You can probably guess that I had no faith or interest in this whatsoever when I first learned of it. As much as I try to subscribe to the old adage of, "You can't judge a book by its cover," I can't help but immediately write off a direct-to-video sequel that no one likely asked for. I hadn't even seen the 2011 remake of Fright Night yet when I randomly saw the Blu-Ray for this at Wal-Mart, probably not too long after it'd been released, and I was like, "Oh, gimme a break." Besides just being derisive at the very idea of a sequel to that movie, I was also annoyed at the title, since there already was a Fright Night 2, albeit one that was very obscure, especially at that point (if nothing else, this one at least dropped the "Part" and added a subtitle to make differentiation easier), and at how the cover indicated that, just like that one, the vampire was a woman this time. It felt like such a lack of imagination, and even after I first watched both the original sequel and the remake, I was so tempted to not bother with this, despite its being available on Hulu at that time. But, in the end, I decided I might as well, for completion's sake. And if you know anything about this movie, you can probably guess what first struck me: it's not a sequel. Despite the title, this is actually another remake of the original movie, telling the same basic story of Charley Brewster discovering there's a vampire in his midst, but in a completely different setting and circumstances. I hate to admit it, but once I realized this, the movie had my attention. And you know what's even more shocking? It's actually not half-bad. It's not great, but if you were to ask me whether this or the remake is better, I'd have to stop and think for a bit (and I might actually give this one the edge). Not only does it offer a female vampire who can more than hold her own with Regine Dandrige from the original sequel, as well as some new and effective takes on Charley, Amy, and Evil Ed, but it makes very good use of its Romanian setting, takes various bits of inspiration from all three of its predecessors while still carving its own identity, its direction is often very stylish and even innovative, there are a good handful of memorable scenes and sequences, plenty of the red stuff for gorehounds (this is, by far, the goriest Fright Night of them all), and, unlike the remake, the gore and vampire effects are mostly done through practical means. On the other hand, though, this has the least effective version of Peter Vincent, the low budget is still pretty evident, there are some sequences that aren't done in the most appealing manner, the specifics regarding the vampire's ultimate goal are a tad confusing, and the climax gets repetitive, with the vampires doing little more than just throwing people around. But, for the most part, color me surprised when I say that there's much more to this flick than you might expect.
A lone woman is attacked at a gas station in Romania by a hooded figure who acts more like a hungry animal than a human. Despite attempting to kill her attacker by igniting some spilled gasoline around the pumps and hiding inside the station itself, she's ultimately caught and killed, and her attacker, who doesn't appear in the CCTV surveillance footage, proceeds to feed on her blood. Meanwhile, Charley Brewster and his friend, "Evil Ed" Bates, arrive in Romania as part of a foreign exchange program. Also among the class is Amy Peterson, Charley's former girlfriend who broke up with him because she suspected he was cheating on her. Charley is desperate to mend the relationship, but Amy isn't keen on trusting him again any time soon. That night, as he and Ed are settling into their hotel room, Charley sees two women making out in the building across the road. However, one of them clearly draws blood from the other's neck, something Charley tries to point out to Ed, but he misses it. Ed is a fan of Fright Night, a paranormal investigation reality show hosted by monster hunter Peter Vincent, who happens to be in Romania at that very moment, filming an episode about the supposedly haunted Poenari Castle, the refuted home of Vlad the Impaler. That night, the students have their first class at the university, and are introduced to Gerri Dandrige, an exceptionally beautiful professor on Romanian history and culture. After class, Charley and Ed embark on a tour of Cachtice Castle, the home of the infamous Countess Elizabeth Bathory. Charley breaks away from the others to use the restroom, and comes across Gerri seducing and pleasuring one of the students, only for the two of them to suddenly disappear when he looks away briefly. While in her class the following night, Charley falls asleep and has a disturbing dream involving her. However, when he wakes up, he learns it might not have been wholly imaginary. Returning to his hotel, Charley learns the student he saw with Gerri has been reported missing, as well as that she's the one who lives in the building across the street. Sneaking into her apartment after he sees her drive off with a body, Charley eventually learns that Gerri is a vampire, one who sustain her youth by bathing in the blood of other women. Moreover, she's none other than Countess Bathory, who has been searching for centuries for a specific virgin whose blood will grant her the power to become a daywalker. And that person may be someone whom Charley knows very well.
Fright Night 2011 can be called a lot of things, but a commercial success isn't one of them, as it only made $41 million against a $30 million budget. So, even if it was direct-to-video, it's surprising that there was any kind of follow-up. But, according to the film's assistant director, Christopher Landry, in his interview in the book, Welcome To Fright Night, Touchstone Pictures still decided that there was enough value in it to make another one, which they would distribute through 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment. Landry also states that they figured, since studios like Universal did well for themselves in this regard, like with their numerous direct-to-video sequels to The Scorpion King, it would be a safe bet. And he said that the idea of another remake rather than an actual sequel came about because producers Michael J. Gaeta and Alison R. Rosenzweig, returning from the previous movie, knew that the lower budget and this being direct-to-video guaranteed that none of the surviving cast members were likely to reprise their roles. Development happened really fast, with the screenplay's first draft being written within a week (although it then went through two months' worth of revisions). The writer was Matt Venne (pictured), who hardly had the most illustrious filmography at the time, having written stuff like White Noise 2: The Light and Mirrors 2 (though, on a better note, he did write Pelts, Dario Argento's second Masters of Horror episode).
Speaking of
Masters of Horror, the film's director, Venezuelan-born Eduardo Rodriguez, had previously directed an episode of its short-lived follow-up,
Fear Itself. His first film was 2005's
Curandero, which Robert Rodriguez (no relation) both wrote and produced, and he also directed the action-thriller
Stash House, with Dolph Lundgren, and
El Gringo, with Scott Adkins and Christian Slater. In his own interview in
Welcome To Fright Night, Rodriguez says that, in the original script, the vampire was still a man and it was his idea to make them a woman. Moreover, he says he'd never seen the original's sequel at that point (which I don't doubt, again, due to that movie's obscurity), and it was just a coincidence that he came up with a similar scenario. What really got him the job, however, was when he suggested that they portray Elizabeth Bathory's transformation into a vampire and history thereafter through animation, as he felt it was the only way they could do it with the time and money they had. While I can't find any concrete info on the budget, the movie was shot in just 23 days, so they really didn't have time to spare. But, as I'll get into, Rodriguez really showed talent in his direction and managed to do quite a bit with such a small amount of time and money. Sadly, he hasn't done much of note since.
This film's version of Charley Brewster (Will Payne) is much more akin to the original, as he's just an average kid who doesn't appear to be seen by his peers as either cool or a dork, though that's because, again, the only other students he interacts with are Amy and Evil Ed. Speaking of the former, the two of them were once in a relationship but have since broken up, with Amy having accused Charley of cheating on her (whether or not that's true is never confirmed). Charley isn't taking the break-up well and desperately tries to win her back, giving her candies and her favorite flowers, as well as just trying to talk with her. Amy, however, isn't interested, and Ed tends to tease Charley for being so hung up on her, both of which drive him inside. And also like in the original, it doesn't take long for Charley to start noticing strange things. First, he sees two women making out in the building across from the hotel he and the other students stay at, only for one of them draw the other's blood. Second, after meeting and becoming intrigued by their very hot professor, Gerri Dandrige, Charley sees her pleasuring another student during a tour of Cachtice Castle, only for them to disappear within the blink of an eye, and for the student to be reported missing the next day. He also has a bizarre dream during class where Gerri asks him if he liked what he saw the night before, and after he wakes up and gets laughed at by the other students, he realizes it might not have been a dream entirely when Gerri asks him the same question. This culminates in the scene where he sees Gerri drive off with a body in her car after the police leave and he sneaks into her apartment (climbing up the side of the building to do so, without falling or being spotted). Searching it, he finds that the windows have UV filters, an old painting of a woman who looks just like Gerri, and a secret passage behind a bookcase, which leads to a ceremonial chamber housing a coffin and a large bathtub. Forced to hide in the coffin when he hears someone coming, he watches an old woman bring a younger one there, slice open her neck, and then hang her above the tub, draining every last bit of blood. The old woman strips off and bathes in the blood, reemerging in the young, lovely form of Gerri. Not only is Charley, naturally, scared to death, but is also discovered by Gerri. He manages to escape by flashing his cellphone's camera in her face but, as per usual, once he's out of danger, his attempts to warn others mostly fall on deaf ears.
