MovieChat Forums > Fright Night (1985) Discussion > The girl in the painting

The girl in the painting

posted 9 years ago by jt2002b
10 replies | jump to latest

I always found it deep and intriguing how the girl in the painting looks almost exactly like Amy. Dandridge stared out the window deep in thought and all he could say about her was "She's someone I knew... A long time ago." This to me always represented that the girl in the painting was his lover in a past life and she was probably killed which upset him and even to this day pains him to talk about. The attraction to Amy is strong because she reminds him almost identically of a lost love.

[–] CountVladDracula 9 years ago

Yes, this is a nod to the original Dark Shadows and the version of Dracula produced by Dan Curtis (creator of Dark Shadows). The first version of Dracula to be looking for the reincarnation of his lost love. The first vampire to do that was Barnabas in Dark Shadows (original TV show). The Fright Night novelization implies that Jerry IS Dracula, which actually explains a lot.

[–] mikebos 9 years ago

That's from the original Dracula story by Bram Stoker. Dracula goes after Jonathan Harker's wife Mina because she looks exactly like his dead wife. Ever since that book was written, almost every vampire story steals this exact plot.

[–] 9 years ago

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[–] bree331 8 years ago

Actually, this is not an element of Stoker's novel at all. This was (for whatever reason) inserted into the Coppola movie which bears Stoker's name, but the Coppola film's love story doesn't come from the Stoker source material.

Not to mention the Dracula of the novel is pretty hideous, even when younger--he's never really young. Nosferatu in the original silent film is the most accurate portrayal of both Dracula himself (fiction-wise, anyway, discounting the historical Dracula), as well as the many themes of the story, much more so than anything depicted in another, more romanticized and modern vampire/Dracula film.

[–] CountVladDracula 8 years ago

Did anyone here claim it was from the Dracula novel? I don't see a post that does. I said it originated with Dark Shadows and the creator of Dark Shadows brought that plot element over into the Dracula mythos.

[–] bree331 8 years ago

Yes, in the post immediately preceding mine, someone claims it is from the Dracula novel.

[–] CountVladDracula 8 years ago

That's from the original Dracula story by Bram Stoker. Dracula goes after Jonathan Harker's wife Mina because she looks exactly like his dead wife. Ever since that book was written, almost every vampire story steals this exact plot.

No, that is not in the original novel. The idea of Dracula looking for the reincarnation of his lost love was invented by Dan Curtis, the creator of the TV series Dark Shadows. He used it for his vampire, Barnabas Collins, in Dark Shadows and it was so successful that he used it for his movie version of Dracula starring Jack Palance. After that other film and TV versions of Dracula used the idea but it is not from the original novel. In the novel there was no love story between Dracula and Mina. In fact the first version of Dracula where Mina falls in love with him is a 1976 novel called The Dracula Tape by Fred Saberhagen.

[–] kgwrote-854-104240 8 years ago

There was an Italian vampire film around 1964 (Monster of the Opera I think) that also did the reincarnated love angle--but I found Blacula did it best--never liked how it is done in other vampire movies-even with Fright Night.
What I have wondered about-Dandridge seems to give Charlie the chance to save himself--but if he or Billy Cole saw Amy visiting Charlie--wouldn't they have gone after her anyway--so he couldn't have made a deal with Dandrige after all.

[–] snparks 8 years ago

I guess these are one of the things that make Dandridge's character most interesting is just how far does his past go? We know that Dandridge has been connected to Billy Cole a long time but what were these guys like in that 'other world' before crossing into ours? We can only guess.

[–] 8 years ago

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