Corona | Coming Attractions

If you were a teenager living back in the summer of 1985 one of the unexpected gems that you might have discovered in theaters was Fright Night, a wonderfully put together underdog horror film. It's still worth checking out if you ever come across it while cable surfing or if you're looking for something that you haven't seen while meandering around your video store.

Fright Night starred William Ragsdale as 18-year-old Charley Brewster, a normal kid who thinks that his new next door neighbor (played by Chris Sarandon) is a real vampire. To try and prove his case Charley approaches the host of a local late night horror show called Fright Night, a faded actor named Peter Vincent (played with real grace and style by Roddy McDowell). At first Peter doesn't believe Charley's story at all but once the evidence begins to mount it's up to only the two of them to stop the vampire. With some really terrific creature effects, solid acting from the cast and a wonderful sense of atmosphere built up by director/writer Tom Holland, Fright Night turned out to be a successful late summertime hit for Columbia Pictures. A sequel followed three years later but couldn't capture the same soul that the first picture had.

Earlier this year DreamWorks landed the rights to remake Fright Night and got former New Line Cinema exec Michael De Luca to produce the film. Now the studio is moving forward with the project by signing television screenwriter/producer Marti Noxon to pen the script for the reimagined film. Noxon is a name familiar to Whedonites, having been one of the inner circle of Joss' on his Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel series. Since the end of those two shows Noxon has gone on to write for Prison Break, Grey's Anatomy, Private Practice and most recently, Mad Men. If the new Fright Night gets eventually made it will be her first theatrical writing credit and a big step forward for her career.

Maybe Noxon's past association with vampires got her the attention to be considered for the writing assignment. That said, it's Noxon's past work that makes me optimistic her take will be more in tune with what made the original Fright Night so cool, and it wasn't just the vampires.