Half Vampires are bullshit

October 31, 2017 3:08 PM

Fright Night vs The Lost Boys - which 80s teen vampire flick rules the night?
posted by Artw (101 comments total)

They both rule, but Fright Night is a better film that is more in control of its gay subtext.
posted by maxsparber at 3:15 PM on October 31, 2017 [8 favorites]

...which is largely missing from The Lost Boys‘ determinedly hetero romp.

check again; are you sure you were watching the lost boys?
posted by entropicamericana at 3:15 PM on October 31, 2017 [46 favorites]

Gay Subtext really should be a top level category for any vampire film comparisons, agreed.
posted by Artw at 3:17 PM on October 31, 2017 [11 favorites]

Also, this article didn't spend nearly enough time discussing Roddy McDowell's Peter Vincent in Fright Night, which is a rather big chunk of what makes the film so special.

Neither does it discuss the shirtless saxophone player or Cory Haim singing Clarence "Frogman" Henry's "Ain't Got No Home" from Lost Boys, so I'm not sure that this writer understands movies.
posted by maxsparber at 3:23 PM on October 31, 2017 [17 favorites]

Yeah cmon Lost Boys is the clear winner over every movie ever made solely because it has the most 80s thing to ever happen ever
posted by supercrayon at 3:26 PM on October 31, 2017 [17 favorites]

The Lost Boys for Twisted Sister ref obviously

(Though the real daddy is Near Dark)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:27 PM on October 31, 2017 [11 favorites]

(Though the real daddy is Near Dark)

I'll see that and raise it The Hunger and Life Force.
posted by maxsparber at 3:30 PM on October 31, 2017 [11 favorites]

Those are a different kind of 80s-ness though.
posted by Artw at 3:31 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

Near Dark has by far a creepier century-old-kid vampire than Lost Boys.

AND Bill Paxton.
posted by Guy Smiley at 3:32 PM on October 31, 2017 [15 favorites]

There is a poll.
posted by Artw at 3:34 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

It's a close contest, but not complete without the third member of the trinity: Kathryn Bigelow's Near Dark, given two recent write ups at Birth Movies Death and Slate.

Personally, I was a huge Fright Night fan as a teen. Peter Vincent and Evil Ed made the whole thing so impossibly sad and weird. The remake is worth considering as well.
posted by informavore at 3:34 PM on October 31, 2017 [3 favorites]

I will say this: I didn't appreciate them at the time (and briefly met Cory Haim in 1992 — he seemed troubled), but I sort of miss a world in which two Jewish kids named Corey can have a moment where they completely take over the world thanks to a movie in which Jackie Gleason's grandson is turned into a vampire by Donald Sutherland's son
posted by maxsparber at 3:37 PM on October 31, 2017 [30 favorites]

The Hunger gets 15/10 for lesbian not so sub-text put loses several thousand for pretentiousness

Life Force is brilliant and a winner in most contests - it's gets a solid 7/10 for lesbian not so sub-text and infinity / ten for gratuitous nudity... but unfortunately 'space' vampires don't count here. Sorry.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:39 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

Everything you just said is backward and wrong.
posted by maxsparber at 3:40 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

Objection! Is Caleb a "teen"? Does Near Dark touch on "teen culture"?

If we go the other way we start roping in monster squad and then we have nard questions.
posted by Artw at 3:41 PM on October 31, 2017 [3 favorites]

No contest. The Lost vampires can GET IT all day, every day, and twice on Sunday.

Now, if this were about the remake of Fright Night vs OG Lost Boys? THAT'S a fair fight.
posted by ApathyGirl at 3:41 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

A GIRL WALKS HOME AT NIGHT vs LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, fight!
posted by Artw at 3:42 PM on October 31, 2017 [14 favorites]

ART THAT'S THE SOPHIE'S CHOICE OF VAMPIRE MOVIES SELECTION
posted by maxsparber at 3:44 PM on October 31, 2017 [8 favorites]

