Martin (John Amplas), a young man who looks around 20-years-old, boards a train in Indianapolis, Indiana for New York. At night, he breaks into a sleeping car and sedates a woman with a syringe full of narcotics. She struggles, but he tells her not to struggle or be upset because she wont feel pain. After a few minutes, the woman falls asleep, and Martin has sex with the unconscious woman. Afterwards, he slices her wrists with a razor blade so he can drink her blood. The woman bleeds to death in her sleep.
In the morning, the train stops in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where Martin disembarks. He is met by Tata Cuda (Lincoln Maazel) an elderly and hostile old man who claims to be his cousin from the Old World. Together, they travel by another train to the town of Braddock, a dying industrial suburb. They walk to Cuda's large house where he shows Martin his living quarters. Cuda then accuses Martin of being an 84-year-old vampire from his old country. He has taken in Martin because he is family, but tells him, "First I will save your soul. Then I shall destroy you." Martin denies being a vampire and implies that Cuda is merely his uncle rather than his cousin. Cuda then puts up strings of garlic on the doors to his and his granddaughter's room, and then holds up a small cross when Martin approaches him. Martin takes away the cross, and even takes a bite of the garlic mocking these attempts by saying bitterly, "There's no real magic... ever". Cuda tells Martin that he can come and go as he pleases. But he also warns Martin that he will kill him if he kills anyone in Braddock. He also tells Martin to stay away from his granddaughter Christine (Christine Forrest), whom arrives home from her job that evening.
Cuda introduces Christine to Martin, but also warns her to stay away from him. But Christine instead strikes up a friendship with Martin who confides in her about his vampire heritage. When Cuda later confirms Martin's claims to be a vampire, Christine, not surprisingly, refuses to believe either one. She thinks that Cuda and the other members of her family have driven Martin to insanity by making him think that he is a vampire. It is never revealed if Martin really is a vampire, or just a shy and lonely youth with troubled issues. Christine is the only person that Martin gets the courage to talk to. When Christine's boyfriend Arthur (Tom Savini) arrives at the house for dinner, Martin stops talking and backs away despite Arthur's attempt at a conversation. Christine later confides in Martin that she hopes to leave Braddock someday with Arthur, even though Martin points out that Arthur treats her badly and is both verbally and physically abusive towards her.
When Christine sees that Martin won't talk to anyone else, she buys him a phone which he installs in his room. Martin begins to repeatingly call a radio talk show where he describes what it's like to be a vampire. He becomes known on the radio as "the Count" to all the listeners. But the patronizing host (Michael Gornick) thinks he's just crazy.
Martin gets a job at Cuda's grocery store of stocking shelves, hauling boxes around, and even gets to be a delivery boy for some of the customers. One of his customers is a certain Abby Santini (Elyane Nadeau), who becomes taken in with Martin. She is a very friendly young woman who is depressed when she tells Martin that her husband is unfaithful. But Martin still does not have the nerve to talk with her, so she is happy to have someone to confide in with her life problems. Martin phones the radio show host to describe his infatuation with the housewife and senses that she wants to have sex with him. When the radio show host asks Martin if it is a sexual problem that he has involving women criticizing him during sex, Martin replies that he has never had sex with a woman who was awake.
One day, Martin travels by train to outside Braddock to look for victims. At a supermarket, he follows a young woman (Sarah Venable) home to her posh suburban house. He sees the woman's husband (Richard Rubenstein) leave for a long business trip, and Martin decides this would be the right time for more feeding. Martin returns to the house after dark and breaks in through the garage door. But it is Martin who gets the surprise when he bursts into her bedroom to find her in bed with her adulterous lover Lewis (Al Levitsky). After a vicious struggle, Martin jabs both of them with hyprodermic needles with narcotics, and waits for the drugs to take affect. He drags the unconscious body of Lewis from the house to a clump of trees across the street where he kills him by shoving a broken tree branch into his neck and drinks his blood. Martin returns to the house where he has sex with the unconscious woman. But out of compassion and pity, he decides to let her live.
Martin begins to have romantic monochrome visions of his vampire past (real or imagined), where he drained blood from a young woman and was chased through the streets of a nameless European town by a torch-lit mob.
During one Sunday at church, Cuda brings home Father Howard (George A. Romero) who asks him about the possibility of exorcism and demon possession. Father Howard calls upon the elderly Father Zulemans (Clifford Forrest, Jr.) over at Cuda's request. Together, Cuda and Zulemans confront Martin his bedroom and attempt to perform an exorcism on him. At this point, Martin remembers (another real or imaginary flashback), in the Old Country of people trying to perform an exorcism on him, and he flees them. Martin then flees from Cuda and Zuelmas as well. A little later that night, Martin terrorizes Cuda in a children's playground when he puts on a Dracula cape and puts false fangs into his mouth to pretend that he really is a vampire.
One day, Martin finally musters the courage to talk with Mrs. Santini during a routine delivery to her house where he tells her that he's aware of her attempts to seduce him and wants now to have sex with her. After having sex for the first time, Mrs. Santini becomes more depressed for she tells Martin that her husband just left her because she discovered that she cannot bear children, and that her desires towards him are based on sex and nothing else. But Martin wants to stay with her and help her move on with her life. Martin tells the radio show host about his affair with the housewife and that he no longer has the urge to attack other women.
