28 March 2024
The Night Stalker (1972)
73 min.
Directed by John Llewellyn Moxey.
With Darren McGavin, Carol Lynley, Simon Oakland, Ralph Meeker, Barry Atwater, Claude Akins, Kent Smith, Charles McGraw, Larry Linville, Elisha Cook.
Extremely entertaining and well done television Movie of the Week, whose success led to a sequel and subsequent series.

Darren McGavin is Carl Kolchak, a reporter investigating a series of bizarre murders in Las Vegas.

But when Kolchak finds that the killer is a vampire named Janos Skorzeny and that said bloodsucker is nearly a century old, well....will anyone believe him?

Of course not. Least of all Kolchak's crusty old boss Tony Vicenzo (Simon Oakland).

So it's up to Kolchak to take down Janos himself. Will he survive his clandestine meeting with the vampire? More importantly, will he lose his job?

Good, spooky fun, with nice touches of humor expertly written by vet scribe Richard Matheson and based on a novel by Jeff Rice.

McGavin is above reproach in his dead on performance as Kolchak. The was the highest rated TV movie up to that time - and deservedly so.

Followed by 1974's equally enjoyable The Night Strangler.

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