Lost Boys, hands down. Better cast, more goofy, no "yerrrr so cooool, Brewwwwster" squealing, excellent final act. Also, Santa Cruz is a fantastic backdrop.
posted by Existential Dread at 3:47 PM on October 31, 2017 [13 favorites]

Other contenders... the Vamp (just for Grace Jones) and Salem's 'fear of windows with drawn curtains at night forever' Lot
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:48 PM on October 31, 2017 [5 favorites]

¿Porque no los dos?
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 3:48 PM on October 31, 2017 [4 favorites]

I prefer Fright Night but when you put "80s" into the equation, then The Lost Boys would be more emblematic of that period.
posted by cazoo at 3:48 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

I've just found out there's a film called Robo Vampire... I'm really not sure how to handle this.

Robo Vampire (in about a minute)
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:50 PM on October 31, 2017

The sheer density of mullets, dangly earrings, and Coreys in Lost Boys definitely wins the "80s" factor
posted by Existential Dread at 3:52 PM on October 31, 2017 [17 favorites]

Lost Boys had greasy sax solo on the pier.
posted by chainlinkspiral at 3:52 PM on October 31, 2017 [8 favorites]

A GIRL WALKS HOME AT NIGHT vs LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, fight!

Thomas Vinterberg's original Swedish film or the US remake?
posted by acb at 3:53 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

C'mon, we're not animals.
posted by Artw at 3:54 PM on October 31, 2017 [8 favorites]

A GIRL WALKS HOME AT NIGHT vs LET THE RIGHT ONE IN, fight!

What We Do In The Shadows
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 3:57 PM on October 31, 2017 [17 favorites]

I've just found out there's a film called Robo Vampire... I'm really not sure how to handle this.

It seems to mostly be about Jiangshi, so the answer is watch the everloving fuck out of it.
posted by maxsparber at 3:58 PM on October 31, 2017 [4 favorites]

What We Do In The Shadows

"I think of it like this. If you are going to eat a sandwich, you would just enjoy it more if you knew no one had fucked it."
posted by leotrotsky at 4:03 PM on October 31, 2017 [12 favorites]

I'm not completely sure that I've seen Fright Night but The Lost Boys, c'mon. Unforgettable.

Anyway, my submission for random vampire movies named in this thread is I Bought a Vampire Motorcycle. It's pretty good!
posted by rodlymight at 4:05 PM on October 31, 2017

The 25 Best Vampire Movies, Ranked
posted by Artw at 4:10 PM on October 31, 2017

Corey Haim’s character has a half naked Rob Lowe poster in his bedroom. I call bullshit on determinedly hetero romp.
posted by iamkimiam at 4:14 PM on October 31, 2017 [11 favorites]

I would suggest a ranking of 90s Vampire Movies but that would be ice skating uphill.
posted by Artw at 4:14 PM on October 31, 2017 [5 favorites]

#TeamLostBoys

“Look at your reflection in the mirror. You're a creature of the night Michael, just like out of a comic book! You're a vampire Michael! My own brother, a goddamn, shit-sucking vampire. You wait 'till mom finds out, buddy!”

posted by Fizz at 4:15 PM on October 31, 2017 [18 favorites]

Between those two films, Fright Night. Good double feature, either way.

PS, if you have not watched It Follows, and you love smart scary stories that are light on gore, but heavy on chills, you still have a few hours left to close out your Halloween with one of the best Horror movies released in years.
posted by Beholder at 4:15 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

I miss the old puppet-horror movies like Fright Night.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 4:19 PM on October 31, 2017

Revoke this writer's licence. Missing the homosexual subtext in Lost Boys is criminal negligence for a critic. It's almost just the text. Does the teen vamp group kinda have a beard? Sure, it also has that oiled up saxophonist.

The last line of LB is the grandfather (the one they moved to CA to live closer to) saying, "One thing about living in Santa Carla I never could stomach: all the damn vampires."

