Movie Review of "Fright Night" (2011)

A couple days ago, my wife and I received the 2011 movie Fright Night from Netflix and, to be honest, I was somewhat disappointed. Yes, I had it on my DVD list. But, I had also had some doubts about the film and, as a result, had purposely been putting movies ahead of it and had hoped to receive one of those movies instead.

My biggest problem with this movie was it was a remake of a film that I used to love when I was younger but, as I got older, realized was somewhat dull and even lame. And, while I'll be the first to admit some remakes are huge improvements over the originals, I just didn't think there would be enough material to work with.

However, since we had the movie anyway, my wife and I did take the time to sit down and watch it last night. After watching it, I have to admit it surprised me.

The movie has pretty much the same plot as the original, a stranger (Colin Farrell) moves into a vacant house next door to Charley (Anton Yelchin) and his single mom (Toni Collette) and we quickly learn he is a vampire. When Charley discovers this after his best friend disappears, the vampire begins harassing him, his mom and his girlfriend (Imogen Poots), forcing him to track down legendary vampire hunter Peter Vincent (David Tennant).

Unlike the original, this version did try to focus more on the blood, gore and horror. In this respect, it did fail a bit. There was a pretty intense scene involving Charley, his mom and his girlfriend in a car chase. But, other than that, there really wasn't anything overly frightening about it.

The jokes in this horror/comedy also weren't overly funny. There were moments when I was chuckling a bit. But, I don't remember any joke or scene that had me laughing out loud.

What really helped this movie though was the cast. I'm not a huge Farrell fan but I thought he made an excellent vampire. He played someone who could be charming but, from the second he's introduced, you could tell he was dangerous. I also loved Tennant's version of Peter Vincent, something I felt was an upgrade over the original played by Roddy McDowall.

As a result of the cast, I did find I liked this movie considerably more than the 1985 original and, even though it definitely wasn't as good as some other films out there, I didn't feel like I wasted my time watching it.

My Grade: 3 stars out of a possible 5.