Like in the original, Charley tries to warn Amy, but that falls apart when he finds Gerri visiting her in her hotel room. He panics and tries to force Amy to leave, before flat out accusing Gerri of being a vampire right then and there. He tries to ward her off with a Bible, and she proceeds to make him look all the more like a deluded idiot. Also like in the original, he tries to tell the police about what he saw, but again, he stupidly mentions a vampire and they hang up on him. But it's when he goes to Ed that things take a turn. After
doing some research and telling Ed that he thinks the vampire in question may be Countess Bathory, Ed suggests they consult Peter Vincent, since he's currently in Romania, shooting an episode of
Fright Night. They find him in a strip club and Ed hires him to assess whether or not Gerri truly is a vampire, an idea that Charley doesn't like at all, especially when Peter charges $2,000, but he goes along with it since he has no other choice. Things immediately go south when they, along with Amy, whom they run into on the street, take the subway, only to find Gerri down
there, waiting for them. It doesn't take long for them to realize that she truly is a vampire, especially Peter, who ducks out of the subway car before she can attack, leaving the kids defenseless. In the chaos that ensues, Ed gets turned and Amy abducted by Gerri, who needs her as part of a special ritual in order to become a daywalker. And like in the original, Charley ultimately has to go to the vampire's lair, in this case Cachtice Castle, in order to both confront Gerri and rescue Amy, who's also been turned at this point. However, both tasks prove to be much more complex than in the original, or even the remake.
While certainly not terrible, this film's version of Amy Peterson (Sacha Parkinson) is pretty unremarkable for the most part. During the movie's first third or so, she spends most of her screentime rebuffing Charley's efforts to reconcile with her, saying he needs to just move on. However, she does show concern for him when he freaks out in the middle of Prof. Gerri Dandrige's class upon waking up from his "nightmare" and asks him if he's okay afterward. After learning his professor's dark secret, and trying to tell the cops, Charley goes to Amy's hotel room, only to find that Gerri is there, inquiring about Amy's family and if she has any in the country. Charley attempts to get Amy out of there, then makes an ass of himself when he accuses Gerri of being a vampire, a faux pas she herself manages to compound. Thinking this is another of his attempts to get back with her, Amy throws Charley out shortly after Gerri leaves. The following night, when Charley and Ed coerce Peter Vincent into coming with them to assess whether or not Gerri is really a vampire, they run into Amy out on the street. Spotting Peter nearby, as well as Ed, Amy puts two and two together and realizes this has something to do with Charley's earlier claims. Ed then just comes out and confirms it, and Amy, needless to say, is less thrilled than she already was. It doesn't keep her from boarding the subway train with them, though, and when they run into Gerri there, she becomes as big of a believer as Charley. After Gerri chases the two of them through the catacombs beneath the city, they make it back to the surface, where they hail a cab. During the ride, Amy tearfully apologizes for disbelieving Charley, and the two of them begin to reconcile. However, Gerri crashes the cab, killing the driver, and abducts Amy back to Cachtice Castle, because it turns out that she's the one whose blood Gerri needs in order to become a daywalker. What's more, the ritual also states that the one to be sacrificed must have "pure blood," and she must kill Charley when he comes to rescue her (yeah, I don't get that correlation either, but we'll get to that).
So, again, like in both the original and the remake, Amy is a vampire herself during the climax, albeit without the shark mouth this time; instead, she just has black eyes and fangs. Like in the remake, she manages to play innocent and lull Charley into a false sense of security, then attacks. This time, however, she does succeed in biting him and making him a vampire as well, leading to a fight between them within a massive bathing pool of blood. There's a moment where Charley seems to commit suicide by
staking himself, causing Amy to nearly die as a result, with purple veins appearing beneath her skin, which becomes diseased and sickly-looking. But when his vampire form quickly heals itself, so does she. Also, Amy appears to maintain a little humanity, as she hesitates a bit when Gerri orders her to kill him, but these moments don't last long. In the end, it's not until Gerri is finally destroyed that they're both released from the curse.
I know one thing for sure: this version of Evil Ed (Chris Waller) is so much better than the one in the remake. In fact, this movie has the most positive portrayal of his and Charley's relationship, as, while Ed does, again, tend to get on Charley's nerves, they are clearly friends. He tends to bust Charley's balls about his break up with Amy and his pining for her, joking that he's going to wait a week before doing her himself, saying, "Free market, bro." Like in the original movie, Ed is very interested in vampires and the occult, and is also a big fan of Peter Vincent and
Fright Night, the latter of which he watches old episodes of online. He talks Charley into joining him on a tour of Cachtice Castle after their first class, leading Charley to suspect there's something sinister about Gerri Dandrige. Also like in the original, when Charley is unable to make Amy or the cops believe him, he goes to Ed. As expected, Ed initially doesn't take him seriously, and is all melodramatic when describing how he would have no chance against a real vampire. But, if nothing else, he does listen to Charley when he says that the vampire is not only Gerri but that she's actually Elizabeth Bathory. He then shows him a website where they see her backstory in the form of a motion comic, and suggests that they consult Peter, since he's in Romania. Really, Ed is just using it as an excuse to meet Peter, which they do at a local strip club. Even though Peter turns out to be a cynical asshole who doesn't believe in real monsters, Ed is able to talk him into coming with them to assess whether or not Gerri really is a vampire, offering to pay him $2,000. Along the way, Ed's completely fanboying over Peter gets on his nerves and almost prompts him to back out, until he promises him another $1,000. However, when they get on the subway car and run into Gerri, who drops all pretense about being a vampire, Peter leaves them at her mercy, much to their horror, as well as Ed's utter chagrin. Ed, to his credit, does try to be a hero, attempting to repel Gerri with an image of a cross on his iPhone while screaming, "Get back, you creature of the night!" All it does is get him knocked aside, and he's then bitten, but all the while, he yells for Charley and Amy to run for it.
Deciding to see just how "evil" Ed truly is, Gerri turns him into a vampire and first sends him to kill Peter. He attacks him in the strip club restroom, beating him senseless, and pins him against the wall, before railing on him for being such a fraud: "You host the greatest monster show on TV, but you don't believe in monsters?! I believed in you, you bastard! I believed in your shitty little show more than you ever did, you piece of shit! I'm gonna make you believe, motherfucker!... Bleeding is believing!" But when he
goes to bite him, he's repelled by, of all things, a tattoo of a cross that Peter has on his chest. Peter then grabs Ed and shoves his face into his chest, using the tattoo to burn and melt away the left half of his face, after which Ed exclaims, "That was nasty!" He then flees, but appears again at Cachtice Castle, where he confronts Charley when he comes to save Amy. Charley initially tries to ward him off with garlic, but when that doesn't work, Ed proceeds to throw him around and beat the crap out of him (and fortunately, he doesn't yammer on and on as he does so). As he
does, he blames Charley for this happening to him, even though, as Charley himself points out, Ed told him to run for it. He manages to disarm Charley of his stake, pins him to the ground, and comes close to killing him, when Charley shoves a bottle of holy water into his mouth and he guzzles the whole thing, causing his stomach to explode! Though Charley tearfully apologizes to him, Ed remains evil to the very end, telling him, "You're... so... fucked!"
Unlike Amy, Ed's vampire look has a little more to it. Granted, he never turns into a wolf, and his design still mostly consists of black eyes, claws, and fangs, but in his case, his teeth become so oversized and somewhat crooked that they seem to make it difficult for him to talk, which is probably why he only brings them out when he's about to kill. (Not that it mattered to Chris Waller, whom I've read was so into being a vampire while in this makeup that Eduardo Rodriguez had to tell him to tone it down a little bit.) And after
Peter shoves his face into his crucifix tattoo, it leaves the entire side of his face burned, initially looking as though he got doused with acid. However, there's a major continuity error with this, as when Ed shows up again at the castle, the scarred over version of this burn, complete with a dead eye, is now on the opposite side!
