A Return to Salem's Lot (1987)

I love this movie so much

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

I only found out this movie even existed yesterday when I ran into it on the shelves of my local library, which has a quite good DVD section where one can borrow DVD's for free. Thank goodness for that, free, I mean, because I'd really be embarrassed to admit I paid actual money to watch this abomination of a movie. It is bad, really really bad. So bad in fact, I'm thinking of writing to the production company and requesting they pay me for watching it!

The original Salem's Lot with David Soul and James Mason was a staple of my childhood. It still scares me senseless and although a little dated is a masterpiece as far as TV Movies go. The depiction of The Master borrows heavily from Nosferatu and is terrifying. To put this laughable sequel into context, The Master in A Return To Salem's Lot borrows heavily from The Muppet Show.Everything about this sequel is cheap and nasty. The acting is diabolical, it's not even Hallmark quality. The story is mildly interesting but proceeds at such a ridiculously fast pace it's bewildering. For example, an old Nazi Hunter (yes, really) turns up in town, has one conversation about the town with the hero of the movie and suddenly turns into Van Helsing, believing without question that vampires exist even though he has zero experience of any or hasn't even seen any and goes about destroying as many as he can with a bunch of homemade stakes.This is the biggest flaw of the movie, there's no investment in characterisation, everything happens at lightning speed because the story demands it and to hell with any rhyme or reason. The characters are so one dimensional they may as well be cardboard cut outs. Even The Master is so poorly written and realised he's basically just an elderly gent in a black suit with absolutely no menace, and when he finally reveals his true face at the movies climax it's hilarious, because he just becomes an elderly gent in a black suit with a Sesame Street mask on.I rated it 3 stars because to be fair in some parts it's downright hilarious, but sadly for all the wrong reasons.

This film is notorious among a couple of my friends after we rented it years ago and had many laughs. Still, it's a shame, because the original Salem's Lot was so strong and the framework story for this one could have put it in the same category----if it had been handled well, but it wasn't.The dad (Michael Morarity) was a bit of a hard headed putz that couldn't see his hand in front of his face. His uninteresting, overly foul-mouthed brat son wasn't very endearing either, yet we are supposed to believe he can wrestle with an ancient Master Vampire and actually offer resistance!! A 120-lb kid should not offer ANY physical resistance whatsoever to a creature with superhuman strength!! Aggravating to put it mildly. The overall impression is that vampires are just weaklings waiting to be killed by your local dog catcher, ice cream man, schoolteacher, anybody in fact.....far from the case of the deadly Mr. Butler in the original, who was not someone you would try to fight when he was awake!!The cheeseball "Nazi Hunter" was the source of the most laughs, but not for the reasons intended. To this day, I can still do a spot-on impression of some of his dumbest lines lol....I was initially excited to watch this movie for the first time and dug the cool small town atmosphere and obvious potential for creepiness, but it wasn't realized. I still enjoyed it somewhat (I enjoy many "bad" movies), but I hope one day someone will come along and do this the right way. That will probably never happen until it is sparked by a highly successful remake of the original first.EDIT: I revised my rating from 3 to 5 after thinking about how I feel about watching this, rather than what a movie critic that has to answer to his bosses would say. Truth be told, it would merit a 2 or 3 in those terms, but my ratings here are heavily biased by how much I am entertained by the film, good or bad.

My Take: One of the worst movies I have ever seen in a life. Definitely the worst horror movie I have ever seen. I bought this movie because I'm a horror movie buff, and it had a good cover art, but that's just a perfect example of the phrase "never judge the book by its cover.", and "Return to Salem's Lot" was, not just truly horrible, but also a is a real joke of a horror movie. The acting is weak, the script is pale, the make-up lacks realism and the scares aren't even scary. Doesn't that sound like a joke? Michael Moriarty is like the father figure in the movie who takes his son back to his hometown, the vampire-infested Salem's Lot. His acting was way too over-the-top... and just plain ridiculous. Andrew Duggan as a lead vampire is weak, and poor Samuel Fuller, reduced to a silly role of a Nazi hunter. And much worse, as if the bad acting wasn't enough, the script never fared better.Silly horror move, I wouldn't even recommend it to a camp buffs. That's how awful it is. Rating: 0 out of 5.