Salem's Lot

Celebrated author "Ben" (Lewis Pullman) returns to his childhood home looking to do some investigations into his own youth when he discovers that there's something distinctly unsavoury going on in the "Lot". That all seems to centre around the long abandoned "Marsten" house whose basement has recently received a strange package before a local urchin goes missing. Luckily for our intrepid writer, he has hooked up with "Susan" (Makenzie Leigh), somewhat sceptical local doctor "Cody" (Alfre Woodard) and with the savvy young "Mark" (Jordan Preston Carter) and as it becomes pretty clear what's going on, they have to work out a strategy that will keep them all alive! This, sadly, hasn't an original bone in it's body - falling somewhere between mediocre Hammer and that "Penny Dreadful" television series we saw ten years ago. The acting is pretty woeful, but no worse than the overly descriptive dialogue and with the possible exception of the young Carter who at least puts some effort into the proceedings, the rest of this follows all too predictable lines before a denouement that offers us nothing new either. Sure, reinventing this particular wheel is nigh-on impossible, but then why make it? It's not as if it has any sense of menace or peril, there are no gruesome special effects or harrowing scenes of gore and blood-lust; it's more like a series of unfunny comedy sketches set in an eerie scenario where just turning on the light (or not going into the place in the first place) might have been a better solution. It's far too long and slow to get going, and all I can think of really is bring back David Soul. Standard television fayre for Halloween, no need to trek to the cinema for this.