In a similar vein to the original, here Peter Vincent (Sean Power) is once again a TV host, but this time of a
Ghost Adventures-style paranormal investigation reality show called, of course,
Fright Night. Also like the original, despite what he says on air, he doesn't believe in vampires or any other types of monsters. When he first meets Charley and Ed, he tells them, "Thanks to
Fright Night, I've been everywhere, from the Himalayas to Haiti, and I've sought out everything from yetis to zombies, trolls to werewolves, and, every time, aah! Nothing." He adds, "I was once in Saudi Arabia, lookin' for a djin, and the whole thing went kablooy on me. I had to hitch a ride on a freighter to get back home. Always make sure your check clears before you show up." Like David Tennant's version in the remake, he's also a pretty dickish and sleazy person. Early on, he's seen berating everyone on his crew when they appear onscreen while he's supposedly investigating Poenari Castle by himself. Moreover, Charley and Ed first meet him at a local strip club, where he's hitting the booze and enjoying the hot women dancing onstage. He's hardly enthused when two fans of his show up, asking for help with a supposed vampire, and only agrees to help them when Ed says they'll pay him $2,000 to assess whether or not Gerri Dandrige is one. And even then, Charley's insisting that she is a vampire and Ed's overbearing fanboying nearly prompts Peter to bail, until Ed promises him $3,000. But, when they board the subway tram, Peter is the first one to see Gerri sitting nearby, and when she looks at him and turns her eyes completely black, he knows something is up and ducks back out. In an act of cowardice far worse than anything Roddy McDowall's or Tennant's versions did, he leaves Charley, Ed, and Amy at Gerri's mercy, resulting in Ed getting turned and Amy being abducted. He goes back to the strip club and drinks shot after shot, then goes to the restroom and gets attacked by the now vampiric Ed. He comes close to buying the farm, until the cross tattoo he happens to have on his chest proves to be enough to ward Ed off and even seriously injure him.
When Charley shows back up to ask for his help, Peter is planning to barricade himself with all sorts of vampire deterrents, as well as harm himself with a weapon said to have killed Vlad the Impaler, and then flee the country as soon as the sun comes up (as you can see, he's also wearing this bright yellow fur coat with polka dots on it, as if he's a pimp from the 70's). He also point blank refuses to help Charley save Amy, admitting that he can but just won't. However, he is good enough to tell Charley that he can turn all
of Gerri's victims back to normal if he kills her by dawn, and also where in Cachtice Castle he can find and defeat her. For much of the climax, it seems as though Charley is going to have to do it by himself, only for Peter to suddenly show up and save him just as Gerri is about to have Amy kill him. He spears Gerri through the back and out her front with his sword, declaring, "Welcome to
Fright Night for real, bitch!" However, he missed the heart and Gerri, going full monster mode, chases him around the bathing
chamber and nearly kills him, until Charley uses his own vampire abilities to shatter the windows and let the sunlight in. And just from all that alone, I think it's obvious why this is most definitely the weakest version of Peter Vincent we've had. In addition to his barely having any screentime or role in the story (they really did not need to have him show up at all during the climax), Sean Power's portrayal is just kind of bland and uninteresting. As mixed as I may have been about David Tennant's version, at least he had a memorable personality and some redeeming
qualities, as well as a bigger part in the climax. Also, I especially don't buy Peter's concern for Charley and Amy here, when it seems as though they may be dead once Gerri has been defeated, as they had barely any scenes together beforehand. And why did he show up to help in the first place? "To make sure the check cleared, kid." He says it as a joke, but you never get the feeling it was because he grew to genuinely care about Charley and his friends, something that, again, had no screentime to develop.
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If I had to choose between the two, I would probably say I prefer Gerri Dandrige (Jaime Murray) over Regine from the original sequel. I still like Regine, as she was an effectively seductive vampire and had a truly horrific plan for Charley, but Gerri just makes more of an impression. When she's formally introduced at the start of her first class, she has an entrance into the auditorium: the lights go out, a flurry of images are projected onto the wall behind her podium, and she walks down towards the stage, initially backlit from the outside hallway, and absolutely knocking out both the guys and girls when they see her. Standing at her podium, she introduces herself and tells them of her plan to give them, "An overview of the history of European art, a history that is riddled with blood and madness, brilliance and glory. A history that, when I am through with you, you will feel as though you have actually lived through it." It doesn't hurt that Jaime Murray is an absolutely gorgeous woman, with a voice that oozes sensuality and seduction, and you can understand why any student would want to stay after class with her. However, she proves to be just as dangerous as her two male predecessors, and much more so than Regine. While Regine mainly focused on seducing and turning Charley, and left it to her minions to do the dirty work, Gerri will do whatever she needs in order to sustain her youth. The movie opens with her attacking and feeding on this poor woman at a deserted gas station, and later, when Charley sneaks into her apartment, she comes back with a young woman whom she's clearly entranced, takes her into the sacrificial chamber, rips her throat open, bleeds her dry, and then bathes in her blood.
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What really sets Gerri apart from the previous vampires in the series is how, rather than seeing Charley as a potential threat who could expose her or a mere nuisance, she's actually amused by him and loves playing with him. When he first sees her as she feeds on a woman in her apartment window, she not only doesn't try to hide but continues doing so, only disappearing when he tries to get Ed to see it. Then, when she spots him watching her seduce the one student at Cachtice Castle, she smiles, mouths his
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name, and turns her eyes black, spooking him, before disappearing with her victim. In class the following evening, when Charley has the "nightmare" where she asks him if he liked what he saw, she repeats the question after he's already woken up with a scream and embarrassed himself. After she rejuvenates herself with the woman's blood and discovers him hiding in her coffin, she says, "So glad you could come, Charley." She adds, "I thought there was something special about you," then sniffs him and
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continues, "I just don't know what it is yet. But I can't wait to find out." Even though he flashes his iPhone's camera in her face and manages to escape, she's not worried, as she knows no one will believe him. She even watches from her window as he calls the police and tries to tell them, only to get hung up on. He then looks up at her window and she smiles at him, knowing what just happened. And when he next goes to Amy's hotel room, Gerri's already there, as Amy invited her up. She proceeds to troll Charley, waving at him when he first shows up, offering to join him
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and Amy when he mentions the party that Ed went to as a way of making Amy leave, and takes the Bible from him when he tries to use it to repel her. In fact, the latter initially doesn't affect her at all, but as she leaves, she lets Charley see the palm of her hand, which is scarred from the image of the cross on the book's cover. She literally endured some pain from touching a holy object just to make Charley look all the more like an idiot.
Gerri drops all pretenses when Charley, Amy, and Ed get trapped on the subway car with her, and intends to kill them all now that Charley has told them what he saw in her apartment. She gets stabbed in the eye with a crucifix for her trouble, but manages to restrain and bite into Ed's neck, before turning him into a vampire. She proceeds to stalk Charley and Amy through the catacombs beneath the subway, and back up to the surface, though she has to retreat when she realizes they came up into an old church. However, she
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happened to scratch Amy during the chase and, when she tastes her blood, realizes she's the specific type of virgin she needs to be sacrificed in order to become a daywalker. Thus, she heads back to the surface, destroys the cab they take to try to make it to the airport, and abducts Amy back to Cachtice Castle. Before she does, she tells Charley to come to the castle himself, since his death also factors into the ritual. When Gerri gets Amy there, she puts her in a ceremonial dress, has her walk into the enormous bathing pool of blood with her, and explains what her
plan is, as well as that she needs Amy to kill Charley. Amy says she would never do that, but Gerri tells her, "It's not up to you," and bites her. However, both Charley and Peter Vincent's intervention into the ceremony, with Charley making good use of the abilities he gains from becoming a vampire himself, ultimately lead to Gerri's downfall.
While it's never alluded to in the film itself, Tom Holland has said he does feel that, in the original
Fright Night, Jerry Dandrige could actually be Count Dracula; this film, in turn, takes the next step and actually makes its vampire a true historical figure linked to the legend: Countess Elizabeth Bathory. After Charley does some research and identifies Gerri as such, Ed shows him a website called
Vampire's Crypt, which details the history of a specific vampire in the form of a motion comic. It
reveals that, while being escorted by her Royal Guard, Bathory was attacked by a monstrous, bat-demon vampire, which bit and infected her. In the centuries since, she's been searching the world for a virgin who was born at midnight under a blood moon, as bathing in her blood would allow her to walk around in the daytime. This is such a specific set of circumstances that she's only now found this type of person in Amy, and even then, there's a further complication in that she also needs Amy to kill Charley because, "The sacrifice's blood must be
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pure." Again, I don't understand what that means exactly. Maybe it means there are to be no outsiders who know the ritual has taken place (if so, then I think Peter needs to die as well), or that killing the person she loves would ensure that Amy has no earthly attachments, but either way, I would think that making her into a vampire would only taint her blood further. And once Amy has been turned into one as part of this ritual, she has to fulfill her role or die, as when Charley seems to commit suicide by staking himself, she begins to wither and turn gray. But then, when it's revealed he didn't puncture his heart, his vampire body heals itself, as does hers. Yeah, a little overly complicated, wouldn't you agree?
