YMMV / Fright Night (1985)

• Alternative Character Interpretation: While Charley's own sexuality is somewhat ambiguous, it's easy to see Evil Ed as openly crushing on Charley, to the point of resenting Amy's presence and getting surprisingly upset at Charley's mild mockery of him as "Evil." Then when Jerry is offering to make him a vampire, he tells Ed he knows what it's like to be "different" and that no one will make fun of him anymore, which could further support this interpretation.
• Awesome Music:
  • The sensual, hauntingly beautiful main theme by Brad Fiedel.
  • "Good Man in a Bad Time" by Ian Hunter, a dark rock track with hypnotic lyrics that fit Jerry's dance with Amy like a glove.
• Complete Monster:
  • The Novelization, by John Skipp and Craig Spector: Jerry Dandridge lacks his movie counterpart's saving graces. A sadistic vampire who makes a point to "savor each death", Jerry marks his arrival in town by feeding on, murdering, and mutilating three victims, attempting to kill Charley for discovering he's a vampire. Hunting down Charley and his friends, and turning "Evil" Ed with the false promise that he would be granted the power to stand up against his bullies, Dandridge kills two bouncers for getting in his way, rapes and turns Amy; and locks Charley in a room with the latter, giving him the choice to either kill her or be turned by her. After Charley's escape and the death of Dandridge's servant, Dandridge makes one last-ditch effort to finish off Charley and Peter before sunrise.
  • Origins, by Tom Holland & A. Jack Ulrich: Vlad Tepes is the man responsible for the turn of Jerry Dandridge to evil. Centuries ago, when Jerry was a heroic prince named Gellert, Vlad called him to fight in his armies. Vlad's habit of torture and impaling hundreds disgusted Jerry, who begged leave to return home, only for Vlad to slaughter his entire domain for sheer spite.
• Cult Classic: Although Fright Night is sometimes overshadowed by other films of its kind, such as The Lost Boys, it's regarded as a classic of both the vampire genre and 80's horror by fans. It did well critically and made back its budget at the box office, and it was popular enough to get a sequel and later a remake in 2011.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Evil Ed is well liked for his quotable lines and energetic personality. When his actor, Stephen Geoffreys, refused to appear in the sequel, critics considered it career suicide. They were right. He wound up making gay porn, though it appears he's moving back into regular films.
• Fair for Its Day: Charley's mother says she hopes the new neighbor isn't gay, not because she has any problem with that, but because she's hoping he'll take an interest in her. The fact that she welcomes him into her home in The '80s, when gays were often blamed for the AIDS outbreak, is pretty enlightened.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Peter Vincent complains about how young audiences don't like vampire movies anymore, preferring slasher movies. Movie trends are pretty cyclical, and there has been at least two cycles since the film's release of vampires and slashers falling in and out of favor with audiences.
• Ho Yay:
  • Jerry and Billy were intentionally written with a homoerotic subtext, though the actors themselves weren't aware of it until they watched the film. Charley's mom's first line of dialogue is that she hopes they're not gay.
  • Evil Ed and Charley have no small amount of it; Ed barely acknowledges Amy's presence unless the two are alone.
• Jerkass Woobie: 'Evil' Ed. He's an asshole, even to his friends. However, it's implied by Jerry that, underneath his Jerkass exterior, Ed is really just an insecure, possibly gay outcast who wants nothing more than to be liked and accepted, but doesn't know how.
• Magnificent Bastard:
  • Jerry Dandridge is an ancient vampire who moves into suburbia and begins to prey upon victims where he is noticed by the young hero Charley Brewster. Charming his way into an invitation from Charley's mother, Jerry initially offers to spare Charley if Charley forgets about him after Jerry's friend manages to fool the police and make Charley look insane. Easily fooling Charley's friends, Jerry realizes the suspicions of actor Peter Vincent and seduces Charley's friend to become a vampire, kidnapping Charley's girlfriend and turning her so as to lure Peter and Charley into a final confrontation, conducting himself with incredible charm and charisma as he welcomes them to "Fright Night. For real."
  • Billy Cole is the vampire Jerry Dandridge's immortal servant and best friend. When Charley brings a detective to Jerry's house while the vampire sleeps, Billy tricks the cop into thinking Charley is crazy while humorously mocking the young hero. When Charley and Peter launch their attack on Jerry's house, Billy seemingly allows them to kill him to let Jerry escape before revealing himself as a powerful ghoul, nearly killing Peter.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Just about everything Ed says: "You're so cool, Brewster!", "To what do I owe this dubious pleasure?" was apparently pretty popular in the 80s.
  • "MMM-MMMM! HIS DINNER IS IN THE OVEN!"
  • Amy's Nightmare Face is commonly used in some Screamer Pranks on the Internet. Most famously "What's Wrong with this Picture?"
  • "Welcome... to... Fright. Night... for real."
• Older Than They Think: Judging from the comments to the actual track, plenty of people were evidently unaware that the sexy song Meg and her cat dance to on Family Guy, "Good Man in a Bad Time" by Ian Hunter, came from this movie.
• Tear Jerker:
  • Jerry pulling Ed to his side with the offer of protection from bullies. It's clear that not only is Ed terrified, but his whole reason for being a jerkass prankster stems from the abuse he's received and his desire to be accepted. It's made even sadder if you accept the theory that he's in the closet.
  • Ed after being stabbed by Peter. His death is drawn out and bloody, and he drags himself along the floor while painfully growling before slowly returning to human form and reaching out to Peter as though to beg for help, and all Peter can do is watch his slow demise while in tears. According to the novelization, he was trying to apologize.
  • Peter's initial status as a washed-up has-been, desperate enough for rent money that he'd take a teenager's savings to con another teenager, can be painful for those in-the-know about how some of Horror's Real Life classic actors ended up.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: The producers didn't have a choice when Stephen Geoffreys declined to participate in the sequel in favor of a starring role in another movie, but really, without "Evil" Ed in the story to joust against, the sequel lost any real purpose to it.
• Unintentional Period Piece: Beyond just the obvious fashions, there's also its meta-comedic portrayal of the horror genre, especially vampire films, with its reference point being the Hammer Horror films of The '60s rather than Anne Rice, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, or The Twilight Saga. Peter Vincent is a former B-Movie star (his name a portmanteau of Peter Cushing and Vincent Price) turned late-night Horror Host, and he is portrayed as a relic of an earlier age in the genre, his show struggling to stay relevant in the face of the new wave of violent Slasher Movies. For modern audiences, shows like Peter's haven't been popular since The '90s (with Joe Bob Briggs probably the last big-name horror host), while the films he starred in and featured on his show have gone from "retro" in The '80s to "classic" (or simply "old") today, hence why the film's 2011 remake updated the character to a Stage Magician based on Criss Angel. Likewise, the villainous Jerry Dandridge is an old-fashioned Classical Movie Vampire (albeit one dressed in contemporary '80s clothes) rather than a more modern take on the idea, hence why Charley turns to Peter for help in fighting him.

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