Fright Night

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For the album by power metal band Stratovarius, see Fright Night (album).

Fright Night
DVD Cover of Fright Night
Directed by	Tom Holland
Produced by	Herb Jaffe
Written by	Tom Holland
Starring	Chris Sarandon, William Ragsdale, Roddy McDowall, Amanda Bearse
Music by	Brad Fiedel
Cinematography	Jan Kiesser
Editing by	Kent Beyda
Distributed by	Columbia Pictures
Release date(s)	1985
Running time	106 min
Country	USA
Language	English
Followed by	Fright Night II
IMDb profile

Fright Night is a 1985 film starring William Ragsdale, Chris Sarandon, and Roddy McDowall. It was followed by a 1988 sequel, Fright Night II, and was adapted into a comic-book series by Now Comics.

1 Plot synopsis
2 Trivia
3 Cast
4 Awards
- 4.1 Saturn Award
- 4.2 Fantasporto
5 External links

[edit] Plot synopsis

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

Charley Brewster (Ragsdale) is a teenage fan of horror movies. He discovers that his next-door neighbor, Jerry Dandridge (Sarandon), is a vampire, but nobody will believe him. He turns to his hero, Peter Vincent (McDowall), the host of a late-night horror show on TV. Vincent pretends to go along with Charley's scheme, confident that the boy is delusional, and gets the shock of his life when he inadvertently realizes that Charley is telling the truth. When Charley's girlfriend, Amy Peterson (Bearse), and friend, "Evil Ed" (Geoffreys), become involved, the situation turns critical.

[edit] Trivia

The visual effects are the work of Richard Edlund, who also provided the effects for Ghostbusters a year earlier. The film contains a puppet that was cut from Ghostbusters. The puppet is the rejected "Ghost Librarian" character.

The novelization, Fright Night by Craig Spector and John Skipp, was published in 1985 by TOR Books.

The musical score is by Brad Fiedel, who also scored The Terminator series.

The name of Roddy McDowall's character, Peter Vincent, is loosely based on veteran horror film figures English actor Peter Cushing, who was a frequent co-star with actor Christopher Lee, and American actor Vincent Price.

[edit] Cast

Charley Brewster: William Ragsdale
Jerry Dandridge: Chris Sarandon
Peter Vincent: Roddy McDowall
Amy Peterson: Amanda Bearse
"Evil Ed" Thompson: Stephen Geoffreys
Billy Cole: Jonathan Stark

[edit] Awards

The film was well-received, winning several Saturn Awards; it also won an award and a nomination at Fantasporto. It spawned a 1988 sequel which also gained a Fantasporto nomination.