A Frightfully good show

Fright Night
DIRECTED BY: Craig Gillespie
STARRING: Anton Yelchin, Colin Farrell, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, David Tennant, Toni Collette, Imogen Poots
CERT: 15A
FRIGHT Night is the film Disturbia might have been if the creepy guy next door had been a vampire. And that’s no bad thing, even for those of us who despise what Hollywood movies and TV shows have done to the vampire genre over the past 20 years.
It’s a remake of the 1985 feature that blended chills and comedy to enjoyable effect. But unlike most remakes and most horrors, humorous or otherwise, in recent memory, this one is a decent film in own right, just strong enough to stand by itself while tipping its hat to the original.
Anton Yelchin is Charley Brewster, former teenage outcast now popular with the in-crowd and dating the finest girl in school (Poots). Which is nice except that, as must happen when a movie nerd starts climbing the jerk ladder, Charley has left his geeky best friend Ed (Mintz-Plassse) behind in the dust.
But Charley may have bigger problems at home, where his single mother (Collette) has taken a shine to their new next door neighbour. Jerry (Farrell) is handsome and charming, but he’s a man of mysterious habits. Like keeping a large skip outside in his yard, full of junk from no obvious source. Then there’s the windows of his house, which are always blacked out. Though apparently this is not so uncommon in these isolated Vegas communities, where the city’s night shift workers sleep all day.
Still, Charley gets some dark vibes from this stranger. At first, he’s not convinced that his old buddy Ed has arrived at a sane conclusion – that mom’s new crush is in fact a vampire who’s been feeding on local schoolgirls and strippers. But soon his neighbour’s suspicious carry-on is enough to send Charley looking for help and he tracks down a Vegas magician called Peter Vincent (Tennant), a man who apparently knows a thing or two about hunting bloodsuckers. (And if he doesn’t, his creators did – he was nammed after Peter Cushing and Vincent Price, those great old vampire movie legends.)
Fright Night won’t go down in horror lore as a classic but it’s entertaining stuff all the same. Mixing horror with comedy is a thin line to walk but director Craig Gillespie (Lars And The Real Girl) navigates it safely enough, even if he succeeds mostly by playing it safe, never really veering dangerously into either territory for big laughs or major gore. His only big mistake is the stupid 3D, rarely a good idea but never when your film is darkly lit to begin with.
The cast put in a good day’s work. Anton Yelchin is an impressive young actor who does another fine job here, while Christopher Mintz-Plasse never really has to stretch, getting by with another performance from his McLovin book.
But it’s the older actors who give Fright Night some weight. Colin Farrell gives his most watchable performance in a long while and makes an enjoyably bad villain. As his nemesis, the obnoxious, alcoholic vampire hunter, David Tennant holds up the comedy end of the bargain with some aplomb – though I’m not sure there’s enough room or good will in this world for another Russell Brand.
Always a pleasure, too, to see the excellent Toni Collette in action. Though I was a bit shocked to realise it’s almost 20 years now since she became a star with Muriel’s Wedding. But I’ll move on quickly before that makes me think of the hideous Mamma Mia! We really don’t want that.  
Worthwhile and best of all, it isn’t in 3D.

Apollo 18
DIRECTED BY: Gonzalo Lopez-Gallego
STARRING: AWarren Christie, Lloyd Owen
CERT: 12A

WELL it had to happen some time and here it is – The Blair Witch In Space.
Yes, the ‘lost footage’ genre is really going places now. To the moon, actually, on a top secret mission that NASA insists never happened, since they called it a day after Apollo 17. Or so they say but the conspiracy theorists are having none of that and neither am I.
The lost footage is the work of three astronauts who document their trip to the moon with video cameras – from the time they’re chosen for the mission to the time they set foot on the lunar surface. Which is when things get weird and they begin to suspect that they’re not here just to find rocks – unless it’s rocks that move by themselves.
Communication goes a tad haywire, too. Oh and then they find footprints and a corpse, and further substantial evidence that the damned Commie Reds have been here for a visit, the sneaky little gits! Which prompts the instantly legendary line, “Stay close – the Russians could be anywhere!”
Ah, if only it was a few crazy socialists they had to worry about. But no, there’s something else out there. Maybe more than one of them, whatever they are. But if they don’t get a move on and do their thing, there’ll be nobody left awake in the cinema.
Boring, I think, is the word we’re looking for here. Though pointless would fit too. Or dull. Or if we want to get flowery about it, spirit-crushingly tedious.
There are moments of visual excellence and the sound design is at times inspired though eventually overbearing. For a certain generation, there’s always a tinge of nostalgic excitement about anything to do with the old space race.
But these finer things don’t survive long in this atmosphere and quickly vanish into the great, great, neverending void of badness. Never to return. Except maybe in the sequel, Apollo 19.
NASA can deny that one too but I know it happened. I know it for a fact.