a mission in Central America. They are apparently on the run from the vengeful vampires. Fortunately, they know when the vampires are near when the holy water they keep with them begins to glow. Warned by this phenomenon as they refill their supplies of holy water, Mears and Petrie quickly go to pack their things before fleeing from the mission. However, Mears finds Susan lying in his bed; now a vampire, she prepares to bite Ben, as he leans down to embrace her, but only to mercilessly stake her, though with grief. He and Petrie then leave, with the vampires still on their trail.

Production

The rights to the Salem's Lot novel were a hot topic within the industry and the genre for quite some time before the film was made. Stephen King himself commented as such "It was a mess. Every director in Hollywood who's ever been involved with horror wanted to do it, but nobody could come up with a script". Larry Cohen wrote a draft of the script that proved unsatisfactory; Producer Richard Kobritz would describe the script as being "really lousy" (Cohen would go on to direct a "A Return to Salem's Lot"), but the filmmakers claim that one element from Cohen's draft remained, namely the decision to turn Barlow from an aristocratic European into the monstrous, Nosferatu-like creature seen in the film. Cohen actually appealed to the Writer's Guild to receive screen credit, but they ruled against him. A screening of the now benchmark horror classic "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre", resulted in Richard Kobritz selecting Tobe Hooper as director, who was thirty-six at the time and fresh off of making the troubled low-budget film "Eaten Alive".

Salem's Lot was filmed in Ferndale, Northern California, and had a reported budget of $4 million. A full scale mock-up of the Marsten House was built for the film, costing an estimated $100,000. Another $70,000 was spent on the interior set.

The film was originally broadcast as a two-part mini-series, on CBS-TV, from November 17-24, 1979. It was then aired as a single three hour movie of the week. (The film runs for four hours when aired with commercials.) "Salem's Lot" was also re-edited to be more violent and fast paced for a limited European theatrical release. One instance that illustrates this, is Dr. Norton's death at Straker's hands: the European version of this particular scene lingers on the doctor hanging on the animal horns, for a considerable number of seconds longer than the American mini-series. The 112 minute version also contains an altered scene of Cully Sawyer threatening Larry Crockett with a shotgun. Larry holds the shotgun barrel in his mouth, though in the mini-series he holds the barrel in front of his face. The "theatrical trailer" (included on the DVD) contains a scene that occurs after Jason calls Ben over in the middle of the night because he sensed an evil presence in the house. The trailer shows him holding a crucifix and saying "There's a dead man upstairs", although in the complete miniseries, this scene is omitted and cuts directly from Ben's speeding jeep to the two of them going upstairs to investigate.

For its initial video release Warner Bros. issued a heavily truncated version of the film, deleting 72 minutes of footage. This 112-minute cut was retitled Salem's Lot: The Movie, which also served as the European cut of the film. Warner eventually released the full-length miniseries to home video audiences. This 1996 video release is now entitled "Salem's Lot - The Movie - Full-length version". The newly relased DVD is titled "Salem's Lot: Full-Length Miniseries".

Music

The powerful, dark, and eerie musical score was composed by Oscar-winning composer, Harry Sukman, who was nominated for an Emmy in 1980 for his work on "Salem's Lot", which was the composer's last feature film before he died in 1984.

Cast

Reaction

Purists of King's novel were off-put by some of the wide deviations from the novel. The biggest complaint was heaped on the characterization of the villainous vampire Barlow. George A. Romero, who was originally attached to direct the film when it was initially being considered for a theatrical release, would later comment: "The biggest problem I had with it, was that the vampire wasn't really the lord. The vampire was an attack dog for James Mason". In the book "Creepshows: The Illustrated Stephen King Movie Guide", Stephen King commented on the Nosferatu-like depiction of Barlow: "It was just a dreadful steal on the make-up. That was bad". Producer Richard Korbitz commented in Cinefantastique magazine vol. 9 #2 on the major change of the character:

Stephen King was pleased with Paul Monash's script: "His screenplay I like quite a lot. Monash has succeeded in combining the characters a lot, and it works". He also commented saying "I like the movie version (the 112-minute cut) better, it just seems tighter."

In 1979, NAL/Signet Books published a paperback tie-in of the novel which included "8 pages of blood-chilling photos".In 2003, the Salem's Lot mini-series was featured on the British television programme, "100 Greatest Scary Moments".

Influence

The mini-series became very influential, as it inspired the suburban vampire film "Fright Night" and the 1987 hit "The Lost Boys". It was also spoofed in "The Simpsons"' Treehouse of Horror IV installment Bart Simpson's Dracula: in this particular episode a vampiric Bart Simpson is seen floating at Lisa's window with a horde of other vampire children, similar to the scenes in Salem's Lot depicting the vampiric Ralphie and Danny Glick, respectively.

Related works

After the miniseries' success, discussion of a potential Salem's Lot network series fell through rather quickly. In 1987, a sequel was made; "A Return to Salem's Lot". Although this is widely disregarded, as it was not based on King's original source material and has virtually no link to the original 1979 miniseries.

Further reading

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External links

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