Almost immediately director Scott Leberecht’s new horror film “Midnight Son” calls to mind George Romero’s 1976 movie “Martin”. Both are ostensibly vampire movies, but vampire movies that tweak the formula and refuse to follow conventions. Gone are the gothic, overdramatic affectations that have permeated the genre for years, and let’s put it this way, this vampire certainly doesn’t sparkle or glint like a diamond in the sun.
In fact, Jacob (Zak Kilberg) can’t go outside in the daytime at all. He has a skin condition that causes him to burn—literally burn, like lighter fluid and a match—when exposed to direct sunlight. His condition has led him to a sad, lonely, isolated life where he works nights as a security guard in a high-rise office building, and spends his days sequestered in his heavily curtained basement apartment painting portraits of a sunset he can never see.
As Jacob’s 25th birthday approaches he goes through a rapid series of physical changes. Out of nowhere an insatiable, all consuming hunger wracks his body. No matter how much food he crams down his throat his malnourished form screams at him. All that will satisfy these new cravings is blood. At first the leavings from the steak he cooks for dinner will fit the bill, then Styrofoam take-out containers procured from the local late-night butcher. But his hunger eventually leads him to more and more desperate measures, like dumpster diving in the biomedical waste receptacle behind a hospital. In the end only human blood will do. I have some friends who work in public health who would be shocked and appalled at the idea of drinking strange blood found in the garbage. They’d squirm in their seats and say something like, “Has this guy never heard of blood-born pathogens?”
No comments:
Post a Comment