A TV movie that feels like a TV movie, except for a couple moments of the most nightmarish imagery which would stick in my head for the decade between when I first watched this until I guess Coppola’s Dracula.

But mostly it’s a TV movie, a version of Needful Things where everyone is fascinated with new shopkeeper James “Bigger Than Life” Mason, but he doesn’t sell anything and nothing happens, then eventually in the second half his Nosferatu boss arrives to kill everybody. First we’ve gotta spend a lot of time with writer Ben (played by a TV cop) fascinated with a house in town. “There’s a connection, I just know it,” says a fat cop about Ben and the house, but Ben already told us the connection, why don’t they ask him? Then there’s high schooler Mark (later of Enemy Mine) – they didn’t know about autism in 1979 but this kid loves monster movies and models and “keeps his feelings in hand.” In the end Ben and Mark will team up to defeat evil, two heroes with haircuts for which they both should be embarrassed.

Meanwhile we’ve got three hours to fill, so Ben finds himself a girl as soon as he gets into town (Bonnie Bedelia of Needful Things, haha), angering her dad Dr. Bill (head priest of Exorcist III) and her ex Ned, who punches Ben straight into the hospital. George Dzundza (Species II) is gonna murder realtor boss Fred Willard for cheating with his wife Julie Cobb (of a three-hour Brave New World), but lets Willard escape, to be instantly killed by yard monsters. Gravedigger Mike of Lawnmower Man gets bit (I saw him a couple days ago in a Rob Zombie movie), making his whitehair friend Lew Ayres (Omen II) sad.

Tobe (who would soon make Poltergeist) lingers on the writer thinking a house is evil, and maybe so, but I think it’s the foreign Nosferatu that is more evil here. It kills Ned at least, then our guys shoot James Mason to death (he’s not even a vampire), burn down the town, and leave the girl behind. I watched the sequel relatively recently, do not remember the Rob Lowe/Rutger Hauer remake, or the version last year that everyone hated.

And especially featuring Elisha Cook Jr. as the town drunk:

This movie is terrific at having characters stand next to their names

I don’t get the version of christianity where a popsicle stick crucifix can ward off evil