dreamer_easy: (Default)
dreamer_easy ([personal profile] dreamer_easy) wrote2008-01-08 06:50 pm
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The Lost Boys

Re-watching the movie that blew all our minds back in 1987. I'd forgotten what a strange and beautiful film it is, not to mention how funny it is. Buffy owes it an awful lot, I think - was this the first vampire flick in which they burst into flames in sunlight? Is Spike's look based on David's?

Weird Science, OTOH, is saved from being total crap by snappy editing and a genuinely funny cast. It's a nice twist that the boys try to make themselves a girl and end up with a woman.

Appropriate images to follow.

ETA: The grandad from Lost Boys was Dumont in Tron. If I ever knew that, I'd forgotten!

ETA: I love how the flying is handled in the film. I guess Buffy also borrowed the idea of the vampires "vamping out". But does the "they have to be invited in" thing predate Lost Boys?

[identity profile] jvowles.livejournal.com 2008-01-08 04:12 pm (UTC)(link)
When I say "cross the threshold without permission", I mean from the owner/resident. Similarly there are a number of traditions about beneficial household spirits that function similarly, but intended to ensure the brownie doesn't leave.

A lot of literary and cinematic mileage is built on subverting the old traditions about welcoming people into your home, greeting them properly, etc. -- the implication being that there are REASONS these things persist.

If, for example, you were to say "I welcome you as a guest in my home", you might rule (as author) that the very old hospitality traditions put you and the vampire in an effective state of truce -- you cannot harm him because he is your guest and he cannot harm you because you are his host, and thus with careful wording you could in fact have a pleasant dinner. Whereas if you say "my home is your home", you've effectively given him carte blanche.

(Again, my mindset also reflects 20 years of being a dungeon master and quite enjoying the Ravenloft setting...)

This is why it's useful to have a set of "rules" defined for your fantasy/horror critters when you write -- you need not reveal them fully to the reader/viewer, but without knowing them yourself, you're going to write inconsistent crap.

In FRIGHT NIGHT, for example, the mere presence of a cross does nothing; it's the faith that backs it that matters -- and thus we often see it employed since then. Notably for Doctor Who fans, in CURSE OF FENRIC, it's the psychic resonance of the faith itself that fends off the baddies, rather than the object that serves as a focus or symbol, and so the Doctor's faith in his friends and the Russian soldier's faith in the revolution work as well as (or indeed better than) the priest whose faith has begun to falter.
ext_5608: (vamp)

[identity profile] wiliqueen.livejournal.com 2008-01-08 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
If, for example, you were to say "I welcome you as a guest in my home", you might rule (as author) that the very old hospitality traditions put you and the vampire in an effective state of truce -- you cannot harm him because he is your guest and he cannot harm you because you are his host, and thus with careful wording you could in fact have a pleasant dinner. Whereas if you say "my home is your home", you've effectively given him carte blanche.

You could build a terrific short story on this notion alone.

As for consistent rules, I'd call it more imperative than useful! Even if the audience not only doesn't necessarily know them all, but in many cases won't pay attention. If I had a penny for every conversation I've been in where someone tried to make a case that something applies to all vampires, and should therefore apply to a specific universe, when that universe has clearly delineated otherwise, I wouldn't need a day job.

They all drink blood (unless they're psivamps or something, but that's more of an SF trope). Beyond that, all bets are off and the responsibility is on the writer's shoulders!

[identity profile] kateorman.livejournal.com 2008-01-09 04:26 am (UTC)(link)
According to one paper I read, it's possible that one of these guest-host tricks gets pulled in "The Descent of Ishtar". Two rescuers are sent to the underworld; the queen of the underworld makes an oath of hospitality to them, obliging her to give them what they ask for - Ishtar!