This shit ain't subtle.
posted by es_de_bah at 4:30 PM on October 31, 2017 [8 favorites]

It's about as subtle as nipples on a batman.
posted by Atom Eyes at 4:37 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

The 25 Best Vampire Movies, Ranked

Not a single Hammer... I'm just gonna climb back in my coffin for a quick ten century nap until the world turns right again.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 4:38 PM on October 31, 2017 [6 favorites]

About ten years ago my then-roommate and his best friend made an animated film that never really got much attention but did have a surprisingly recognizable cast for a movie that two guys were making largely in their apartment. Included in that cast was Chris Sarandon.

I don’t know how much time my roommate and his bestie spent trying to casually trick Chris Sarandon into saying “for real” (as in “Welcome to Fright Night… for real.”), but Sarandon caught on pretty quickly and he was chagrined a few days into production when they finally tricked him into saying it.

You gotta make your own fun in this world.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 4:41 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

The Hunger is the best 80s vampire film. Fight me.

(Also Fright Night remake had David Tennant in not very many clothes and I'm very much here for that as well.)
posted by soren_lorensen at 4:42 PM on October 31, 2017 [5 favorites]

Coppola's Bram Stoker's Dracula is also a favourite of mine. Oldman's portrayal of Dracula is a bit over the top but there's something about it that I just love. It's so heavy with dramatic flair and there's so much sexual energy oozing on the screen. Also, I'm forever crushing on Winona Ryder so that probably has something to do with it. Keanu's performance is mostly forgettable.
posted by Fizz at 4:46 PM on October 31, 2017 [6 favorites]

The 25 Best Vampire Movies, Ranked

Not a single Hammer... I'm just gonna climb back in my coffin for a quick ten century nap until the world turns right again.

Nor Innocent Blood (1992), nor Habit (1997).

Well, maybe they were #26 and #27.
posted by Guy Smiley at 4:48 PM on October 31, 2017

Also, that opening blood red suit of armor he wears. I love the hell out of that.
posted by Fizz at 4:51 PM on October 31, 2017 [4 favorites]

Michael, I’ll just leave this here, Michael.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 4:52 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

Lost Boys now know the rule about filling up the car with gas when you take it without asking.
posted by ovvl at 4:54 PM on October 31, 2017 [5 favorites]

Keanu's performance is mostly forgettable.

Oh, if only that were true.
(I do actually like that movie, in spite of itself.)
posted by Atom Eyes at 4:59 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

The Mignola tie-in comic is a masterpiece.
posted by Artw at 5:00 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

Also, that opening blood red suit of armor he wears. I love the hell out of that.

For anyone else who wants to vicariously pretend to be Dracula wearing that blood red suit of armor as depicted in Bram Stoker's Dracula. Your prayers have been answered.

Hen Gaidth Armor is a relic set in The Witcher 3: Blood and Wine. It’s a crimson heavy armor set that restores your vitality every time you kill someone.

posted by Fizz at 5:09 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

For sure there are scenes in Lost Boys that are better than anything in Fright Night, but FN wins because it's consistent all the way through whereas LB is so obviously the frankenstein monster of two different directors with studio notes mixed in.

And obviously the perfect 80's vampire movie is Near Dark and The Hunger on a double feature. You can't pick between them. I'll show you the math.
posted by lumpenprole at 5:17 PM on October 31, 2017 [6 favorites]

Bram Stokers Dracula also has the amazing soundtrack by the late Wojciech Kilar. I reckon it’s one of the best horror soundtracks ever, spooky and evocative as fuck.
posted by supercrayon at 5:23 PM on October 31, 2017 [5 favorites]

also, re: Bram Stoker's Dracula:

Coppola was insistent that he did not want to use any kind of contemporary special effects techniques such as computer-generated imagery when making the movie, instead wishing to use antiquated effects techniques from the early history of cinema, which he felt would be more appropriate given the film's period setting coincides with the origin of film. He initially hired a standard visual effects team, but when they told him that the things he wanted to achieve were impossible without using modern digital technology, Coppola disagreed and fired them, replacing them with his son Roman Coppola. As a result, all of the visual effects seen in the film were achieved without the use of optical or computer generated effects, but were created using on-set and in-camera methods. For example, any sequences that would have typically required the use of compositing, were instead achieved by either rear projection with actors placed in front of a screen with an image projected behind them, or through multiple exposure by shooting a background slate then rewinding the film through the camera and shooting the foreground slate on the same piece of film, all the while using matting techniques to ensure that only the desired areas of film were exposed. Forced perspectives were often employed to combine miniature effects or matte paintings with full sized elements, or create distorted views of reality, such as holding the camera upside down or at odd angles to create the effect of objects defying the laws of physics

posted by entropicamericana at 5:29 PM on October 31, 2017 [11 favorites]

