Day 55: Near Dark

Way before she went on to win the academy award for Hurt Locker, Kathryn Bigelow knocked this vampire movie out of the park. I don't know for certain that she made this while she was married to James Cameron but it would make sense as half the cast of Aliens reappears in this one as a vampire clan. Bill Paxton, Lance Henrikson and the lady who played Vasquez are all keeping one step ahead of the sunlight as a group of former confederate soldiers turned vampires.

Adrian Pasdar falls in love with Mae, one of the vamps, and gets turned in the opening act. The rest of the movie is him trying to acclimate to the vampire lifestyle of killing and being on the run. Let's just say he isn't cut out for it. The best sequence in the flick, to me, is a tense scene at a roadhouse where the vampires take the customers apart one at a time. As Pasdar's family goes looking for him, they are drawn closer into danger. Finally, he must decide to take a stand against the forces of evil or accept that he is one of them forever. One of the better 80s horror flicks, in my opinion. Sure, there is gore, but not so much as to be excessive. Worth a watch.