When Stephen King novels get adapted as feature films, the name of the game is always compression. Even the longest of the long King movies (Frank Darabont’s 189 minute adaptation of The Green Mile and Mike Flanagan’s 180 minute director’s cut of Doctor Sleep) feature composite characters and skip over subplots from their source material. As cinematic as the books are, this is a reflection of the author’s style: his fiction creates not just lives but worlds.
The way in which many filmmakers have circumvented this obstacle in the past is by not adapting the books as features but instead as miniseries, and Salem’s Lot is a prime example. The novel (which is the second King had published) is not one of the writer’s longest tomes, but it has twice found a more comfortable home with the expanded real estate available on the small screen – first in director Tobe Hooper’s adaptation from 1979 and then again in 2004 with director Mikael Salomon at the helm. A standout part of the experience of the book is witnessing the creeping vampire infestation engulf the abbreviated titular town, and unfolding as a two-part series on television allowed that.
This history in mind, writer/director Gary Dauberman has defied convention with his new adaptation of Salem’s Lot, and the medium, as expected, does have an outsized impact. Its runtime is over an hour shorter than the combined episodes of the respective miniseries, and it means that it has a very different pacing and energy. It thusly requires an expectation adjustment from King’s dedicated Constant Readers, but what’s most important is that the core of the novel remains: an exciting tale of vampire-centric terror with a collection of compelling characters fighting against the monstrous forces of evil.
Lewis Pullman stars as Ben Mears, a novelist who travels to his hometown of Jerusalem’s Lot, Maine with the hopes of reconnecting with his past while working on his next book. His return comes shortly after the arrival of Richard Straker (Pilou Asbæk), a new resident who owns an antique store with his never-seen business partner Kurt Barlow (Alexander Ward), and also shortly before successive horrors start to hit the town. It starts with the disappearance of a young boy named Ralph Glick (Cade Woodward), who goes missing when he and his brother Danny (Nicholas Crovetti) are walking home from a friend’s house, but death then starts spreading like a cancer.
Though Ben himself is initially seen as a suspect by the town because he’s viewed as an outsider, he begins to understand the reality of what’s going on after friendly English teacher Matthew Burke (Bill Camp) survives an attack. Together with Matthew, the lovely and ambitious Susan Norton (Makenzie Leigh), local physician Dr. Cody (Alfre Woodard), alcoholic priest Father Callahan (John Benjamin Hickey) and brave young monster expert Mark Petrie (Jordan Preston Carter), Ben tries to save Salem’s Lot by destroying the evil at its source.
Salem’s Lot is missing the scope of Stephen King’s book, but it has a lot of good ideas.
After initially being set for theatrical release in 2022 and then sitting on a shelf for an extended period, the streaming arrival of Salem’s Lot may come with concern that the delay was reflective of quality shortcomings, but that’s far from the case. It’s a horror movie that makes time to develop the personalities of the characters and their bonds amid a time of extreme crisis (a specialty of Stephen King’s writing), and while it feels rushed in sections and lacks the scope of the source material, it balances the scales with smart story and style ideas.
Rather than complicating everything with the existence of cell phones, the film smartly maintains the novel’s mid-1970s time period, and where is deference demonstrated to Tobe Hooper’s beloved Salem’s Lot adaptation in certain choices (the most prominent being the monstrous appearance of Kurt Barlow), it’s still effectively scary while playing with the familiar and exercises its own creativity. Everyone aware of the book/miniseries knows to brace themselves for Danny Glick floating outside Mark Petrie’s window, but Dauberman still successfully makes you jump with the moment. The director and cinematographer Michael Burgess make exceptional use of silhouette in the haunting scene where Ralph is abducted (leading to a freaky first person perspective sequence in the moments leading up to his death), and while I won’t say too much as to avoid spoilers, the movie deviates from the novel making inventive use of a drive-in theater as key setting.
The film brings together a great cast to play the personality-filled ensemble of heroes.
Some cuts are more surprising and disappointing than others – like Ben Mears’ traumatic personal history at the Marsten House where Straker and Barlow live and the episodic instances of locals being attacked – but the movie does still effectively breathe life into the characters with dedicated time and wonderful performances. Lewis Pullman has a unassuming charm that is well-suited for the main protagonist in search of his next chapter, and the actor has terrific chemistry with co-star Makenzie Leigh, whose sweet bright-eyed Susan is filled with ambition and thrilled at the prospect of leaving The Lot.
Salem’s Lot does right by Mark Petrie, with Jordan Preston Carter infusing him with a powerful defiance who takes no guff from bullies; Bill Camp has the perfect level of gravitas for Matthew Burke to sell the others on the very real presence of the supernatural in the Maine town; and both Alfre Woodard and William Sadler are scene-stealers – the former playing a woman of science who finds herself enraged in the face of real monsters, and the latter playing a man of the law who is very upfront about not giving a shit.
In the long, long legacy of Stephen King movies (there are over 50 to date), Gary Dauberman’s Salem’s Lot is a title that ranks toward the middle of the pack – not bad, but also not exceptional. It’s a shame that it’s not getting a theatrical release, but it will certainly make for entertaining streaming viewing during Spooky Season 2024 and it beats the film getting deleted so that the studio could get a tax break.