Sorry, but Near Dark nails what it would actually be like to be a vampire. Roaming from shitty town to shitty town preying on the hicks and shit stains and bugging out before the shit hits the fan. One of Bill Paxton’s best early performances.
posted by photoslob at 5:46 PM on October 31, 2017 [4 favorites]

loses several thousand for pretentiousness

You... you don't really get goth, do you?
posted by Pope Guilty at 5:48 PM on October 31, 2017 [10 favorites]

I’m sorry, but Jason Patric and Billy Wirth? My teen heart couldn’t take all the dark haired broody beauty contained in the film.

And that scene where they do an overlay of Michael and the very same Jim Morrison poster I had in my room? A girl can only take so much.

We will also not speak of the amount of labor I put into making myself a jacket like Starr’s. Not a word.
#teamLostBoys
posted by teleri025 at 5:56 PM on October 31, 2017 [7 favorites]

OK, let's do this:

The Hunger: OK, Susan Sarandon and Catherine Deneuve get together and that's frankly awesome, but for a movie where Bowie gets second billing, it seems like he's hardly in it, and you can guess how I feel about that. I mostly blame Whitley Strieber for that; he seemed to think that his rewriting of vampire lore was more compelling than the dirty bits (wrong! wrong as can be!), and he's since gone deep into the woo.

Near Dark: The dirtbag vampires were kind of cool, especially since most of them were played by James Cameron regulars, but I didn't really care about the two young people that we were supposed to be cheering for. And also, I blame this film for the career of Poppy Z. Brite.

Fright Night: Really a good film, and tighter than The Lost Boys by a country mile, but the comment about the eightiesness of the films got me thinking, and Fright Night could have easily been done in the seventies: Roddy McDowall, a couple of clean-cut kids who aren't sure whether or not they should do it, the nerdy sidekick-turned-vampire-sidekick, and a vampire who looks like the sort of Playboy-reading fellow who buys his cologne in a quantity that requires a container with a handle. For that matter, Near Dark could have been done then, too, as a horror ripoff of Badlands, and The Hunger as the crossover effort of someone who decided to cross-pollinate seventies porn and seventies horror.

The Lost Boys: None more eighties. I'm trying to imagine a seventies version of it--maybe regular bikers for vampires instead of punks, maybe Donald instead of Kiefer, maybe Robert Altman directing for shits and giggles--and it just doesn't come together. Not without the two Coreys and the oiled-up beefcake working the saxophone like... well, like something out of eighties porn, definitely not seventies. Kiefer was making a name for himself by playing a succession of thugs in the eighties, and the way he told Jason Patric that he was eating maggots instead of rice was more evil than any of the makeup or effects. Plus, Dianne Wiest and Edward Herrmann, what the fuck was up with that, but damned if it didn't work. Somehow.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:02 PM on October 31, 2017 [12 favorites]

The remake of Fright Night sucked, per the Law of Roddy, which (I just made up but) states that the remake of any movie starring someone named Roddy is destined to suck. You'll cite this when they try to remake They Live.
posted by Catblack at 6:12 PM on October 31, 2017

loses several thousand for pretentiousness

You... you don't really get goth, do you?

Mate, I'm goth as fuck... I've seen every Hammer film including On The Buses, the inside of wardrobe looks like a singularity, cut me and I bleed snakebite and black. Still don't change the fact it's pretentious as all hell. Bauhaus are all right though.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 6:13 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

No contest. Fright Night by a long shot.
(Although Near Dark is the best.)
posted by hoodrich at 6:15 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

...the shirtless saxophone player...
... greasy sax solo on the pier...
...that oiled up saxophonist...
...the oiled-up beefcake working the saxophone...

