Unlike other vampire films with a European background, Near Dark takes place in American western countryside, which is a quite unique setting. The camera work does a great job to show the iconic view of American West: the dawn and sunset, the dust, and a cowboy on a white horse, etc. The most interesting fact in the film is that the vampires can be transformed back to human by blood transfusion.
The beginning shot, when a mosquito is sucking blood of Caleb, indicates the showing of the blood suckers later; and the action of sucking blood itself also corresponds with Mae’s words about instinct. Just like what Scott Tobias says in his article, “killing and feeding is just a sad necessity of her existence, and she's numbed herself to it.” I feel pity for Mae and Caleb, they both become vampires out of their own wills. Put myself in their position, I guess if I were a vampire, I may also have to kill people and suck their blood for survive just like they do in the film. But this vampire group travels like criminals, they steal cars, burn houses and even torture their preys, except Mae, the rest of the members seem somewhat enjoy the process.
The acting of the cast is fascinating, each character has their own distinctive personality. Among all the six characters, Mae is the most complicated and conflicted one. She makes Caleb to become one of them, but she also feels bad that Caleb is suffering; that’s why she even opens her own wrist to feed Caleb, and this is one of the most moving moment to me. Some of Mae’s words are still stuck in my head, her voice is so attractive and hard to forget, “It's dark. It's so bright, it'll blind you.”
HD中字
