American Cinematographer - October 1985 - 74

final confrontation and the climax
of the picture.
As they approach the

house,

green light and dry ice fog
from it like a ghostly, evil
presence. Together, Peter and
Charley enter the house and fight
Billy Cole (Jerry's assistant zom¬
pour

bie) and defeat him. At that mo¬
ment, Jerry appears and dawn

begins breaking.
Chasing Jerry down into
the dark basement, where the win¬
dows have been painted black to

sunlight from entering, Pe¬
him out of his
bed. At this point, the inte¬

prevent
ter

manages to get

coffin

riors of the basement are lit cold
and blue, denoting that the evil

Jerry is still in

power.

But then,

Charley begins breaking out the
black glass, causing great shafts of
sunlight to enter. To achieve the
effect of bright morning sunlight,
Kiesser used the extremely bright
Xenon Skytrackers and placed
them outside the windows of the
basement set, pointing in. Specific
windows were broken out in a cer¬
tain order, creating a pattern of
shafts on the set.

smoke

cookies, a unit called an oil
cracker, regular moll fog, and even
dry ice. However, we primarily
used steam for the alley sequence
where Evil Ed runs into Jerry

Dandridge."
The other sequence shot
in downtown Los Angeles was the

Club Radio sequence. Built in
what used to be Andrews' Hard¬
ware,

Kiesser said the main thing

that attracted the production to
the abandoned, gutted, building

of the architectural fea¬
inside. Not much work was

were some

tures

needed
nous

to

transform the

caver¬

building into the throbbing

Club Radio.
"The interesting thing
about the Club Radio sequence,"

said Kiesser, "was

72

American

Cinematographer

the

use

of

spot¬

lights." Blues, purples, pinks, yel¬
lows, and greens all pulse and
the beat of the music in¬
side the club. "We had the entire
move to

place rigged with HMI spots that
could rotate in any direction and
then they were hooked up to a
computer and programmed for
certain

moves to

ever

music

the beat of whatwe
used for

background."
Amy, Charley's girlfriend,
is seduced by Jerry on the dance¬
floor

Club Radio and taken
his house. Charley rushes
to Peter Vincent's house and con¬
vinces them that they have to save
back

at

to

Amy from the clutches of the vam¬
pire. Finally agreeing, the fright¬
ened Peter Vincent and Charley
head

to

October 1985

Dandridge's house for the

Finally, Jerry is cornered
by the shafts and destroyed by the
light. The final shot of the picture,
showing Charley, Peter, and Amy
in a very warm light, denoting
their triumph over evil.
"I usually come in with a
pre-conceived notion of what I
want to accomplish with a scene,"
said Kiesser, "and that usually
evolves as I watch the scene unfold
with the actors. What I want to do
with a scene usually never changes,
but how I accomplish it usually
does. I like to play a realistic
source,

the

but it is really relative

scene

to

itself.

"Photography should

not

be jarring. If the audience's atten¬
tion goes to the photography, that
means their attention is not on the
story - which is
be. That doesn't
ture

have

where it should
mean that a
pic¬
can't look pretty. But you

to

tell the

story."

A

Mark Steensland is a film student
Ithaca College in New York. His

at

byline has appeared in Millimeter
and Prevue.
American Cinematographer - October 1985

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