His name is Tim Cappello you shallow, shallow people.
posted by elsietheeel at 6:30 PM on October 31, 2017 [8 favorites]

(I was kidding, don't @ me.)

Bram Stoker's Dracula may have had Keanu, but The Lost Boys had Alex Winter...

They should have made a vampire themed film called Bill and Ted's Heinous Undeath.
posted by elsietheeel at 6:33 PM on October 31, 2017 [6 favorites]

Lost Boys for sheer 80s-ness. Like, none-more-80s.
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey at 6:46 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

I'm trying to imagine a seventies version of it--maybe regular bikers for vampires instead of punks, maybe Donald instead of Kiefer, maybe Robert Altman directing for shits and giggles--and it just doesn't come together.

There is Psychomania. Not exactly vampires, but undead bikers terrorizing for kicks. No Sutherlands, and doesn't really come together either but kind of fun if you enjoy goodbad movies.
posted by rodlymight at 6:58 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

Personally I don't care much for most of the Vampire Films, but I have a fondness for Coppola's 'Bram Stoker's Dracula', for it's Baroque weirdness & deft technical flourishes. The good guys are overwhelmed by the strange charisma of the antagonists, which is how it should be in the story.
posted by ovvl at 7:05 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

His name is Tim Cappello you shallow, shallow people.

No joke, I own the soundtrack.
posted by Halloween Jack at 7:08 PM on October 31, 2017 [3 favorites]

Calling The Hunger "pretentious" means you believe it not trying to achieve the goals it purports to aspire to. And I have to disagree with that. I believe it's exactly as campy and weird as it was trying to be.
posted by ardgedee at 7:10 PM on October 31, 2017 [3 favorites]

Life Force is brilliant and a winner in most contests - it's gets a solid 7/10 for lesbian not so sub-text and infinity / ten for gratuitous nudity... but unfortunately 'space' vampires don't count here. Sorry.


Life Force lost a thousand gay points from me when the two naked hottie space vampire dudes were blown up within seconds of appearing onscreen. >:-|

That is no way for a movie to treat a closeted 18-year-old gay boy in the ‘80s, man. Just really harsh.

So, for gay 80s vampiritude, I gotta hand it to Lost Boys. The half-naked Rob Lowe poster was icing on the cake.

Meanwhile, if we’re talking gay-subtext vampire movies from the 80s, I submit Top Gun as one for the list. Because of the volleyball scene, the Cruise and Skerritt in the bathroom scene, and because that movie suuuuuuuucked.
posted by darkstar at 7:25 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

Lestat can fuck off.
posted by Artw at 8:10 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

I first saw Bram Stoker's Dracula at a midnight screening, which created this weird, dreamlike experience that few films have matched for me since. Not a great movie, but a unique one.
posted by EarBucket at 8:15 PM on October 31, 2017

The dirtbag vampires were kind of cool, especially since most of them were played by James Cameron regulars

It's basically Aliens but the marines are vampires, the aliens are cowboys and the APC is a van. I love it.
posted by Artw at 8:21 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

You haven't see Lost Boys until you've seen it on the beach in Santa Cruz with the boardwalk all lit up behind. Fright Night ain't never going to have that.
posted by GuyZero at 8:25 PM on October 31, 2017 [6 favorites]

Also The Hunger may be a bit artsy but it's no The Lair of the White Worm.
posted by Artw at 8:25 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

Man, I love the Hammer vampire movies so much. I think I've seen every single one. Captain Kronos, Vampire Hunter is way better than the name implies. Horror of Dracula is really good. Even Dracula A.D. 1972 has its campy charm. Uh, it's been a while since I saw Dracula: Prince of Darkness, but I think I remember really liking it.

You get the point. (point, ha ha)

Since there are a few of us Hammer fans, we need to hash out a ranked list of Hammer vampire movies. Nothing brings people together and then drives them apart like disagreeing about which movies are the best.