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Gerri also seems to require either a nightly feeding or blood bath in order to retain her youth. The most explicit example of this is when Charley witnesses her, as an old woman (Liana Margineanu), bring a young woman back to her apartment, lead her into the hidden sacrificial chamber, then slit her throat open, hang her above the bathtub, drain her blood into it, and then bathe in it. She submerges down into the blood and, when she pops back up, she's completely rejuvenated and returned to her beautiful, young form.
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This is obviously meant to be a direct link to the legends of how the real Bathory would bathe in women's blood in order to sustain her youth but, while it is definitely one of the movie's most memorable scenes, my problem is that what she needs to do in order to sustain her youth is so inconsistent from one scene to another. Like I said, sometimes it seems as though she only needs to feed on someone else's blood, like the woman at the gas station at the beginning, and the homeless man she killed on the subway car. Obviously, it doesn't need to always be a
woman, given the latter and how Gerri also preys on that student at Cachtice Castle. And since she removes the student's body from her apartment, you can guess that she bathed in his blood. But, I would prefer it if they had simplified things by having her feed on blood in order to sustain her young, and have her only need to bathe in the blood of the specific virgin required for the ceremony.
Gerri has quite the cadre of powers and abilities at her disposal. Like Colin Farrel's Jerry in the remake, she's unable to shapeshift, but unlike him, in addition to her speed and agility, she is able to fly, as she takes off with Amy when she abducts her. Also like him, she, as well as other vampires, are able to heal most major damage inflicted upon them. In an obvious nod to
Bram Stoker's Dracula, her shadow sometimes takes on a life of its own, and is what slits the one woman's throat before she bathes in her blood. Her
mere presence can affect the environment around her, creating a gust of
wind that can blow out candles, as well as make them light by
themselves. And while she doesn't employ full-on hypnosis, she does get both that one woman and Amy into a suggestive state where they're unable to resist her, and is also able to mess with Charley's mind and cause him to have a bizarre dream about her. Her most distinctive ability is when she uses a type of echolocation to track Charley and Amy in the dark, catacomb tunnels. She
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creates a clicking noise with her mouth and uses the sound-waves, visualized as rapidly flickering lights moving through the
tunnels, to pinpoint their location. She then moves through the tunnels
herself in an unsettling, floating manner, with her POV being a deep, blood red. And at the end of the movie, after she reveals that Peter Vincent missed her heart, she drops her human form and becomes the type of bat-demon vampire that first cursed her hundreds of years ago. She turns into a completely nude, pale-skinned, roaring and snarling humanoid creature, with a bald
head, pointy ears, and a mouth filled with big, sharp teeth. While it's only onscreen for a few minutes, and doesn't do anything other than menace and nearly kill Peter, it's still a pretty cool-looking makeup design (though, I think Regine's bat-monster form was freakier, even if you also only got to see it very briefly).
Getting to the traditional vampire tropes, they're kind of inconsistent when it comes to Gerri. She isn't affected at all by an image of a cross on Ed's iPhone, and can, for the most part, safely touch a Bible to give off the facade that she's human. It's only when she touches the image of a cross on the book's cover that she's burned, and even that is something she's able to tolerate just to troll Charley. However, when she finds she chased Charley and Amy through the catacombs and into an old church, just being there causes her to
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sizzle and steam, forcing her to retreat. Also, a cross can still be used as a literal weapon
against her, as seen when Charley stabs her in the eye with one, and
like before, her underlings seem to be more vulnerable, given how Peter's cross tattoo is enough to severely burn Ed, and guzzling a bottle of holy water causes his stomach to explode. However, Gerri is apparently weaker in her older form, as when she attacks the woman at the gas station at the beginning, a small crucifix hanging from the rear-
view mirror is able to temporarily repel her. Not only is the sunlight rule in play, obviously,
but Gerri sleeps in an actual coffin rather than within the earth, like
the vampires in the remake, and does seem to still need to be invited into a dwelling, as she mentions how Amy invited her into her hotel room. But, interestingly, while she doesn't appear in mirrors, on CCTV surveillance footage, or iPhone cameras, she does have a reflection in the large pool of blood in her castle.
You're probably expecting me to go on and complain about the movie's look, as it is most definitely that digital, heavily color-corrected aesthetic that I tend to bitch about. But, believe it or not, I actually rather like the way this looks. It has a very lush and glossy feel to it, with a rich color palette that I particularly enjoy, with lots of greens in many of the nighttime exteriors and deep amber golds in the interiors, as well as good use of blue and purple in settings like the gas station during the opening, the interior of Gerri's apartment, the strip club, the catacomb tunnels, the
interior of the old church, and during the climax, when Gerri goes into her monster form. Even places that should be relatively normal-looking, like the kids' hotel rooms, as well as the teaching auditorium and the university's main lobby, are given something of a vivid look, with the latter two being bathed in a very bright white, while the former has a less overt form of that amber color. What's more, 98% of the movie takes place at night, with only two exterior scenes set during the daytime, as well as a couple of interiors,
and, as you would hope, it makes very good use of darkness and shadows. Scenes like those set within the depths of Cachtice Castle (both during Charley and Ed's tour, and the climax), the sacrificial chamber in Gerri's apartment, and the sequence down in the subway and the catacombs, are prime examples of this, although I have to say that the flashing lights they employed to simulate Gerri's echolocation when she's stalking Charley and Amy down in the latter can get overwhelming and could cause a seizure if you're epileptic (not to mention that it makes getting screenshots really difficult).
It's really cool how, even though he was working on a low budget, direct-to-video "sequel," Eduardo Rodriguez opted not to just go through the motions but, rather, decided to make the movie as visually inspired in his direction and the editing as he could. This is clear from the opening at the gas station, which is shot in a very skillful manner, setting up how utterly isolated and alone the woman is out there before Gerri attacks. The attack happens suddenly, and Gerri is kept almost entirely offscreen, often filmed in a peripheral manner, and it leads to an
impressive-looking explosion when the gas tanks are destroyed. And when Gerri attacks the woman inside the station, aside from a brief shot of her appearing behind her and grabbing her, it's shown entirely from the CCTV security camera's POV, meaning it looks as though the woman is being thrown around and killed by nothing. This inspired direction by Rodriguez continues throughout the movie, such as in how, after Ed tells Charley that Peter Vincent is shooting an episode of
Fright Night in Romania, it transitions straight into the show's opening, as well as night
vision footage of Peter's investigation of Poenari Castle, which is then ruined when his crew end up in the shot; Gerri's introduction, which is edited as a bombardment of historical imagery intercut with her appearing and walking through the auditorium; a memorable moment where, after Charley returns from Cachtice Castle, to his hotel room, there's a sped-up, tilting shot of an alarm clock on a nightstand, with him lying down on his bed in the foreground, as the light transitions from night to daytime, before their
chaperone comes in to wake them up for their first class of the day; that's followed by time-lapse footage of the city, going from day to night (the second instance of such footage); and when Gerri has drained the woman's blood into the tub, there's a flurry of edits, cutting from her looking at the hanging body to close-ups of both it and her, before she proceeds to bathe in the blood. Speaking of which, Charley's nightmare in the middle of her class is very surreal, with the flickering light from the projector, weird camera angles and close-ups, shots where all
the students are staring ahead, completely entranced, and Gerri suddenly slashing Amy's throat and splattering Charley in the face with her blood, before he wakes up. Even a more mundane sequence like Charley looking up information on Elizabeth Bathory is done in a visually interesting manner, starting with a shot from the computer's POV, with the transparent, mirrored screen superimposed over his face, as he types her name into the search engine. Then, after a brief cut to a shot behind him, it pushes in on an
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image of Bathory's coffin on the computer screen, which transitions to a shot of the coffin in Gerri's apartment. This is followed by a shot of her resting inside it, when she opens her eyes, and that close-up of her face becomes the painting Charley saw in her apartment, which also happens to be the image of Bathory he finds in his web search. And finally, there are some minor and, occasionally, quick moments that are still creative, such as a tilted angle on one of Cachtice Castle's corridors when Charley breaks off
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from the tour group; a POV from Peter's chest when he shoves Ed's face into the cross tattoo (can't say I've seen that too often); Charley's picture popping up on the right side of the screen when Peter photographs him with his iPhone to make sure he's not a vampire; a repeated shot of Gerri jumping into the pool of blood when it looks as though Amy is dying; and a shot from inside a hole in Charley's chest after he staked himself, revealing he missed his heart. All of it shows just how Rodriguez was making the most of this job.
