Katie Crocker - Associate Editor
There’s “The Lost Boys”, sure, but when it comes to great ’80s vampire movies there’s also no going past “Near Dark”. Directed by future Oscar Winner Kathryn Bigelow, and written by Eric Red (“The Hitcher”), the film was a much less commercial film than Joel Schumacher’s “Lost Boys” as it replaced pop music with an infectious score by Tangerine Dream, spirited performances with moody, edgy character turns (from the likes of Adrian Pasdar, Jenny Wright, Bill Paxton and more), and a backdrop that was more western than Santa Cruz.
As a treat to their readers, Arrow in the Head were supplied with a treatment for “Near Dark 2”, which readers could download here. Writer of the original Eric Red penned the treatment, assumingly some time ago, so no guarantee that it’ll ever see the light of day but it’s a fun ‘what if’.
Hollywood were planning to remake the movie a few years ago but their plans were came to a halt for some reason. Uproar, maybe?
Ten years ago, I got to thinking about what would happen if the saga of NEAR DARK continued in a way that stayed true to the modern vampire western fundamentals of the piece. The vampire clan of Jesse, Severn, Diamondback and Homer had to have kin, after all. So I mapped out a sequel. Allowing for the passage of time since the original, the follow up picks up fifteen years later and follows Caleb and Mae’s now grown daughter, Sarah. You can read it here for the first time anywhere. The film will never get made, but so what? Happy Halloween horror fans, here’s the outline of how I saw NEAR DARK II!