Anyway, I think The Lost Boys is more iconic, but Fright Night is a better movie.
posted by shapes that haunt the dusk at 8:38 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

maxsparber: "and briefly met Cory Haim in 1992 — he seemed troubled"

I think it's safe to say your perception was accurate.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:40 PM on October 31, 2017 [2 favorites]

70's vampires are best vampires!

MARTIN vs. LET'S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH, fight!

Also, 70's Dracula-off: BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA (1973) * vs. DRACULA (1979)
posted by Doktor Zed at 8:54 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I really wouldn't include Lifeforce or The Lair of the White Worm, particularly; the former was Tobe Hooper taking a shot at a big SF movie and the latter was Ken Russell being Ken Russell at random, and despite having their moments (Patrick Stewart being possessed by the nude alien vampire in the former, Amanda Donohue sporting a rather ornate accessory in the latter), mostly they seemed like a couple of talented directors starting to lose it.
posted by Halloween Jack at 9:03 PM on October 31, 2017 [1 favorite]

I spent a lot of time in Santa Cruz in the 80s and even lived there for a summer in 1990 as a semi-professional saxophone player (ska band). Playing shirtless saxophone on a stage there turns out to not be actually very cool at all. Never even came close to having sex with Jami Gertz, or anyone else for that matter. Although I never tried oiling up my body. Or lifting weights.

The point is shirtless saxophone players didn’t get as much action as you’d think in Santa Cruz in 1990. I have no idea about the vampires though. But I switched to guitar and moved to Seattle in the 90s. I never went back to shirtless and flabby on stage and my band groupie stats went from “zero” to “one.” Reader, I married her.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 10:11 PM on October 31, 2017 [7 favorites]

crtl-f "Near Dark"

10 matches

/sigh of relief

I happened to see Near Dark the same week I saw Lost Boys, and good god, Lost Boys is terrible extruded studio product that I hated every second of. Near Dark has a barroom vampire fight synched to the Cramps. Eventually I heard some well known performers were in it who got famous later, whatever. IT IS A VAMPIRE MOVIE THAT CHOREOGRAPHED A SCENE TO A SONG BY THE CRAMPS.

No vampire movie can ever accomplish a greater aesthetic task.

Cramps synch comes in around 6:00 in this clip.

We must have watched the movie on VHS because I remember everyone in the room bursting into amazed gabble that the band had landed such a gig, and that it was so perfect.
posted by mwhybark at 12:22 AM on November 1, 2017 [2 favorites]

Also, when the two vampires in Lost Boys are killed in the cave, they bled glitter all over Michael, Sam and the Frog brothers. We just watched this on Blueray last night and the sparkle blood was a gd revelation.
posted by iamkimiam at 2:42 AM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]

When it comes to these flicks, I can only echo Catherine Deneuve at the climax of The Hunger: "I loved you all!!!"
posted by DrAstroZoom at 6:33 AM on November 1, 2017

The Lost Boys has the supremely enjoyable big studio ponderous eightiesness, in spades. The Frog brothers are inspired, Diane Weist and Edward Hermann bring some unexpected class to the proceedings, and having the vampires look like what suburban kids who shop at Spencer's Gifts think vampires would look like makes it that much more enjoyable. As an exercise in style and nostalgia it succeeds magnificently. Great movie, terrible film, basically.

But Near Dark, playing it all more or less straight, is a far better film. The practical considerations of being a vampire. Plus Bill Paxton.

Fright Night kind of splits the difference - doesn't play it straight, at all, but as a goofy film it has the good sense and grace to never devolve into a goof. I love it.

NOT A VAMPIRE MOVIE but for me the undersung and charming 80s goof horror movie to beat is House.
posted by dirtdirt at 7:05 AM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]

Near Dark and Lost Boys are both fine films doing entirely different things and there's no reason for them to be in competition.
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:31 AM on November 1, 2017 [6 favorites]

I haven't seen Fright Night, but I was 13 in 1987 and full of hormones so I gotta vote Lost Boys. Jason Patric imprinted me with a lifelong attraction to guys with dark hair and eyes.
posted by AFABulous at 7:58 AM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]

Looking for gay subtext in movies has to be on the list of things that are incomprehensible from a white male privilege standpoint.

