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CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION | ||
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Positive:
10
Mixed:
4
Negative:
3
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Critic Reviews
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
Screenwriter Peter Filardi ("The Craft") and director Mikael Salomon (HBO's "Band of Brothers") have defied the odds, delivering a four-hour, two-night version of King's vampire-infestation parable that ranks with the best filming of his work. It has genuinely scary parts, which is rare enough in video- King, but it's also perfectly in tune with his mordant sense of humor. Wickedly funny lines are scattered throughout Filardi's script. [20 June 2004, p.11]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
A thoroughly enjoyable mini-series. [19 June 2004, p.E01]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
All in all, Salem's Lot is a serious, elegant piece of work that provides plenty of shocks and creep- out moments without lingering over brutality and gore - which makes it feel less like a contemporary horror picture than a lost treasure from the 1940s or '50s, when filmmakers had to find imaginative ways to suggest what they weren't allowed to show. It's a feast of horror you can sink your teeth into. [19 June 2004, p.9]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
I was pleasantly surprised when the new two-part Salem's Lot, based on the Stephen King best-seller about a town of vampires, spooked me. And it did it the old-fashioned way, with genuine scares and classic horror elements. [18 June 2004, p.D17]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
What makes all of that work so well here is a combination of credible acting, suspenseful filming and special effects that, especially in the second part, go beyond what you'd expect from the small screen. [17 June 2004]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
This version, 25 years after a first and relatively well-regarded mini-series, more than justifies the considerable effort that went into making it. It's a tale of soullessness with a remarkable depth of soul, of bloodsucking that's pulsing with red blood cells. [19 June 2004]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
The remake isn't first-rate King because it saves most of the terror and special effects for the second half. More than 500 effects decorate the program, and the eerie cinematography helps transform Melbourne, Australia, into New England...In the lavish visuals, acrobatic vampires prowl ceilings and expire with ferocious flourishes. These bloodsuckers have different but very splashy ways of exiting the planet...Those images should satisfy moviegoers who can't get enough visual magic at the multiplex. But great acting serves the show better in the long run. [20 June 2004]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
Gross and engrossing, TNT’s two-parter that begins Sunday night is downright spooky. It’s also more than a little hokey. Be prepared to wince at lines like “literature has become elitist, like black-light photography” and “she’s dead, or undead.” But fine performances from Rob Lowe as the tortured writer, Andre Braugher as the high school teacher with secrets, and Donald Sutherland as the creepy antique dealer in the big mansion serve up a heap of horror. In lesser hands “Salem’s Lot” could quickly get campy.
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May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
Salem's Lot is hardly bad. It's just that certain unpersuasive special effects, unruly performances and subplots undermine the best of intentions, a fate with which fans of King's oeuvre are no doubt familiar. [19 June 2004]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
It's got a creepy moment or two, and fleeting glimpses of solid performances from supporting players James Cromwell and Andre Braugher, but most of it just plods along. [18 June 2004, p.150]
May 14, 2021
Season 1 Review:
Terrible...The first five minutes of Salem's Lot are great. Well, four minutes. And then Lowe's voice-over kicks in, which essentially starts the poison drip. It's a lot of King-speak, which is annoying and so formulaic it ought to be patented (and might be). There's a line about "dull, mindless, moronic evil," which is pretty much a perfect synopsis of the movie.
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