Jeez, early Bigelow made one of the most 80s movies ever. Leather jackets, crazy haircuts, fire shows, vampires, extremely dark settings, b-rated rock ‘n’ roll music accompanied by a synth score, and blood squibs galore! The angst is literally burning furiously inside of my skull after watching this.
I’m so pleased that Kathryn is doing based-on-a-true-story movies these days. It seems to be a genre much more up her lane of expertise. I will admit though, it is a chore to make these cruddily written, corny vampire romances come off as anything other than a cruddily written, corny vampire romance. Dear Golly, the writing is dreadful in this movie…
I love me some Bill Paxton, nevertheless. He STOLE that bar scene. Rest in peace, man. Rest in peace.
Verdict: C-
“Near Dark” is now available to stream on The Criterion Channel.
Burning the Celluloid 
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