Movies
[Trailer Vs. Trailer] ‘Near Dark’ Takes On ‘The Lost Boys’!
Ah… 1987. Whereas 1981 gave us two seminal werewolf movies (An American Werewolf In London and The Howling) 1987 gave us two very distinct vampire films in The Lost Boys and Near Dark. Both films remain a part of the cultural conversation to this day (at least in our little horrific corner of the world) but they couldn’t be more different. Lost Boys is a glossy, campy romp with a truly genial (if dysfunctional) family at its center. Near Dark is a stark, poetic western that never once utters the word “vampire.”
Both films had commercial potential, but Lost Boys utterly crushed Near Dark at the box office. Joel Schumacher’s bloodsucking blockbuster was the first of the two to be released (July 31st, 1987) and by the time Kathryn Bigelow’s quieter, more disturbing film came along – the market had had enough. At least that’s the conventional wisdom, part of me thinks that Near Dark never really had a chance at being a hit, regardless of The Lost Boys. It was simply to dry and dour, perhaps too elegant even, for a mainstream 80’s breakthrough.
The trailers for these films tell roughly the same story – gloss vs. grit. I really dig both films, but its easy to see why audiences were swayed to check out Lost Boys – even if I prefer the trailer for Near Dark.
After pulling in $28 million at the worldwide box office this month, director (and star) Dev Patel’s critically acclaimed action-thriller Monkey Man is now available to watch at home.
You can rent Monkey Man for $19.99 or digitally purchase the film for $24.99!
Monkey Man is currently 88% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, with Bloody Disgusting’s head critic Meagan Navarro awarding the film 4.5/5 stars in her review out of SXSW back in March.
Meagan raves, “While the violence onscreen is palpable and painful, it’s not just the exquisite fight choreography and thrilling action set pieces that set Monkey Man apart but also its political consciousness, unique narrative structure, and myth-making scale.”
“While Monkey Man pays tribute to all of the action genre’s greats, from the Indonesian action classics to Korean revenge cinema and even a John Wick joke or two, Dev Patel’s cultural spin and unique narrative structure leave behind all influences in the dust for new terrain,” Meagan’s review continues.
She adds, “Monkey Man presents Dev Patel as a new action hero, a tenacious underdog with a penetrating stare who bites, bludgeons, and stabs his way through bodies to gloriously bloody excess. More excitingly, the film introduces Patel as a strong visionary right out of the gate.”
Inspired by the legend of Hanuman, Monkey Man stars Patel as Kid, an anonymous young man who ekes out a meager living in an underground fight club where, night after night, wearing a gorilla mask, he is beaten bloody by more popular fighters for cash. After years of suppressed rage, Kid discovers a way to infiltrate the enclave of the city’s sinister elite. As his childhood trauma boils over, his mysteriously scarred hands unleash an explosive campaign of retribution to settle the score with the men who took everything from him.
Monkey Man is produced by Jordan Peele’s Monkeypaw Productions.
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