Even though he's said he only came up with it to compensate for lack of time and money, the animated motion comic sequence that details how Elizabeth Bathory became a vampire is one of the movie's standouts, for sure. It depicts her being transported by her Royal Guard, which are then attacked by a demonic creature that, after slaughtering her guards, bites and infects Bathory herself with vampirism. It cuts to her back at her castle, where she's feeding on a woman who's chained in front of a fireplace, and her husband, upon hearing that the blood of a virgin born
at midnight under a blood moon could potentially save her soul, allows her to leave the castle to search for such a person. The comic then depicts her traveling across various lands throughout the ages, feeding on various people, but only finding temporary rejuvenation each time. It also suggests that she was the one behind the Jack the Ripper murders, the destruction of the Hindenburg, and the death of the Black Dahlia, culminating in an image of her sitting
atop a pile of dead people, licking their blood from her fingers, with a fire raging in the background. The comic then ends with her returning to Romania, where it claims she remains to this day.
In another decision that I think very much benefited the movie, Rodriguez decided not to shoot entirely on pre-existing sets at Castel Film Studios, as the producers originally planned, but at actual locations in and around Bucharest. This was really tough on the cast and crew, as they shot in November and December, almost entirely at night, and it was absolutely freezing, getting down to -15 degrees, but it helps give certain scenes, like those set on the dark and almost completely empty city streets, a real sense of atmosphere. The sequence that starts in the subway
station and continues on to the deserted car (which has a lot of very bright, colorful graffiti spray-painted on its exterior, which really contrasts with the bland, yellow-painted interior) and the tunnels were actually shot in those very locations, and from what I read in
Welcome To Fright Night, the filmmakers almost got killed because the trains started running again two hours earlier than when they were told they would! I'm sure the catacomb tunnels for the one sequence and the ancient church they end up in were sets but, regardless, they still look great, especially the latter,
even if you don't see it for that long. And the opening at the gas station was shot at an abandoned station on the Romanian-Bulgarian border, and you can tell from the shots of the surrounding countryside that it really is out in the middle of nowhere (the gas tanks exploding, however, was something they had to do on a backlot). Some noteworthy settings within the city of Bucharest itself include Charley, Ed, and Amy's, hotel rooms, which look far above average for what you'd expect some exchange students to get; the
amphitheater where Gerri conducts her classes and the bright, white university lobby you see in the one scene; and the strip club where Peter Vincent spends his free time, notable for its bright blue, glossy lighting scheme, and the really awful-looking men's restroom, where Peter is attacked by and repels the now vampiric Ed.
As per usual, the most memorable settings are those tied to Gerri Dandrige herself. The first is her apartment in the city, within an old building that happens to be across the street from Charley and the others' hotel. When he sneaks into it by climbing up the front of the building and through the window, he finds that the apartment is very dark, with sections bathed in purple due to the windows' UV filters. The apartment itself is very old in its architecture, with a main sitting room full of fancy, old style furniture, a
fireplace that's been carved out of granite, with a small column housing a lamp on either side of it, and, above the mantel, a painting of Gerri in her original identity as Elizabeth Bathory. In a hallway beyond that room, Charley, in his scramble to hide when he hears Gerri returning with the woman whose blood she bathes in, ducks into a room where he discovers a secret passageway behind a bookcase. This passageway has lots of different types of clocks lining its walls (a nice nod to all the clocks Jerry had in his
house's foyer in the original
Fright Night), and it veers off to the left, through a spot filled with old paintings, and ends with the bathtub that Gerri fills with the blood of her victims. On the opposite end of the room is Gerri's coffin, which Charley himself is forced to hide in to avoid being discovered, although that doesn't last long.
This chamber and the tub is merely a prelude to the large bathhouse found within the depths of Cachtice Castle, with the massive pool of blood. This pool is fed by a fountain that's shaped like a woman who's been hung upside to have her blood drain out, and the chamber itself is wonderfully Gothic, with its stonework architecture, old style chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, floor candelabras, and stained glass windows. Gerri also apparently has a lot of clocks there as well, just so she can stay updated as to what time it is. While that room, as well as the spot where
Charley fights Ed, which has some construction equipment and work-lights set up, were a set, some of the castle's exteriors and interiors were shot at Hunyadi Castle, aka Corvin Castle, which is where Vlad the Impaler is said to have been held hostage for seven years. In his interview in Welcome To Fright Night, Sean Power says that while he was there, shooting the segments for Fright Night that you see early on, the place had an eerie atmosphere about
it and that spooky things did happen, such as equipment malfunctions, temperature fluctuations from one section to another, strange, unexplained sounds, and a feeling of being watched. In said interview, he flat out says, "The place is definitely haunted - no doubt about it."
In addition to the well done direction, cinematography, editing, and use of mostly real locations, another thing I appreciate about
New Blood is that the screenplay by Matt Venne is a lot more intelligent than you might expect for a movie like this. For one, while the
Fright Night movies have, from the beginning, been about bringing classic vampire myths and tropes specifically into modern day America, setting this one in Romania not only makes for a nice change of scenery but is also a way of connecting the series to the very birthplace of the
vampire legend. While it's hardly unprecedented, given how many times Vlad Tepes has been turned into Count Dracula, and is also not the first time this has been done with Bathory herself, it is interesting how make the villain into a notorious historical figure, changing Bathory from a woman who murdered hundreds of virgin women and bathed in their blood because she believed it would sustain her youth, to an actual vampire who does the same by both feeding on and bathing in blood. The movie further plays with fact and fiction by suggesting that
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the character of Count Dracula, as we know him, really is just a
fictional character who was named after Vlad Tepes, but that Bram Stoker
actually based the details on Bathory. This is stated by the tour guide at Cachtice Castle, who says that the "real" Dracula was a woman, and when one tourist brings up Vlad the Impaler, he adds, "But, why, if there are no accounts of Vlad drinking blood, does Stoker's Dracula consume blood, and then, seem to appear younger after doing so?" Ed then confirms that he's
talking about Bathory, whom the guide proceeds to refers to as "Countess
Dracula," a popular nickname for her (likely originated by the 1970
Hammer movie of the same name). In reality, there's a lot of debate about whether or not Stoker had even heard of Bathory when he wrote Dracula, and it's also been suggested that the tales of her bathing in her victims' blood were mere legend and that she killed simply for sadistic pleasure (not to mention some theories that
she never killed anybody and was the victim of a political frame-up). However, she is believed to have been an inspiration for the novella of
Carmilla, which supposedly influenced Stoker, so it's all relative.
When you really look at it, you can see just how much
New Blood takes from the previous
Fright Nights. Besides the basic plot of the original, the vampire being a woman this time, as per the original sequel, and the tone being darker and more overtly gory, like the 2011 remake, there are details like the vampire's dwelling being across from where Charley is, and his first seeing signs of her true nature by spying on her out the window; her having a bunch of clocks in her apartment and castle; her pursuing Charley and Amy throughout much of the city (with
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a major moment occurring on the road, like in the remake), before abducting and spiriting Amy away; Ed not only going after Peter Vincent when he first becomes a vampire but also voicing his displeasure at what a sham he is; Peter himself not only being a more foul-mouthed, sleazy, and abrasive person, like in the remake, but his profession being updated to better suit modern times (although making it a TV show again); the vampires often letting out monstrous roars and screeches, like in the remake (though they're not as animalistic in their behavior); Peter,
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following his encounter with Ed, forcing Charley to prove he's not a vampire as well when he shows up; Gerri leaving Charley at the mercy at the now vampiric Amy; and Charley becoming a vampire himself, as well as Gerri turning a hideous bat monster during the climax. And yet, the movie never feels like just a retread of stuff we've seen before, as it does have its own identity. The setting definitely helps, but so does Peter now being the host of a paranormal investigation reality show; Ed not only
not completely shooting down Charley's claims but actually aiding him in researching Bathory and enlisting Peter; the confrontation between Charley and vampire Ed having the emotional resonance that was missing in the remake; and the climax, as messy as it gets, is definitely unlike anything in the previous movies, with Charley and Amy having become vampires and fighting each other in a large bathing pool of blood, while Peter ends up dealing with Gerri.
