Director: George A. Romero
Written by: George A. Romero
Cast: John Amplas, Lincoln Maazel, Christine Forrest

Year / Country: 1977, USA
Running Time: 91 mins.

See it with someone you’re sure of…

Martin is a vampire. At least that is what he appears to be. But why does he use a needle to put his victims to sleep? And why cut their wrists with a razor in order to drink their blood? Where are his fangs? There are answers to these questions. Because he slices their wrists he is able to stage a suicide. These logical explanations apply to everything Martin does. That way you can never be sure he is a real vampire. He could also be faking it or merely thinking he is one.

Martin’s eldest cousin Tada Cuda, where he goes to stay in Pittsburgh, certainly thinks he is a real nosferatu. He tells him that he will first save his soul and then destroy him. Vampirism is a family curse, we later learn, and Martin is one of the last living specimens. But the more we see of him, the less we believe he is for real. Every vampire myth is discarded by Martin. He eats garlic, can hold a crucifix and sunlight only mildly bothers him. He tells his cousin that there is no magic. It is just a sickness.

Black & white flashbacks later reveal that Martin is an old vampire, if he is not imagining it. In these flashbacks, Martin is chased by an angry mob after he gets caught feeding on human blood. This is where Romero’s point is becoming clearer. Monsters are created by man so they don’t have to deal with their own vileness. It is much more convenient to have a scapegoat like Martin. Romero himself said about Martin: “Man’s barbarism seems quick to rise, particularly when justified by some ‘cause’ of righteous society, as witness the heinous acts performed in wartime.”

That humans are more monsters than monsters is a theme that finds its way in almost all of Romero’s films. But rarely more successful than in Martin, which is considered his finest film besides the ‘Dead’ series. I agree. It is atmospheric as hell and especially when it reaches a horrible and confrontational ending, Romero’s point comes across perfectly.

Rating:

Biography: George A. Romero (1940, New York – 2017, Toronto), who lived in Pittsburgh, made his feature debut with Night of the Living Dead. It was a low budget zombie movie that was both groundbreaking and shocking in its time. Quickly, it became a major horror classic. He then directed some smaller, personal films in which he often combined horror and social commentary. In 1978 he topped the success of Night of the Living Dead with his brilliant follow-up Dawn of the Dead. In the eighties his career stagnated a bit when he created the third part in his zombie series Day of the Dead. It was a failure both commercially and critically. In 2005 Romero made a small comeback with Land of the Dead. Romero died in 2017.

Filmography (a selection): Night of the Living Dead (1968), There’s Always Vanilla (1971), Season of the Witch (1972), The Winners (1973, TV episodes), The Crazies (1973), O.J. Simpson: Juice on the Loose (1974, TV doc), Martin (1977), Dawn of the Dead (1978), Knightriders (1981), Creepshow (1982), Day of the Dead (1985), Monkey Shines (1988), Two Evil Eyes (1990) [with Dario Argento], The Dark Half (1993), Bruiser (2000), Land of the Dead (2005), Diary of the Dead (2007), Survival of the Dead (2009)