Meanwhile, Arthur meets with Cuda and tells him that he wants Christine to leave town with him so they can get married and start a family. But Christine becomes angry at Cuda when he tells Arthur that insanity runs in their family and he shouldn't consider having children with her. Shortly afterwards, Christine packs up and leaves Braddock for New York with Arthur despite Martin telling her that Arthur is abusive towards her. But her mind is made up. Before leaving, Christine tells Martin that she really has no ill feelings towards him and just wants to make a fresh start with her life. She says goodbye to him and promises to write. But Martin knows that with an abusive and possessive man in Christine's life, she probably won't.
Depressed over losing his one true friend, Martin phones the radio show host and tells him that he's getting "shaky" and wants to go out looking for more victims. That night, Martin travels to a rough crime-ridden area of Pittsburgh and attacks two derelicts in a alley, injecting them with narcotics. He kills one of them by silting the bum's wrist and drinking his blood. Martin is about to kill the second one when a police car shows up and gives chase. Martin narrowly escapes during a long chase on foot which leads from the garbage strew streets and through a local store. Martin runs into an old warehouse where a drug deal is going down. A shootout between the two cops and the three thugs begins where all of them are killed, leaving Martin as the sole survivor who casually walks away from the carnage.
One day, Martin finds Mrs. Santini dead in her bathtub, after she had slit her writs with a razor blade. Martin anonymously calls the police to report the body and leaves. He phones the radio show host one final time to say that he really doesn't need friends or people to talk to for he is his own person. But when Cuda learns about Mrs. Santini's suicide, is mistakenly thinks Martin killed her and made it look like a suicide as he's done before. Cuda walks into Martin's room while he is asleep and kills him by hammering a wooden stake through Martin's heart.
Cuda buries Martin's body in his back garden, while over the closing credits various voices from people are heard talking to the radio show host asking the whereabouts of "the Count".
6/10。奥斯卡系电影，白布包裹家具、监狱鱼眼长镜头，极大得调高了我的观影期待，谁料一泻千里。除了主角其他人物都没有任何神秘之处，本应是主题的算牌也在香港夸张的赌博电影洗礼下众口难调。我好像从来没有进入过保罗施拉德的世界，《第一归正会》是，这部也是。算牌是导演与观众的较量，他藏着王牌但我已失去耐心。
我以为是个小甜饼，但是看下来我并不吃这种设定，我理解不了这种斯德哥尔摩式的莫名其妙的爱情，再帅的对象也不行。如果我讨厌一个人，除非他有什么惊天逆转的表现或者解释，最多可以理解然后变为普通熟人，但是突然爱上？最后一刻还搞什么反转误会？拉倒吧。
好久没看这么简单纯粹的小妞电影了，全是套路，不用动脑。
前几天被雪滴花虐的没边了所以半夜看完本片，剧情简单易懂，没中文字幕也能看个差不多，男女主之间有点chemistry，所以虽然没啥演技也能完成个七七八八。
提前的Christmas movie time，除了电梯那里的改编和书里我最喜欢的结尾没拍之外其他都OK，两人还是很有chemistry，虽然男主这种男模式的帅我不是很喜欢
這片是賭片的完全反高潮設計，完全反過來的。。。或者說是披著一個賭博片的犯罪片，有點意思啊。
聲音和音樂營造出足夠迷人和有效的氣氛與情緒可以讓弱情節的藝術電影有更寬闊的更多維度的思考與想象空間。
好俗……虽然看得就是俊男靓女谈恋爱 但是是怎么做到毫无火花 毫无剧情可言 然后就是 派对、圣诞、见父母…… 看来漂亮国拍烂片一点也不输大陆！sos
男女主之间的火花绝了，好久没看到这么标准苏的男主了哈哈哈哈哈哈哈甜得我哇哇叫。但是剧情上短板很明显，婚礼那段很仓促，人物描写也很潦草，配角都是工具人。
小甜饼，颜值高，经典的enemies to lovers梗
主角在伊拉克的过去不由自主地让人想到施罗德前作《第一归正会》。可惜这次没有个有趣、新鲜的想法，没有耐人寻味的人物。况且主人公的过往、外在冷静、叙事的一般套路以及不最亮眼的结局，令人失望。
男女主全程毫无CP感，男主长了张随时要家暴的脸，人工糖精过剩，引起不适，情感进展的莫名其妙，情节递进得令人发笑，玛丽苏小甜剧也要讲点基本法啊，我对甜剧已经很低要求了，实在吃不下
不知道是不是威廉达福给我的错觉，怎么施拉德到这一部变得有点像费拉拉。
可是个人感觉好像也没有那么欢乐。
适合吃饭看，轻松爱情片，男女主真欢喜冤家，无脑可入
The body never forgets. 审讯的痛感在想象中无限放大，白色的布包裹着家具，等着暴力和悔恨。
纽漂的大学毕业生周末在朋友家一起看的电影。看完了就出去喝一杯那种
220325/想被人爱🥲/他们做爱了，我也想
前期节奏挺好的，后期开始崩坏，美国的date文化让人有点不解，哈哈看看就好
仿佛是只能在牌桌上流转的扑克，肉身始终被关在那虐囚的监狱。赌局的筹码是道德的刑具，宾馆的白布是灵魂的洗礼，递来电话的男孩本是心中自我的重生，爱与救赎却隔着探监室的玻璃触手难及。当谷歌可以探寻地球任意街景，却没有软件可以抵达内心。当算法可以预测比赛成败输赢，却没法教人如何救赎此生。
Copyright © 2015-2023 All Rights Reserved
