Day 6 Fright Night!!! & Fright Night 2!!

Awwww yeah! I love me some vamps. These two especially. In fact I have the soundtrack to the first playing currently. Seriously give the soundtrack a listen, it was from a time where bands made music for films, and the director picked the tracks as well.This is one of the film series that prompted me to try and talk about sequels that really held up to the original or surpassed it in someway. But also, most importantly and sadly. This is also the one sequel that is the absolute rarest to find.

So if you've managed to see Fright Night Part 2, you genuinely are among the few!But lets start with the awesomeness that is the first yes? Yes.The first Fright Night was a fun Rear Window meets Dracula story. new neighbor moves in, nextdoor teenager discovers neighbor feeding on a date they brought home, commence the spoopy.

I like how the film handles the vampires discovery. He could kill his neighbor Charlie. He's a freakin vampire! But he doesn't. Instead he actually tries to reason out a deal with him. Tell no one what I am and what you saw, and you all can live, no bites totes swear. But Charlie is like "Nah your a monster I gotta stab that." So Charlie, the horror fanatic has to convince his friend, girlfriend, mother, anyone who'll listen. That his neighbor is a vampire killing people. No one cares to listen to the youth of the day, so he takes his case to a TV persona who shows horror flicks late at night in the corny style of Svengoolie. Which ends poorly as even his hero thinks he's nuts. Until he doesn't. The movie doesn't get a lot of credit sadly, but back in the day it was pretty damn amazing.

There's also a lot LOT of fun and interesting little stories with this film and especially the sequel. It's hinted at in the film, that the lead vampire is bisexual but never outright said. The director apparently wanted him to be even more so but the studio said 'Nah, no man lovin!" But the director said fuuuuuuck that, and did it anyway, giving the handsome vampire a handsome man friend to take care of him as he slept. Even Chris Sarandon was cool with playing him as a gay vamp, but alas. Studio said nu uh. Did the director give up there? NO! Charlies punk friend, who is gay in real life, also wanted to play the character as such. When he meets up with the head vampire during the movie it's even hinted at that the vampire knew he was in the closet and why he was teased for being different.

Not something really common back then. But fight as they might to bring some gay into the fright, It all had to be underlined and in the shadows. That's the fun story stuff, the not so fun is what happened to some of these people in real life.But your not here for that, the movie is a product of its time, and still pretty classic. Yes Charlie today comes off as a sexual predator getting pissy with his girlfriend for not putting out, and I do mean pissy, the guy goes full rage mode when she won't let him put his eclair in her glazed donut. So we have a vamp having fun toying with Charlie and promising to kill his friends and mother because Charlie just won't let it go and let him live in peace. We have Charlie dealing with being unlaid and trying to survive being torn apart, a television horror show host dealing with a failing career and the sudden realization vampires are real.

Charlies girlfriend fending off Charlies constantly trying to touch her hooha, AND a hot af vampire now wanting to politely bang her to piss off Charlie. It all collides into a fun, definitely memorable fight. As well as creepy monster face which the director loved so much they used it on the cover of the poster, and became the image most of us growing up around then remember from Video stores. It's not an unknown film by any means but it's definitely a classic. It did a fun take on vampires in the same vein that Lost Boys did. It had great music, fun humor, and a great cast.So how do you top that in a sequel? You bring back people you thought were dead! Chris Sarandon's vampire is back! Charlie and his girlfriend are back! Peter Vincent the vampire hunter is back! Evil Ed is back!!!Actually that sadly never happened. I say sadly but I don't mean it. The movie still managed to pull off its own thing without bringing back the dead and STILL held up to the original.

So what happened with the sequel?

Why was it forgotten to time?

Firstly a change in leadership at the film company, deciding to focus more on oscar worthy films and not horror, add in a dash of real life murder, and a sprinkle of a cut budget, finished with losing the director and most returning stars, and ship the film overseas before showing it in America on fewer than 150 screens, and you get most of the picture. The sequel continues the story of Charlie, now in college and moving on with his life and his best buddie Peter Vincent. But soon his college life is thrown to craptown when, a lady vamp shows up with her posse and sets out to fullfill Plan V for Vengeance!

She's not just any lady vamp, she's the 1,000 year old sister of Jerry the vampire from the first film.Her plan, and plot of our movie. Is to seduce Charlie, turn him into a vampire, and then kill him as vengeance for her brothers death.But not content with just doing this, she also decides since Mr Peter Vincent helped in killing her bro bro, he needs to lose his show! So she pulls an Elvira and takes over his horror show in the process. She is relentless!The movie is a worthy sequel and holds up to the original by continuing the adventures of Charlie. The humor is much the same, but a bit more present. The studio wanted to calm down the gayness in the sequel but that only happened a smidgen. There's a fun werewolf, a Brujah who loves moths and insects. A fun group of vampires, a professor who is just, supportive and bad. It's a hard to find but good follow up to the original and more than worth seeking out, even if you have to sail the digital high seas to find it.