A moody, effective, atmospheric vampire flick
I literally watched THE NIGHT FLIER on a 'dark and stormy night'. No kidding. It was mid-to-late January 1998 as I recall. It was cold, raining, and already dusk at 5:00 pm when I watched the movie. It was still cold and raining when I left the movie theater. Perhaps it was this combination of the movie's atmospheric and creepy vibe along with the real dark and stormy night that made me remember this Stephen King horror flick.
I seem to agree with many of the fans. THE NIGHT FLIER is not a great horror flick but neither is it a bad one. But yet it's not averag or mediocre either. It's hard to explain. Like most of us who like THE NIGHT FLIER, it's more of a feeling. The best I can say is that from A to F, this movie would receive a B or B-. On a scale of the classic four star rating system, we'd give it a two-and-a-half star rating, which means, 'definitely worth a look'. Only the controversial weak ending prevented a higher rating. Mel Ferrer was primarily responsible for making the movie work, as the grizzled, jaded, cynical, a$$h--e, but highly intelligent, tenacious and pugnacious independant news rag investigative reporter. The plot device was genius, the Cessna, tandem-engined Skymaster, which made it's reputation in Vietnam as a scout reconnaissance and artillery spotting plane, is the mobile flying coffin of an aerial nomadic vampire monster. More plot genius. The flying Skymaster vampire coffin traveled over the rural back air routes from one isolated rural airport to another, which helped heighten the gothic atmosphere of this movie by lending it that 'isolated' and 'helpless' feeling to it.
The director, Mark Pavia, effectively created a 1997 rural American backdrop version of 18th century rural Eastern Europe amid the gloomy, densely wooded Carpathian Mountains. You knew you were in rural northeast America, but you felt just as helpless and isolated as any Romanian, Czech, Yugoslav, Bulgarian, Hungarian peasant stranded out in the deep woods as the sun is going down and the sounds of distant wolves howling in the far off mountains chills your blood.