On 19 February, horror legend Stephen King took to X: 'Between you and me, Twitter, I've seen the new Salem's Lot and it's quite good. Old-fashioned horror filmmaking: slow build, big pay-off. Not sure why WB is holding it back; not like it's embarrassing or anything. Who knows. I just write the fucking things.'
No one, it seems, knew just what was happening with Gary Dauberman's adaptation of King's beloved 1975 novel about vampires taking over a small town in Maine. Announced in April 2019 and commencing principal photography in September 2021, it was set for theatrical release in September 2022, but delayed due to COVID-related hitches in post-production. And then... silence. Sure, there was the pandemic and the 2023 SAGAFTRA strike, but this mystery went deeper, and strangely chimed with the book's genesis.
'In the early 1800s a whole sect of Shakers, a rather strange, religious persuasion at best, disappeared from their village (Jeremiah's Lot) in Vermont. The town remains uninhabited to this day,' wrote King in a 1969 column for his campus newspaper at the University of Maine. It was this Mary Celeste-style enigma that inspired both his epistolary short story Jerusalem's Lot (available in the 1978 Night Shift collection), and the dense, detailed novel of 'Salem's Lot.
In all probability, Dauberman's movie vanished due to the restructuring of the Warner Bros. Discovery conglomerate. This was the same company that was behind the Batgirl and Coyote vs. Acme movies, both of which were infamously shelved as tax write-offs. Would such a fate befall Salem's Lot? fretted King's legion of fans. But the author's tweet seemed to suddenly get the wheels of industry turning: Dauberman's movie, the first based on a book that has twice been adapted into a miniseries (Tobe Hooper's 1979 iteration and a 2004 effort starring Rob Lowe), was announced to be landing on streaming platform Max in the US, and would receive a cinema release in the UK.
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Denne historien er fra October 2024-utgaven av Total Film.
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RETURN TO OZ
WICKED Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande defy gravity as the Broadway smash reaches cinemas.
GRIN AND BEAR IT
SMILE 2 Trauma-horror sequel sees the curse latch onto a pop superstar...
BAD ROMANCE
TIMESTALKER Alice Lowe falls in love with the wrong man time and time again...
CLOWNING GORY
TERRIFIER 3 Creator Damien Leone says Art the Clown is coming home for Christmas...
SELF EXPRESSION
LAYLA A non-binary, British-Palestinian drag queen navigates their expression of identity.
GENA ROWLANDS
I like difficult roles,' said Gena Rowlands. No kidding. A stage, TV and film actor whose career spanned more than six decades, Rowlands will be most remembered for the series of coruscating dramas she made with her first husband, actor-turned-director John Cassavetes, between 1968 and 1984.
'NOW NOTHING IS ABOUT LOOKS OR ABOUT BEING A LEADING LADY.AND IT'S VERY LIBERATING' EMILY WATSON
Since breaking hearts in Breaking the Waves, Emily Watson has delivered countless screen masterclasses, from Gosford Park and Punch-Drunk Love to Apple Tree Yard. Now, the English star goes toe-to-toe with Cilllan Murohy in Irish drama Smeal/ Things like hese and fronts 1V prequel Dune: Prophecy. Is it her second coming? It's elementary, my dear Watson...
BLODD PRESSURE
BASED ON STEPHEN KING'S MOST INFLUENTIAL BOOK AND WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY IT SCRIBE GARY DAUBERMAN, VAMPIRE MOVIE SALEM'S LOT FACED AN UNHOLY FIGHT TO GET TO OUR SCREENS. TOTAL FILM HUNTS DOWN DAUBERMAN AND STARS LEWIS PULLMAN AND MAKENZIE LEIGH TO LEARN ALL THAT WAS AT STAKE...
Lucky Man
He broke out in Beatles jukebox musical Yesterday and has a varied slate of juicy projects on the horizon, including a very different take on a superhero franchise. But, as the everhumble Himesh Patel tells Total Film, he puts a lot of it down to luck...
A BUE ABOVE
WORLD-BUILDER EXTRAORDINAIRE RIDLEY SCOTT IS ALSO THE MASTER OF THE DIRECTOR'S CUT, RESTORING HIS MISHANDLED GEMS INTO MASTERPIECES. WITH THE EXPANSIVE DIRECTOR'S CUT OF NAPOLEON NOW AVAILABLE TO STREAM, TOTAL FILM SPEAKS TO THE GREAT SCOTT ABOUT BLOWING UP BONAPARTE HIS RELATIONSHIP WITH EDITING AND WHY BIGGER IS (USUALLY) BETTER.