Like the remake,
New Blood doesn't have a lot of humor, but what humor there is, I think, is more effective. Much of it comes from Ed, with how much he teases Charley about his hang-up over Amy breaking up with him, how he, twice, comes up behind Charley and scares him, his enthusiasm over vampires, the occult, and
Fright Night, his and Charley arguing over how much to pay Peter for his services, and some of the stuff he says and does after becoming a vampire himself (at one point, he does his own variation of Stephen Geoffreys' crazy cackle).
One of the funniest images in the movie is when, after their chaperone wakes them up for their first class, you see Ed rise up behind Charley, wearing a sleeping mask with big, bulging, bleeding eyes on it, while also hearing the sound of a cuckoo clock. There is also a bit of humor to be had with Peter, mainly when he's getting drunk at the strip club and fawning over the hot women while talking with Charley and Ed. The image of a confused Charley suddenly appearing
on the right side of the screen when Peter photographs to make sure he's not a vampire is also pretty funny, as is how Peter has all these half-naked strippers helping him to fortify himself against any that come for him. And, despite how gruesome and gory this one is, and its overall serious tone, it doesn't have quite the same dark and disturbing vibe that the remake sometimes did.
What I most appreciate
New Blood for, especially given the low budget, is how it keeps the CGI to a minimum, and mainly makes use of practical makeup and gore effects. As I've said, this is definitely the goriest
Fright Night, with throats getting bitten into and ripped open with copious amounts of blood; the one woman getting her throat sliced open before all of the blood is drained out of her; Gerri getting stabbed in the eye with a crucifix in one scene, and through her back and out her torso by Peter's sword during the climax; Ed getting half of his face melted and his
stomach exploding after he guzzles down a bottle of holy water (some blood splatters on the camera lens there), followed by a close-up of his gory innards and one last one before he expires; a similar shot of the inside of a gaping hole in Charley's chest, complete with a beating heart; and the massive bathing pool of blood that features heavily during the climax. And, thankfully, much of the vampire designs, including Gerri's monster form, were executed through makeup rather than done digitally. Speaking of the digital work, it is actually done quite well and often comes
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off as fairly seamless: instances of digital snow to keep continuity between shots, subtle vampire transformations like the eyes blackening and fangs growing, wire removal, and making it look as though the woman at the beginning is being tossed around by nothing on the CCTV footage. A really impressive visual effect was how they made Amy look as though she were beginning to wither and die after Charley seemingly kills himself, which was done through rotoscoping and the use of digital doubles. Also,
Gerri's shadow when it moves of its own accord looks a lot better than you might expect (I've read that they did initially try to do that without digital means but it proved too difficult), as well as when her eye heals after he removes the crucifix that got jammed into it. Inevitably, there are some effects, like Gerri's burns from the explosion at the gas station healing when she feeds, the one woman's blood seeping into her skin, Ed's bite wounds healing when
he becomes a vampire, Charley's chest cavity repairing itself after he removes the stake, the stained glass windows shaking and shattering, the sunlight pouring in, and Gerri melting into a puddle of slime after being exposed it, that don't look all that great, but the fact that they're so few and far between is really good for a direct-to-video flick like this.
Like with the remake, the movie's opening nicely sets things up, but starts off in a less flashy, more down-to-Earth manner. The first thing you see is the woman pulling into the gas station in the middle of nowhere, followed by her filling her tank up, sending a quick text, and then scanning her desolate, empty surroundings with a very nervous expression on her face. Feeling uncomfortable, she gets back into her car and sends another text (said text is in French, indicating that she's a tourist). Just as she does, a
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hooded figure smashes through her window and grabs at her, snarling and roaring ferociously. However, when the attacker opens the door and lunges into the front seat, a crucifix dangling from the rear-view mirror repels her, burning her hand. However, the woman is unable to unlock her passenger side door, as the figure climbs up onto the car's roof and violently rocks it back and forth. The woman sees in her side-view mirror that, not only is the gas pump still connected to the tank, but the assailant's actions are
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spewing fuel out all over the car's exterior. She grabs her cigarette lighter and, finally managing to open the passenger door, tumbles out and crawls across the ground. The attacker stands up straight atop the roof, as the woman flicks her lighter and throws it behind her, while she runs towards the service building. It lands on the ground right beside the car and quickly ignites the gas, causing a huge explosion that completely engulfs the pumps. The force of it blasts the woman towards the station's automatic doors, slamming her against them. However, this doesn't
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deter her attacker at all, as she stalks towards her, completely unfazed by the explosion. Entering the station, the woman finds it completely deserted (there was a deleted shot showing that the sole attendant had been killed), and grabs the phone behind the counter. But her attacker suddenly appears behind her, badly burned but more than strong enough to grab and throw her around the station. The whole while, the CCTV cameras capture everything, but it looks as though she's being attacked and throttled by nothing. She's thrown against a set of shelves, dragged across
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the floor, flung right up into the ceiling, and then into the cooler, breaking the glass. She's finally dragged towards and hoisted partially onto the counter, her head placed on the cash register, and the vampire proceeds to feed on her, instantly repairing the fire damage, as well as restoring her to her young and beautiful visage. As the woman's blood runs down from the bite on her neck and across her white shirt, the blood drops turn into big splotches and form the title.
Like the original
Fright Night, the movie gradually eases into the really big sequences, following the opening. The first notable moment is when, as he and Ed are settling into their hotel room, Charley sees two hot women making out in the window of an apartment across from them. At first loving what he's seeing, and trying to call it to Ed's attention, he's then shocked when he sees what looks like blood running down the one woman's back from her neck. He again yells for Ed, but by the time Ed comes out of the
bathroom and walks up to the window, there's nothing to be seen across the way. The next scene transitions to the opening of Peter Vincent's show,
Fright Night, as he says he's all alone in Poenari Castle, said to be the home of Vlad Tepes. He roams the dark hallways and corridors, with the only viewpoint being that of his night-vision camera, and talks about how a vampire is refuted to haunt the castle. Hearing something up ahead, he suddenly rushes through a door, exclaiming that there's something in there with
him and it just made a run for it. Stopping to catch his breath, he activates the light on his camera mount for a better view, and scans up a wooden ladder leading into the ceiling. But, when he pans back over to the right, a crew member appears in the shot and Peter angrily yells for them to cut. As everyone comes out of hiding, he yells at them to stay away from the camera, and they set up for another take. Later that night, after they've met Prof. Gerri Dandrige at the university, Charley and Ed are taking a tour of Cachtice Castle. Charley breaks off from the others to
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find a restroom, when he wanders down a hallway and hears moaning nearby. He follows it to a doorway and, looking into the large room there, sees Gerri pleasuring another student. Like with what happened before, at the hotel, Charley is initially taken with this, but when Gerri spots him, things turn creepy when she mouths his name and her eyes suddenly turn black. Charley quickly hides back around the doorway, and when he looks again, they're both gone. He runs through the room and into the next area, and finds that there's nowhere they could've disappeared to. Ed then finds him and tells him that the tour's over, so they both promptly leave.
