At this moment, it’s hard to disconnect the new Salem’s Lot from its nearly two-year release delay, during which many feared the film would never, ahem, see the light of day. That’s an unfortunate situation. On the one hand, it clearly didn’t deserve to sit on the shelf for so long, caught up in the leadership change at Warner Bros. On the other, it doesn’t quite live up to the expectations that inevitably built as Stephen King pressured the studio to release it.

I hope, with time, it can exist on its own terms. But my viewing experience was shaped by this context, which seemed to make the movie’s virtues and failings equally glaring. I can’t speak to how well it adapts its source material; I’ve never read King’s original book, nor have I seen either of the two miniseries versions. I can only say I found the script inconsistently effective, balanced out by an often strong sense for horror image-making that should leave fans of vampire tales with enough to feel satisfied when the credits roll.

An Attempt At Ensemble Storytelling Weakens Salem’s Lot

The Horror Movie’s Script Is Not A Strength

Though anchored around author Ben Mears (Lewis Pullman), who returns to his childhood home of Jerusalem’s Lot for inspiration, Salem’s Lot wants to be an ensemble film. The early section takes time to introduce us to several characters who will play important roles as this small town is set upon by the newly arrived Kurt Barlow (Alexander Ward), a vampire shipped in from the old world by his off-putting familiar, Richard Straker (Pilou Asbæk). I can imagine a version of this truly invested in the community, achieving the scope of something like Midnight Mass. Instead, it dilutes its focus.

Writer-director Gary Dauberman seems torn between the desire to make a compelling drama and a cool, scary movie. Far too often, the backstory and revealing moments we’re treated to don’t end up mattering all that much. Once someone finds themselves in a vampire-horror setpiece, it all goes out the window. The one real exception is Mark (Jordan Preston Carter), a young, genre-obsessed boy defined by his bottomless courage. Who he is always determines what he does, and he’s the most consistently engrossing character because of that.

If anyone else succeeds in getting us to really care about them, credit goes to the performer. The dialogue in Salem’s Lot is often awkward, but when Bill Camp’s schoolteacher Matt Burke speaks, even once he starts spouting folklore, he always sounds like a real person. His scenes (I’m thinking of two in particular, one at a bar and another in his home) are the best version of what Dauberman’s film could have been, with style fueled by dramatic investment. Even so, that style goes a long way.

Salem’s Lot Brings Back Vampire Horror With Truly Striking Imagery

And A Throwback Sensibility I Appreciated

As a vampire movie, Salem’s Lot is refreshingly old-school. Recent entries in the subgenre typically draw tension from revealing which traditional vampire tropes are “real,” but this not only embraces all the classics, it works to make them visually interesting. Once the conditions for an encounter are met, you can feel the movie transitioning into horror mode. The filmmaking really comes alive in these moments.

This movie is built on light and shadow and uses them to striking effect. Salem’s Lot‘s vampires are defined by predatory eyes that glow, peering at us through mist or from the dark corner of a room. Crosses glow bright in a vampire’s presence, and to hold one defiantly before you not only makes for a great tableau but summons a mighty, repellent force. We’ve come a long way from 1931’s Dracula, when Bela Lugosi just hissed and twirled his cloak at the sight of one.

After a lengthy cycle of them having been deployed in other ways, I enjoyed seeing vampires be presented as terrifying. I expect other horror aficionados will feel the same way; the cool and scary portions of this movie really connect. I just wish Dauberman had truly committed to that instinct. The film moves too quickly, perhaps to progress through the story, when it should let us sit in the creeping fear. I often felt the daytime scenes were pulling me away from what I was most engrossed by, not sinking me deeper in.

As much as the best scenes prove how much is added when we really care about the person under threat, you don’t really need the constructs of character to achieve that. It’s enough that we see the humanity of whoever we’re supposed to identify with and the inhumanity of the monster that pursues them. How they respond to such a situation will teach us everything we need to know about them. Salem’s Lot, frustratingly, seems to understand this only some of the time, and ends up a solid film when it could have been a great one.

After premiering at Beyond Fest on September 25, Salem’s Lot will become available to stream on Max on Thursday, October 3. The film is 113 minutes long and is rated R for bloody violence and language.