Salem's Lot

King's book is among his best works, and it must be a pleasure to film such a strong work. Although it suffers from some traditional flaws of King's adaptations. Salem's Lot has an advantage over other television King projects only in that it has two parts, so most of the traditional filler is eliminated, compared to other TV adaptations where it would be worth cutting out dozens of minutes and entire long scenes. Originally, I considered giving it four stars, but in the second part, the quality goes downhill like a skydiver without a parachute. The screenplay is only average and doesn't make use of all the possibilities of King's source material, and the direction could be more inventive and the acting performances more convincing, especially in the case of the main protagonist. Donald Sutherland's performance was decent, but Rutger Hauer could have been more intense - his character should have been more demonic. Overall impression considering the TV nature of the film: 50%. (03/02/2008)