THE ADDICTION
As Ari Aster’s Hereditary again sparks the “elevated horror” debate, here’s a gleaming 4K Blu of Abel Ferrara’s hypnotic black-andwhite vampire movie to remind everyone that genre movies have long refused to be boxed.
Shot with clarity and sensuality, The Addiction sees Ferrara invert his King Of New York thesis that drug addicts are vampires, as NYU student Kathleen (Lili Taylor) is forced to “come to terms with my existence” after being bitten by a creature of the night.
Amid poetically rendered but staple images of sinking suns, covered mirrors and wraparound shades, there are references to Sartre, Heidegger and Nietzsche, plus horrific archive footage from the Vietnam War and Nazi concentration camps, and a palpable fear of Aids. This being Ferrara working from a screenplay by his long-time partner-in-crime Nicholas St. John, the film’s blood is also clotted with Catholic despair: there are musings on sin, guilt and forgiveness en route to a conclusion that the human race is addicted to evil – all set to a hip-hop soundtrack.
The blend of pulp and philosophy is always arresting if occasionally pretentious, while the jolts of violence – an academic soiree descends into a bloodbath – go straight for the jugular. The most chilling scene, though, offers just a few lines of dialogue, with Christopher Walken cameoing as an ancient vampire whose line delivery is so soul-shakingly evil it would make Dracula crap his cape. Jamie Graham