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Following his nightmare when he falls asleep in Gerri's class, Charley returns to his hotel and finds a large police presence there. He asks the lady at the desk what's going on and she says she believes someone has gone missing. On his way up, Charley glances at a photograph the inspector is showing to someone, and it's revealed to be that of the student he saw with Gerri. Up in his room, he finds a note that Ed left, saying he sneaked out to visit another castle (namely Hunyadi Castle, the very shooting location
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for some of the previous scene). He looks out the window, again across the street at Gerri's apartment, and sees her open the window, then look up and down the street. Following her line of sight, he sees that she's watching a police officer, as he gets into his car and drives away. He then glances at where she was first looking before, and watches another police car drive away. Looking back up at her window, he sees that it's now closed and Gerri is nowhere in sight. She then suddenly floats down to the street, carrying an
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obvious body in a garbage bag over her shoulder. He watches her put it in the back of a car and drive off, just before he sees that the inspector is about to leave. Charley quickly rushes downstairs and out onto the street, but is unable to catch the inspector in time. He then tries to enter Gerri's apartment building but finds the front door locked, and thus, climbs up to her window on the very face of the building. Once inside, that's when he snoops around, only to then have to hide himself when Gerri, now an old woman, returns with the young woman. This leads into Charley
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discovering the ceremonial chamber and having to hide in the coffin across the tub, as he watches, first, an erotic display where the young woman, in a seeming trance, gets down on her knees in front of Gerri and, removing her coat, undulates her body in an erotic manner. Gerri's shadow then reaches out, caresses the woman's face, before undoing her top and pulling it down to reveal her breasts. The shadow then fondles and touches her breasts, as the woman moans and touches her face, clearly feeling pleasure (in the unrated version, she also gropes her own
breasts). But then, the shadow scratches her neck, hard enough to make her bleed, and Gerri tastes the blood herself. Suddenly, she sports a mouth of fangs and lets out a monstrous roar. Her shadow slashes open the woman's neck, with lots of blood gushing out.
Utterly terrified, Charley watches as Gerri drains the woman of her blood down into the tub (some extra shots of her hanging body are the only other additions to the unrated version), strips off her robe, steps into the tub, submerges beneath the blood, and reemerges in her young form. Horrified by this, Charley takes out his iPhone and looks through its camera to see that there's no image of Gerri in it, confirming that she is a vampire once and for all. That's when she discovers him, and he just barely manages to escape
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by flashing the camera's light in her face, causing her to recoil and snarl. Outside, he calls the inspector, but does himself no favors when he flat-out says that a vampire is responsible for the student's disappearance. After the inspector hangs up on him, Charley sees that Gerri was watching from her window, smiling at his inability to get someone to listen. He then goes to Amy's room, only to find Gerri there as well, and tries to repel her with a Bible, accusing her of being a vampire. That's when she makes him look like a seriously deluded person when
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she takes the Bible from him with no ill effects whatsoever, then jokes that, with the sun coming up soon, she'd best get back to her coffin. Before she leaves, she gives Charley back the Bible, pats its cover, and, standing in the doorway, waves at him, revealing the burn mark the image of the cross on the cover left on her palm. And when Charley returns to his room, utterly dejected after Amy threw him out and wouldn't listen to him, he looks up information on Elizabeth Bathory and is shocked when he sees an image of a painting of her, namely the same one he saw in Gerri's apartment.
Once Charley and Ed meet up with Peter, and the three of them, along with Amy, head down into the subway, the movie kicks into high gear. As they board the train, Peter sees Gerri sitting at the end of some seats on the other side of the car. She looks up at him, turns her eyes black, and smiles evilly, prompting him to immediately duck back out of the car. The kids are left shocked at this display of cowardice, but Peter does warn them by pointing in Gerri's direction as the car begins to move. That's when they see her, as she gets up out of her seat and cracks her knuckles,
clearly not intending to play nice. Walking up to them, she tells Charley that he's been, "A very nosy boy," and asks the others if he told them everything he found in her apartment. When they sheepishly say, "Yeah," she drops any remaining pretenses, as in the back, the seemingly asleep homeless man who was sitting next to her falls over dead, revealing that she fed on him. Just as they're processing this, Gerri turns back to face them, turning her eyes black and brandishing her fangs. Now knowing they're in trouble, Charley and Amy move for the door behind
them, while Ed tries to repel Gerri with an image of a cross on his iPhone. Gerri easily knocks him aside, but then, Charley removes a real crucifix that Amy is wearing around her neck and stabs it into Gerri's right eye. She recoils in pain from this and the two of them run past her. Ed tries to join them but Gerri grabs him by the throat and lifts him up. He yells for Charley to run, and jams the crucifix further into Gerri's eye socket for good measure. She tosses him aside onto the seats, roaring in pain, while Amy seizes the
chance and hits the emergency brake. She opens the door, and when Charley hesitates because of Ed, he, again, yells for him to go. Gerri lunges at and bites into Ed's neck, as Charley moves to try to help. Amy tells him they need to go, and pulls him off the subway car and into the tunnel outside. Gerri continues feeding on Ed, then glances to see that her other prey has eluded her. Not at all concerned about this, she proceeds to turn Ed into a vampire, then removes the crucifix from her eye socket, which instantly heals itself, and follows after them.
Charley and Amy run down the subway tunnel, using their iPhones' flashlights as a way to see where they're going, and come across a large hole in the ground. With Gerri quickly approaching, her shadow rounding the bend behind them, they remove a slab of concrete partially blocking the hole and jump down into it. They then find themselves in a maze of dark catacomb tunnels, again with only their iPhones to allow them to see where they're going. In back of them, Gerri jumps down into the catacombs and, crouching down, scans her dark surroundings. She
then uses her special echolocation to pinpoint where they are and begins homing in on them. Charley and Amy, hearing the sounds she's creating, realize she's down there with them and begin rushing blindly through the tunnels, trying to find a way out. Eventually, they come to a spot where they see light coming through an opening up in the ceiling. They desperately yell up for help, but get no response, and then use some wooden boxes they find lying around to try to reach it. Gerri begins closing in with her echolocation, while Charley manages to climb up
through the opening. Amy panics when she hears Gerri approaching and says she can't reach his hand when he stretches down for her, but he implores her to try. It takes some doing, as well as Charley counting to three so Amy can jump up to him and grab his hand, but they do it just as Gerri makes it to the chamber's doorway. Charley pulls Amy up, but not quick enough to keep Gerri from jumping at and slashing her across her leg, drawing blood. Still, he manages to pull her up through the opening and they
fall to the floor. Gerri then jumps through the opening and lands right in front of them. But before she can attack, it's revealed that they've found their way into a church. She immediately begins to smoke and burn as a result, and retreats back down into the catacombs. Charley and Amy then flee the church, while Gerri, tasting Amy's blood, which she still has on her fingers, realizes she's the type of virgin she needs for the ceremony.
Charley and Amy hail a cab and tell the driver to take them to the airport. There's a brief lull in the action, as they try to compose themselves, process what happened, and also begin to reconcile. When they start to get a little amorous, the driver starts shouting at them in Romanian, and doesn't see Gerri drop down into the road in front of them. The cab hits her and acts as though it just slammed into a brick wall, doing a flip through the air and landing on its roof, all while she watches calmly. The driver is killed instantly, and just as Charley and Amy come to,
Gerri grabs Amy and drags her out of the wreckage. Charley crawls out after her and desperately tries to stop Gerri from taking her, saying she can do whatever she wants with him instead. Gerri says that, if she wanted Charley dead, he would already be dead, and tells him to come to Cachtice Castle later that night. She then flies off with Amy, leaving Charley utterly distraught.
Back at the strip club, Peter has been downing one glass of liquor after another, when he goes to the restroom. As he's standing at the urinal, he glances over at a stall whose door is wide open and, hearing something, wonders if there's someone else in there. He proceeds to check one of the other stalls, when he hears a gurgling sound in the one next to it. He opens it, but then finds it's the sound of backflow from a clogged toilet (which they do show in detail). Just as he realizes this, Ed bursts out of another stall, grabs him, slams him repeatedly against the wall, then
throws him through the door of one stall, sending him into its corner. He rips off the toilet paper dispenser, smashes him repeatedly in the face with it, and as Peter tries to crawl out, Ed grabs him and slams him against a mirror, shattering it. He collapses to the floor, only to get grabbed, picked up, and pinned against a stall wall. After Ed angrily admonishes him for being a phony, he goes to bite his neck, only to suddenly be repelled. Peter realizes it's the cross tattoo he has on his chest and he rips his shirt open,
fully exposing it. He then grabs Ed and shoves his face into it, burning him as a result. Flailing around, he then tosses Ed aside, leaving the side of his face badly burned and prompting him to flee. Meanwhile, Gerri arrives with Amy at Cachtice Castle, taking her to the chamber with the bathing pool filled with blood, and later turns her into a vampire as the two of them wade around in it.
