LA Weekly from Los Angeles, California • 18

IFfflm Martin: Our Quiet Transylvania by Ginger Varney And why should they? Martin hasnt that many victims. The kids a killer all right, but in this movie there are ten murders and Martin is responsible for only four. His bloody deeds are no more sensational than the violent sexual assaults that routinely occur on city streets. In contemporary terms, the vampires evil is run of the mill. Which is director George Romeros whole point.

Romero is showing us that evil no longer has any impact; nor does magic. Theres simply no serenity in real life for the vampire to turn into catastrophy. The disintegration of order, the collapse of public morale, has already occured. We live with it every day. Draculas crimes are commonplace.

Here 9s To Home-Grown Horror 0 OTHER MOVIEMAKER working in the horror genre says as much, as successfully as George Romero. His scripts use few cliches and those that do turn up get stood on their heads. With the thrills and chills hes equally unpredictable. Some scenes are vilely, flamboyantly frightening; others merely itchy with a sinister potential. But the emphasis in a Romero movie is always on the explication, not the excitement.

And the explication never includes any reassuring reminders that an audience is worlds away from the poor ghouls on display. This is Pittsburgh, not Transylvania; and theres no escaping the implications of that kind of home-grown horror. Martin is the first vampire movie to further the genre since the Tod Browning-Bela Lugosi Dracula of 1931. HE MARTIN OF THIS movies title is vampire but one who possesses no occult power and isnt even particularly long in the tooth. Martin wears jeans and windbreaker in place of the more formal flowing cape and black-tie dress suits traditionally favored by Dracula or Nosferatu.

He walks or uses public transportation to get from victim to victim, never coming closer to a castle than the suburban palaces of Pittsburghs middle class. And these victims are not voluptuous virgins or outrageously beautiful maidens his taste runs to thickthighed housewives and plain-jane career girls. Nor does he go up the spout without blood on a rigidly regular basis; Martin spends most nights listening to the radio rather than prowling the streets for fresh flesh. And daytimes he works in a deli. Clearly Martin would prefer not to be a vampire, especially one who cant cast a spell.

And since hes excruciatingly shy, this lack of both worldly and unworldly charm makes the procurement of potential victims all the more difficult. Thus he makes do with the only magic he knows drugs. These he carries about in a backpack and uses to put his victims to sleep. Played by John Amplas in a frail, searching style, Martin seems more troubled teenager than bedeviled monster. In fact, adolescent sexual anxiety is one of his main miseries; hence he rapes.

With the exception of the old uncle whose house Martin shares, nobody notices a vampire is alive and well in Pittsburgh. GAPE WLANS HAVING A BALL! His dream teams got a preacher, a jailbird, a pool shark, ajnuscleman. And the best guy on the team is a girl. 1 to make his movies there. A huge warmlooking man in his mid- 40s, Romero has a style that is sort of protective big and nice and yet quite obviously accustomed to having his way.

His Pittsburgh company has made roughly 500 commercials, as well as numerous television documentaries. So hes never had to wait tables while waiting for investors. Over the years, Romero has shot miles of film, polishing his craft. His Pittsburgh operation (which now has an office in New York) has also imported 40 European theatrical films. Romero: To have access to the kind of money to really execute all your ideas, you have to eventually start tapping into the industry at large.

With the success of Night of the Living Dead, Hollywood took notice. Romero came here to talk deals. Romero: At that point I resisted because what I was getting was B-grade horror stuff. You know, Were gonna build you up, take care of you, get you in shape, then well put you in the ring for the big match. And I wasnt interested in that.

My paranoia came from my space in Middle America and not really understanding what the business was all about. But there is typing, and very often directors do get typed. If you can get out and work in several different areas, fust work seriously with the medium, and not be afraid of what you 're doing, you become a more viable product. If your pictures are making money, somebodys going to give you a shot. Romero returned to Pittsburgh and to his production company.

He made three films which, in his words, "nobody saw. Then he made Martin, but not before a i Romero: An Unbranded Animal by Bobby Goodman EORGE A. ROMERO MADE HIS first feature film. Night of the Living Dead, far from Hollywood and big-studio intervention in Pittsburgh. The film was widely successful it became a cult phenomenon for a while and Hollywood came to call.

But Romero politely resisted being cruised by the studios, earning him the Hollywood PR classification maverick. A maverick is not an anti-establishment revolutionary but an unbranded animal, and thats Romero. He has no objection to working in the system, but is wary of being branded a horrorfantasy director. His current film, Martin, though definitely of the horror genre, is a most unconventional movie. Its a contemporary down-to-earth, almost intellectual variation on the vampire theme.

Martin, produced on a small budget is imperfect, but extremely well-crafted and highly effective. Romero: Martins what this art form should be about. It's an idea that I wanted to do and I expressed it the way I wanted to express it I wanted to make Martin, so we went out and raised the money. What I want to do is make films, recognizing that I'm not a Kubrick who can walk in and get $15 million on an idea that I happen to have. He started the first film-production company in Pittsburgh (five more have sprung up since), and is perfectly happy COLUMBIA PICTURES PRESENTS FRIEDMAN KINGS ROAD PRODUCTION GABRIEL KIPIWUISI BREAK ASSOCIATE PROOUCER EXECUTIVE PRODUCER SCREENPLAY BY JACK GROSSBERG GERALD FRANKEL-SANDOR STERNl STORY BY DIRECTED BY PRODUCED BY MARC KAPLAN JACK SMIGHT STEPHEN FRIEDMAN music by DAVID SHIRE and JAMES Di PASQUALE pg Harm bjiwb Mrrco I mwnnwofarMUaniWii 1 READ THE BALLANTlNE PAPERBACK 1979 Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.

STARTS FRIDAY FIZB. 23rd PACIFIC HOLLYWOOD, PLAZA WESTWOOD AKD AT A SELECTED THEATRE K5AR YDU! I 4 March 1379.