Salem's Lot (2024) - Movie Review 

This movie is pure escapism. Nothing more - nothing less. If someone wants the book - then read the damn book. Thank heavens the internet didn't exist back in 1979. It's a good movie. I think an extended cut on blu-ray and UHD will make it a much better movie. We know the original cut was 3 hours. We know screening audiences forced Warner Bros. to make changes. There are already suspicions as to what those changes were. Hopefully a 3 hour Dauberman cut will give this movie a different edge. Just enjoy it for what it is and don't look back. Someone sitting with their 1975 copy of the novel and waxing lyrically about links to the Dark Tower and how Barlow needs to be Arthur Houseman - please. Pretentiousness gone mad.

My God I have never seen a film that critics have been so divided on as this one. Half of the critics hate it and call it garbage and half of them absolutely love it!! Strange.

Hate to tell you Dawg, there was already a remake in 2004 with Rob Lowe.

I was there in 1979, saw the original mini series on TV, and it totally freaked me out, especially the vampire kids at the window. I've seen clips of this new movie but I am not holding out much hope.

Apparently it's showing at cinemas in Europe

I didn't love it, but it was okay - I was hoping for more of an original 'Fright Night' experience and got the remake feels 😂. I bet they trimmed out some things that would help it's continuity make more sense. Great review, tho, man🙂.

I thought this was part of Jacob Hubbard’s Halloween special.

I think in the book the Dr. Injects himself with something after being bit?

There's a reason this was shelved and then sent to streaming. It's dogshit from top to bottom. They took the most important character in the book and original film, The Marsten house and made it a non factor.

I hope Jacob can be the new John Campea.

overall enjoyed the movie not better then the original only thing i could say i liked more was that Barlow had a few lines of dialogue. i guess the original film Barlow had a lot more scenes that were cut and he spoke a few lines maybe one day we will get the deleted scenes

The rabies shot doesn't have anything to do with vampire lore. Normally, when tell the story of Salem's Lot is supposed to play like real life and the Dr. will treat his wound as if attacked by an animal as opposed to a movie monster. This version really skipped from normal life to the town is already lost to vampires in the blink of an eye. One of the many reasons it's not the classic it should be.

Agreed. Not the best movie. However, I was a big fan of the third act.

In the book the crosses do glow (I like that part in this) :-) you need to read it… it’s creepier than the actual 1979 film (which I actually watched as a child in 1979 and was scared to death lol). Here’s my take on the new one: THE POSITIVES: 1: Looks great, with a great colour palette and nice cinematography. A few nice transitions too. 2: The vampires are fast, vicious, and they kept the glowing eyes from the original. 3: Has the feel of an 80’s / 90’s vampire flick and you’re never short of action as it easily fills its (just shy of) two hours run time. 4: The silly demonic voices on the trailer were actually just on the trailer for the most part. 5: It’s better than the truly horrendous 2004 Rob Lowe version. 6: That’s it really. THE NEGATIVES: 1: Jerusalems Lot should be a character as much as the people who live there, as portrayed in the original novel and film. This was sorely neglected. 2: The script and dialogue in general is atrociously bad. ‘B’ Movie bad. Literally appalling in a lot of scenes. 3: The pacing of the film is ruined by its stupidly short run time. No space to breathe between scenes as it bounces from one major element of the story to the next at a frenetic pace. 4: Zero character development. They merely get over a whole heap of time where Ben and Susan get to know each other by skipping it with ‘One Week Later’ after Ralphie Glick gets taken. It’s cheap and makes you question why they bothered making a ‘feature film’ in the first place. 5: Pilou Asbaek as Straker was dreadful. He hammed it up much like his Greyjoy character in Game of Thrones. The one saving grace is he barely had time to appear on this rushed adaptation. James Mason, he is not. 6: Quick guys, we only have 2 hours fit everything in, let’s just all immediately believe in vampires so we can get this party started. (That’s how it felt anyways) 7: In their attempts to make this scary, they neglected the creepiness of the original, opting for Salem’s (jump scare a) Lot. And those jump scares barely had an effect on me. Typical modern horror play… they simply haven’t got a clue anymore. 8: Barlow. A CGI mess for the most part. You can tell Dauberman directed this as he looked like ‘The Nun’.

Can i say i loved the movie but to the comments and the host do you all think that 1970s just are superior making movies over todays remakes?..Salems lot 79 and the Exorcist 73 just cant be touched ..filmakers should stop being lazy with CGI and do it the hard manual old fashion way..just my opinions..you guys thoughts?

Stop apologizing but your hair looks good here though.

First I loved the adaptation... Second you look like you're in middle school at this point.

🦇🩸 As far 'Salem's Lot '24 being a faithful & balanced adaptation of it's Original Source Material, it Fails Utterly in almost every regard. To borrow from RLM/Mike Stoklasa's "STEAK Analogy": 'Salem's Lot when compared to it's Source Material (Novel) is like when you take a Giant 300+ *page **-Book-* Steak; and when trimming the Fat to turn that Steak into a a digestible 120 minute Feature Film, you inevitably end up trimming some of the Best Parts of the Steak away in the process; you are then left with a much smaller, less satisfying Story which only tangentially resembles what made it's original Source Material so remarkable, original & satisfying in the first place. (i.e. this should've been a Mini-series) The only thing more of a Letdown was the titular (CGI-Enhanced) Mr. BARLOW himself: who feels like a comic book character of an Idea of a generic Vampire. All around a huge disappointment which needs to be rectified by someone not only talented enough, but by someone who cares enough about the source material to do it justice. *D -* 🚫🧛‍♂