The climax begins when Charley arrives at the castle, armed with a bottle of holy water, some garlic powder, and a stake he can deploy from his coat's sleeve. He marches inside, remembering what Peter told him, specifically about the bathhouse said to be found deep within the castle, when he hears what sounds like Amy calling for him. Looking down a corridor to his right, he sees a shrouded figure on the floor and realizes it's the source of the voice. He walks towards the figure, calling for Amy, but when he gets close, the figure turns to look at him and he
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instead finds himself facing Ed. Charley immediately throws garlic in his face and Ed recoils, wiping at his eyes and acting as though it hurts. But then, he reveals he's just playing with him and laughs, exclaiming, "Really?! Garlic?!" Charley then deploys his stake and asks Ed to just let him pass. Ed, however, bares his fangs, and roars and lunges at Charley. He knocks him to the floor, then picks him up and slams him down through a table. Picking him up again, Ed pushes his face against and then scrapes it across the wall, before throwing him through a bit
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of scaffolding. Charley stumbles to his feet and struggles to fight back, only for Ed to put him in an a chokehold and forcibly remove the stake from his sleeve. Once he's disarmed Charley, Ed knocks him to the floor, pins him down with his foot and hand, and proceeds to let out a screeching roar, as he prepares to bite Charley. However, Charley reaches for the bottle filled with holy water in his pocket and jams it into Ed's mouth when he comes down with his fangs. He ends up guzzling the whole thing before he finally
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rips the bottle out of his mouth, and his stomach begins gurgling very loudly, as well as violently spasms. Charley shields himself from what's coming, as Ed throws his head back and moans in pain. That's when his stomach explodes and, after looking down at the massive, bleeding, viscera-filled hole in his midsection, keels over. While Ed is in his death throes, Charley crawls over and says he's sorry, but Ed just tells him that he's fucked. Sure enough, Gerri appears behind Charley and immediately restrains him by grabbing his hair. She remarks, "Pity. Not so evil after all," and drags Charley away, while Ed finally expires.
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Gerri drags Charley to the bathing chamber and throws him right into the large pool of blood. She tells him, "Happy hunting," and leaves, with the double doors closing behind her. Wading through the blood, Charley calls for Amy, and then sees some bubbles rising to the surface nearby. He wades over to them, thinking it might be her, when the bubbles suddenly stop. He sits there for a few seconds, as everything goes quiet, when he turns around and sees Amy is in the pool with him. She acts strange as she approaches him, non-verbally answering his questions about her
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well-being, and Charley, knowing something's wrong, reveals he has another stake in his other sleeve. He warns her to stay back, but she manages to get close enough to rip the stake out of his sleeve and toss it onto the floor. She shushes him, and acts as though she's going to kiss him, but after nuzzling his face, she switches to vampire mode and attacks. She quickly grabs and bites into his neck, then tosses him over her and back down into the blood. She grabs him again and flings him up onto the floor, then launches herself out of the water and lands right next to him.
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Licking her fangs, she grabs his hair, yanks his head back, and bites into his neck again, this time feeding on his blood. Once she's done, she wipes the blood away from her mouth, then flings him onto the floor. He crawls to the shallow part of the blood pool and stands up, only for her to shove him back into it from behind. She then jumps in at him, grabs him, and bites his neck on the other side. The two of them twirl and violently flail around in the blood, with Amy doing a crocodile-like death roll attack on Charley,
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before surfacing and letting him go. She shoves his head beneath the surface and lets out a screech that's loud and high-pitched enough to rattle the chamber's stained glass windows. The bubbles coming up from where Charley went under stop, and for a few seconds, it seems as though he's dead. However, he immediately surfaces, gasping for air, when Gerri reenters the room. Amy knocks Charley over to the edge of the pool, as Gerri bends down and whispers for her to finish him off. However, by this point, the
vampirism has taken hold of Charley, and he launches himself out of the pool when Amy tries to attack again. He grabs the stake that Amy disarmed him of earlier and appears to commit suicide by ramming it through his chest. This immediately seems to doom Amy, who begins to wither, as well as become gray and sickly. Horrified, Gerri jumps into the pool with her and cradles her, though she can do nothing to stop it.
But then, Charley sits up and removes the stake, revealing that he deliberately missed his heart. Amy's deterioration promptly reverses, as Charley's chest cavity seals itself back up. Wielding his stake, he jumps at Gerri and goes to stab her, but she turns around, grabs it, and throws him back across the chamber. She quickly reaches him, shoves him towards the edge of the pool, and, holding the stake herself, gestures towards Amy. She again orders her to kill Charley, and Amy approaches him, takes the stake, and prepares to stab him with it. All three of
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them roar, but before Amy can go through with it, a blade comes out of Gerri's torso, stopping everything in its tracks. Shocked, she falls into the pool, as it's revealed that Peter showed up and flung the sword at her from behind. But, despite his pithy remark, as well as how it's now 5:30, with all of the clocks in the castle beginning to ring in the sunrise, Charley notes that both he and Amy are still vampires. Peter realizes he didn't actually kill Gerri, and turns around to see her shadow coming through the doorway behind him. Amy takes the opportunity to grab Charley and pull
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him back into the pool, while Peter is faced with Gerri, who licks her own blood off the sword and remarks, "Missed." She lets out a roar that blows out all the candles in the chamber, and changes into her bat-demon form in-between the flashes of extinguishing light. Once she's in full monster form, she stomps towards Peter and backs him against the wall. Charley tries to talk Amy down, while Gerri grabs Peter by the throat, lifts him up, and flings him across the floor. She, again, storms up to Peter, picks
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him up, and pins him against the wall, while Amy corners Charley at the one end of the pool. Peter reminds Charley that the sun is now up and, just as Amy reaches and prepares to kill him, Charley uses his own vampire echolocation to not only disorient Gerri but shatter the stained glass windows. The sunlight pours in, and Charley dunks himself and Amy beneath the pool to avoid being affected themselves. Gerri, however, isn't so lucky, and melts into a puddle of slime, which then streams and runs into the pool.
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Collecting himself after witnessing this up close, Peter crawls towards the pool, as Charley and Amy haven't surfaced yet. However, just as he reaches the edge, they both appear, now cured of their vampirism. The movie then quickly wraps up, as the three of them walk out of the castle, with Peter getting into his own vehicle and driving off first. Charley and Amy linger around a little bit, long enough for Charley to gift Amy with a new crucifix necklace, and the movie ends with the two of them kissing out in front of the castle.
Sadly, if the movie is truly lacking in anything you'd come to expect from Fright Night, it's the music score. It's definitely not bad music, and composer Luis Ascanio, who often works with Eduardo Rodriguez, does his own thing, the same way that Ramin Djawadi did on the previous movie, but it's probably the least memorable score in the series. It definitely goes for a European, Gothic feel, often with lots of chanting, as well as some eerie whispering voices, like in the lead-up to when Gerri kills the woman in the chamber, and some loud, ringing bells for when she's finished draining her blood, but it's one of those scores that, for me, doesn't stick in my head after the movie is over. The same also goes for the songs on the soundtrack, which include two tracks, American Hookers and Cowboys & Aliens, from an indie rock band called Gram Rabbit; one by Dez Cuchiara called LMFAO; The Flower, by Tyler Blew and the Secret People; and White Cow by Space Needle, which plays over the ending credits (and which I don't remember a thing about, other than it was generic and forgettable). Seriously, the use of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata during the scene with Gerri and Amy in the blood bath is the only part of the soundtrack that sticks in my head.
most definitely proved to be a very pleasant surprise. While some may be put off to learn that it's actually another remake, it manages to tell the story that we're now all familiar with in its own unique way, while also paying tribute to what came before. It benefits greatly from some pretty good actors, especially Jaime Murray; some very stylish and visually interesting direction, cinematography, and editing; very good use of its Romanian setting; a plethora of well done makeup
and gore effects, with very little distracting digital work, and what digital work you have is mostly effective; and some well done and memorable sequences. It's certainly not perfect, as it has the least effective portrayal of Peter Vincent, the mythology and lore around Gerri Dandrige's ultimate plan can be rather confusing, some of the CGI effects employed do look quite cheap, the music score and soundtrack are pretty ho-hum, and the climax kind of overstays its welcome and gets a bit repetitive, but for a direct-to-video followup to a movie that wasn't that successful to begin with, this is much better than it has any right to be. If you were like me and wrote this off the minute you heard about it, I would advise giving it a chance. As I hinted at before, I think I may prefer this to the 2011 remake.
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