Whoo there's a poster of a shirtless dude on a kid's wall! (brother and is implied that all the other vampires had sex with the only teen-aged girl in the movie).

Whoo there's a shirtless volleyball scene! in a movie where Tom Cruise is so irresistible he beds his teacher.

Predator works better if you are looking for subtext. At least it doesn't beat you over the head with its straight-ness. Most Schwarzenegger movies do in fact. In Commando, he travels with a hot young thing whom he never beds, and in the shirtless oily scenes he grapples with the villain.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:03 AM on November 1, 2017

Looking for gay subtext in movies has to be on the list of things that are incomprehensible from a white male privilege standpoint.

Huh? I'm a white male.
posted by AFABulous at 9:09 AM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]

Huh? I'm a white male.

Ok, probably not the correct word, but having to reach so hard for possible clues (like the poster) while the theme of the overall product is the total opposite. Like looking for swears in Peppa Pig.
posted by The_Vegetables at 9:49 AM on November 1, 2017

Reminder that Lost Boys was directed by Joel "Batsuit with nipples" Schumacher. Gay barely-subtext is just what he does.
posted by dnash at 9:54 AM on November 1, 2017 [4 favorites]

Subtext exists when it's not allowed to be text.

And it's no skin off your nose if it's there or not, so I'm not sure what your ultimate goal is here.
posted by elsietheeel at 10:11 AM on November 1, 2017 [4 favorites]

which 80s teen vampire flick rules the night?

That's easy: Once Bitten
posted by P.o.B. at 10:17 AM on November 1, 2017 [4 favorites]

That's easy: Once Bitten

Ok, holy crap, I had no idea. So. 80s.
posted by GuyZero at 10:48 AM on November 1, 2017

but having to reach so hard for possible clues (like the poster) while the theme of the overall product is the total opposite.

You might enjoy the movie The Celluloid Closet. Gay filmmakers have been hiding gay themes in everything from arch dialogue to subtext to costume design since the dawn of film.
posted by maxsparber at 10:52 AM on November 1, 2017 [5 favorites]

At least it doesn't beat you over the head with its straight-ness.

Pssst: the more a movie beats you over the head with its straight-ness, the more gay it is likely to be.

Heterosexuality is (was?) the unmarked default. The need to draw attention to it, to affirm it, betrays an anxiety about the audience's reading of the material that has to come from somewhere.

That's probably more 90s than 80s theorizin', but, unlike much of same, is probably true.
posted by praemunire at 11:06 AM on November 1, 2017 [5 favorites]

Also Fright Night remake had David Tennant in not very many clothes and I'm very much here for that as well.

Same. (Plus eyeliner. And leather.) This is why I have seen the not-so-great remake twice ... so far.
posted by trillian at 11:31 AM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]

I really thought it was a given that Sam is meant to be gay in Lost Boys.
posted by runcibleshaw at 11:33 AM on November 1, 2017 [2 favorites]

but having to reach so hard for possible clues (like the poster) while the theme of the overall product is the total opposite.

I mean, looking for gay subtext in vampire anything is so true it's cliche by this point. I wouldn't go blaming that on your racial/sexual identity. Maybe just read a little more writing on film.
posted by lumpenprole at 11:42 AM on November 1, 2017

Bringing a persistent Marvel Mutants question to vampires:?is having subtext worth it when you can just have text?
posted by Artw at 12:52 PM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]

Pssht. 70s vampires make 80s vampires look like nothing, without a doubt. Get funky, everybody!
posted by delfin at 3:02 PM on November 1, 2017

(Note: some nudity in the 'make 80s vampires' trailer. Dunno about the others. Caveat emptor.)
posted by delfin at 3:11 PM on November 1, 2017

Yeah, Sam was probably intended to be a gay character in Lost Boys.

Youtube evidence.
posted by darkstar at 5:10 PM on November 1, 2017

You vant de seventies wampyr? Fvine!

Martin, dir. G. Romero, 1978. So great.
posted by mwhybark at 7:56 PM on November 1, 2017 [1 favorite]