Hanging out with The Lost Boys (1987)

Today's dose of Halloween comes in the form of The Lost Boys. No, not the Peter Pan variety, but the Kiefer Sutherland sort. The kind with fangs and drink blood. Interestingly, they can both fly and never age. I've heard of this one a number of times, but only in the last year or so. I got the impression that it was one of the better, or at least cooler, vampire movies. Also, having come out in the late 80s, it seems a lot of people around my age have a lot of nostalgia for it. After all, it stars the Corey's and an early appearance of Bill, of the famous Bill and Ted duo. Well it's 2012 now, so can this '87 cool movie still hold up today? Hit the jump to find out.


Michael (Jason Patric) and Sam (Corey Haim), along with their mother, have just moved to live with their grandfather in Santa Carla, CA. It seems like any other waterfront town, although there are an unusual number of "Missing" posters around. Then they find out this just might be the murder capital of the world! The local comic book store kids start trying to warn Sam that there's vampires in the town. Meanwhile, Michael gets pulled into a local biker gang, lead by David (Kiefer Sutherland) who seems to be more than he appears.

Kiefer Sutherland makes a pretty badass biker!

This movie seems to be filled with actors I associate with the 80s. First you have a very young Kiefer Sutherland with crazy bleached, spiked hair, that is almost like a mullet. Then you have an even younger Alex Winter who later became famous as Bill S. Preston, Esq. of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure. Last but not least, you have the Corey's: Corey Haim and Corey Feldman. Corey Haim plays the more main role of the as the younger brother Sam. Feldman plays one of the two Frog Brothers, the comic book shop geeks obsessed with vampires. Of course, as it turns out, they're actually right!

Sam (center) and the Frog Bros.

I'm not sure what it is about Corey Haim and Corey Feldman that made them so popular in the 80s. I never really liked them when I was growing up, so I never saw any of their movies. Outdated 80s culture, combined with the annoying Corey's made large portions of this film nearly unwatchable for me. Every scene these two were in, but especially Corey Feldman, were awful! The whole theme with the kids from the comic book store, oddly named "The Frog Brothers", was just horrible. They seem to be the only ones, however, that have noticed that there are vampires running around. Sure they seem crazy at first, but when Michael starts becoming transparent in the mirror and floating off the ground, their stories start to sound a little more believable.

Speaking of vampires, this is probably the only part of the movie that was kind of still OK. The biker gang, who I guess are the titular lost boys, was pretty cool looking. I say "cool looking" because they had almost no character to them at all. Kiefer Sutherland was the closest to having an actual personality beyond being a Yes Man. The initiation they put Michael through was also pretty cool and seemed really fun. They even had a sweet, yet utterly impossible hide-out of a whole hotel that was now almost perfectly underground! Also, the facial make-up/effects when they changed into vampires was pretty cool, particularly the eyes! I guess even the fights at the end were pretty cool. Too bad the script seems like something that was scribbled drunkenly on napkins one night.

Jack Bauer is a vampire!!

I can totally see how if I was a kid in the 80s and I saw this when it came out, this would have probably been one of the coolest movies ever. Now though, it just feels like it doesn't hold up all that well. It definitely seems like a movie you had to see when it came out, or at least closer to the 80s, to get. Now it's filled with crazy clothing fashions, goofy and annoying kids, a terrible script and empty acting that hold it back despite its kinda cool vampires and a single fight scene at the end. I also got the impression it didn't know what kind of movie it wanted to be. Either a kid's movie with water guns, or a more grown-up horror with bloody murders. Was I the only one who wanted the Frog Bros. to get killed and have the Lost Boy gang win? I think that would have been a much better ending than the bland "everything works out good in the end." Goodbye Kiefer vampire, you were possibly the only good thing about the whole movie. You will be missed.