Chiasmus cult cinema trailers - "The Lost Boys" (1987). *These will be ongoing posts, courtesy of the A.Glass DVD collection. As I offer via Chiasmus Cult trailers, my summarized overviews*

What coming of age Generation X movie, offered a sign of hope that the generation who were all going to be 20 year olds in the 1990s, might actually carry the torch, or at least a variation, without the copy, of the counterculture ethos handed down by the boomers?  Give up?  "The Lost Boys" (1987).  And yes, this is a teen vampire movie, with touches of humor and horror, which, and if you were a 17 year old at the time, you would have identified with it, and chuckled along at its relatable aspects.  Such as the first scene, where the mother, "Lucy Emerson" played by the incredibly talented Dianne Wiest, as her and the two teenage sons, the main characters in The Lost Boys, the late Corey Haim, who plays "Sam Emerson", and his older brother "Michael Emerson" (Jason Patric) are driving to the fictional town "Santa Carla" (based off Santa Cruz, California), to begin a new life after Lucy's divorce.  Listening to music, when they land on a song, which Lucy, says, "this is from my era", both son's gripe, and the channel is changed to the main soundtrack song for the movie, the 1980s band, 'Echo and The Bunnymen' cover of the 1967 'The Doors' song, "People are Strange".  Setting the stage for the transition, as teenages vampires being the main theme, to early 40 year old baby boomers feeling old and redundant.

Hence, the screenplay written by James Jeremias, and by definition a stagehand in the industry, who worked on the "Blade Runner" (1982) set, wanted to create a story about homeless teenage Vampires living in Santa Cruz, that never grow up, a sort of reverse story of Peter Pan.  Hanging out on the boardwalk, arcades and amusement park.  But, paradoxically reflecting a darker version of the remnants of the 1970s counterculture, when it did indeed enter a more bleak time, at the precursor of 70s hedonism, and when the 1960s did dry up, the amount of homeless youth in and around California was staggering, and so was the abuse.  

As the Gen Xers new found sensibilities and later entrepreneurial dreams as the 1990s rolled in, "The Lost Boys" directed by the late Joel Schumacher, who very much epitomised the transition from Boomer to Gen Xer, within his movies throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Somewhat closes the gate on those future aspirations, albeit offering that there is still a hangover from 1960s and 1970s countercultures to get over, that the 1980s remained active with our parents who were only in the 30s, and thus, were still acting it out.  The Lost Boys, despite it being at the tale end of the 1980s, is very much that 'dark hippie' flick more than not, as the Emerson family drive into Santa Carla, with the "Welcome to Santa Carla" sign viewed from behind, with the graffiti, "The Murder Capital of the World" scrawled on the back, in reference to Santa Cruz of the 1970s.

A young Kiefer Sutherland, plays "David" the head of the Vampire gang, with his glamish, rock and roll looking, pre 1990 grunge, gang members, including his bohemian chic girlfriend "Star" (Jamie Gertz), to which, on the first night of the Emerson brothers checking out the boardwalk amusement park, the older brother, Michael is seduced by Star, in a kinda awkward lovestruck moment, which leads to an impromptu meeting, albit filled with sexual tension, with David, and then leading further too Micheal hanging out with the gang (within a cave that used to be a hotel, that got sucked into the foreshore from the 1909 Earthquake), while drinking David's blood, in a peer pressure drug taking session type of way, the blood is stored within a stylized looking wine bottle.  And thus, David is turned into a half vampire.  As he begins to go through physical and emotional changes, with the younger brother Sam, hooking up with very unlikely vampire hunters, two military dressed teenages working in a comic book store (watch for their stoned hippie parents, perpetually sleeping at the counter) called the "Frog brothers", played by Corey Feldman and Jamison Newlander, attempting to save his brother and kill the head vampire.  That being the late Edward Herrmann's character "Max", who is dating Sam and Michael's mother, in a vain attempt at creating a vampiric family of boys with a mother, so they are no longer lost.

"The Lost Boys" does not try to proclaim any projection of what Gen X would turn out to be, apart from the fantasy that may just stay young, carefree and rebellious, nor offer reprieve to the Boomers, as their three decades of counterculture influences actually did not get passed on within the 1990s, nor the 2000s for that matter.  So, the movie does feel somewhat dated, and maybe with the current generation of late teenagers and early 20 year olds, unrelatable.  

And yet, if you just turn off the transgenerational comparisons, and enjoy the movie, where you can have fun at night, on the cheap, without mobile phones, just hanging out, without the post digital tension, and getting up to mischief, which does not killing people and drinking their blood.  Then you may find an endearing charm with "The Lost Boys", in that sweet spot of the late 1980s to 1993.

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(A.Glass 2025)

All CHIAMUS Cult Cinema trailers/commentary to date: chiasmusmagazine.blogspot.com/search/label/Chiasmus%20cult%20cinema