(Director: Joel Schumacher. Screenwriters: Jan Fischer, James Jeremias, and Jeffrey Boam.)
Review
Lucy, recently divorced mother with two teenage sons, relocates to Santa Carla, California, to live with her father (played by a hilarious Barnard Hughes). Her teenage sons are Michael Emerson (Jason Patric, ROGER CORMAN’S FRANKENSTEIN UNBOUND, 1990) and his slightly younger brother Sam (Corey Haim, SILVER BULLET, 1985). As they enter Santa Carla, its greeting sign sports a spraypainted warning on its wooden backside: “Murder Capital of the World*.” An excitable Sam notes the graffiti, while Lucy and Michael tamp down his proclamations that they shouldn’t move there, though Michael isn’t thrilled about the move either.
When Sam and Michael go to the local Boardwalk (actually, the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk in Santa Cruz, California), Michael is instantly smitten with Star (Jami Gertz), a pretty, young woman who runs with a pack of motorcycle-riding punks. It appears she’s an item with the menacing David Powers (Kiefer Sutherland), leader of the vampire gang. Star is not alone in noting Michael’s attention toward her; David is aware of it too and means to do something about it.
Before long, Michael—like Star—is a reluctant coffin convert. Michael’s change affects those around him. David and his crew relentlessly push Michael to join them and if he doesn’t, they’ll kill everyone Michael cares about.
Meanwhile, Sam has made buddies with the adolescent Frog brothers, Edgar (Corey Feldman, FRIDAY THE 13th: THE FINAL CHAPTER, 1984) and Alan (Jamison Newlander, THE BLOB, 1988), self-proclaimed vamp-killers and comic bookstore owners. When Sam, Alan, and Edgar find out that Michael is wavering between life and undeath—his out-all-night lifestyle symptomatic of drug addiction—they, with Michael and Star’s help, seek out David and his cohorts to destroy them, even as Lucy is drawn to her video store employer, Max (Edward Hermann, THE TOWN THAT DREADED SUNDOWN, 2014).
This popular horror comedy—which effectively manages both elements—was released stateside on July 31, 1987. It’s a respectful, more violent, and bloodier spin on J.M. Barrie’s 1904 stage play PETER PAN; OR, THE BOY WHO WOULDN’T GROW UP, later a 1911 novel by Barrie. LOST’s title—reference to Pan’s eternally young companions—as well as its themes and structure also stem from Barrie’s PAN.
LOST delights on all levels. Its visual aspects, camera movement, pop culture-savvy and quotable dialogue, and other elements make it stand out in a genre glutted with tripe. LOST is further elevated by its all-around stellar players, who include Dianne Wiest (EDWARD SCISSORHANDS, 1990) as Lucy, and Alex Winter (FREAKED, 1993) as Marko.
LOST is one of the best bloodsucker flicks in its genre, an on-the-surface R-rated teen-themed B-flick made by all-around great talent and book-based thrills. Worth watching and owning, this. Followed by two direct-to-video sequels, LOST BOYS: THE TRIBE (2008) and LOST BOYS: THE THIRST (2010).
[*Santa Cruz, California, where much of LOST was shot,
was given this macabre moniker after three different killers, in a short period
of time, did their foul deeds sometimes in the 1970s.]
Deeper film(ic) dive
According to IMDb, LOST ‘s other references include:
Lucy, Sam and Michael’s mom, is named after Lucy Westenra, a character in Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel DRACULA;
Alan and Edgar Frog’s first names acknowledge macabre author Edgar Allan Poe.
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