Plantiana Yawn. Poorly Filmed Snooze Fest.

BoardChiri Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Irishchatter I don't get why anyone would really enjoy this, the quality is so poor even after all these years and the storyline seems to be skipping a lot. As well, it seems like a Pre-Twlight movie so I'm assuming the author of Twlight managed to copy a dopey vampire teenage guy who is suppose to be the vampire where he is actually not. He only has those stupid teeth things in his mouth that look as if it was forced in his mouth. Seriously this is just so stupid, I have nothing more to say about this movie but its pure rubbish to hell!

Mr_Ectoplasma "Martin" follows the titular character, an awkward young man who has delusional fantasies about being a vampire. After relocating from Indiana to a small Pennsylvania town, he moves in with his cousin and aged grand uncle, where his vampiric tendencies begin to spiral out of control.One of George Romero's more understated offerings (I'd liken it in tone to his offbeat 1973 effort, "Season of the Witch"), "Martin" is as much a psychological character study as it is a horror film; in fact, it's something of a collision of the two. The film begins with a disturbing date rape scene-turned-bloodletting that is discomforting to say the least. This sets the tone for the remainder of the film, which is downbeat and atmospherically dreary, largely evoked through the idyllic small-town sets and emotive camera-work. Black-and-white photography is utilized to full effect for the vampiric fantasies, which are surreal and eerie.The success of the film largely depends on John Amplas's performance as the title character, and he does the character justice. Martin is both sympathetic and abhorrent, disturbed and misunderstood—the balance struck between both extremes is nuanced, and the tension within the character's identity is where the majority of the film's power lies. The conclusion of the film is in line with its downbeat tone, and renders the film something of an unexpected modern horror tragedy.Romero has said that "Martin" is his favorite of all his films, and it's understandable why. It feels like one of his most personal works (perhaps his most personal), and Martin as a character is able to evoke a multitude of feelings from the audience. The film is both disturbing and amusing, horrific and depressing—it also maintains a high-brow aesthetic throughout in spite of its budgetary limitations. An understated, atmospheric, and compelling character study that functions just as well as a horror film. 9/10.

fidelio74 Along with Travis Bickle, Martin (John Amplas) is surely one of the great on-screen loners. He is isolated from the society he inhabits because he is an eighty-five-year-old vampire. 'Martin' is set in Braddock, Pennsylvania and there is a wonderful sense of a town stuck in time while the rest of the world has moved on. Perhaps Braddock was once a booming steel town which has fallen on hard times.There is definitely something intensely disturbing in the way Martin attacks and drugs his victims before slicing their veins open with a razor blade and feeding upon them. The film contains some shocking violence so be warned; it is not for all tastes. 'Martin' has a wonderful sense of timelessness which has a lot to do with the black-and-white flashbacks and the dreamy, surreal quality of working-class Braddock. Instead of feeling that he is eighty-five, the flashbacks make us feel that Martin has lived since time immemorial, walking down his lonely road through the ages.One of the most interesting things about 'Martin' is Martin's relationship with Mrs. Santini (Elyane Nadeau). She is a desperately sad character who befriends Martin and penetrates his shyness. Another bond Martin forms is with the host of an all-night call-in radio talk show. Martin calls himself 'the Count' and discusses with the host quite matter-of-factly his behaviour as a modern vampire.Lincoln Maazel is excellent as the tyrannical, patriarchal Cuda who rules his household with an iron fist and who considers Martin the albatross around his neck, the unspoken shame and bane of his family. Christine Forrest - who would go on to marry the film's director, George A. Romero - offers solid support as Christina, Cuda's daughter. She befriends Martin warmly, ignoring his idiosyncrasies. The film's special effects makeup artist, Tom Savini, plays the role of Arthur who is Christina's unpleasant boyfriend.The Umbrella DVD edition has lots of juicy extras for you to get your teeth into but, much to my disappointment, there are no interviews with John Amplas or Elyane Nadeau (RIP). 'Martin' is one of my all-time favourite films.MAJOR SPOILER WARNING: There is crucial dialogue at the conclusion of the end credits.

Was it All a Dream? When I said in my review of his legendary Night of the Living Dead, that George Romero is a horror director with a very inconsistent record, this film sticks out most in my mind as proof of that struggle. Between trying the hardest to be a character study and having to fill out the genre requirements to be sold as a horror film. For his sake, I'm thankful that much of his work feels like it's straining to be horror. Because were it not to add those elements, I wouldn't be interested in seeing his films at all. Without the threat of zombie invasion, 1985's Day of the Dead would be a painfully tedious and irritatingly over the top war flick about people yelling at each other. 1978's Dawn of the Dead would be an action film about people trying to survive the breakdown of society from... what would most likely be anarchy caused by widespread riots and outbreaks of street crime (the sort you'd see in something like 1979's The Warriors or 1978's Saturday Night Fever), were you to take out the zombies. 1973's The Crazies would lack the tragedy to make the boring military effort to contain the outbreak of disease worth watching.And 1976's Martin would be a lame art film about a lanky, skinny dork walking around the neighborhoods of Pittsburgh, watching the people interacting and realizing his upbringing was just not normal. Which is what most of Martin is anyway, save for a half dozen scenes of Martin stalking women, drugging them, then raping them and cutting their wrists so he can suck their "blood," which looks so much like melted-crayons, you'll wonder why the strangely un-vampiric Martin likes to drink it so much. All while the fairly mopey boy narrates almost every shot he's in. And he's in almost every shot. I was once told that narration is the last resort of a screenwriter, a product of desperation. In Martin, rather than Romero using the narrations as a tool of creepy foreshadowing, it's more to provide internal reflections over why Martin is doing what he does. Which, not to beat on a dead horse but, is really quite boring. As is the character of Martin. Who is the entire film.Is Martin a vampire or is it in his own head? Good question. My answer? I don't care. What I want most from a horror film, regardless of how ambitious it is or not, is to be entertained. All said and done, a horror film being scary is a great thing. But it's a luxury. Something I just can't expect from every horror film I see. So, I try to go with the flow. So, how does Martin flow? Quite well, all things considered. Romero does have a style to most of his films. And even though I find The Crazies to a better final film (partly because of the fact that it looks haphazard stylistically, and documentary-like), Martin is a better film in terms of style or atmosphere. Romero is the horror King of library music tracks, which has always bothered me. But, maybe I should lighten up on that. As a matter of fact, I'll never know or never care to know where the original tracks came from. So, the usage of this music by Romero's films is like sampling the flavor of music at the time. One of the few things I truly like about Martin is that I remember the music. The hallucinogenic, reverberating, trapped-in-a-glass-jar quality to most of the pieces.The other thing Martin really has going for it is Martin's amusing reactions to 1970's America. If he really was an 80-something year old vampire with almost no exposure to American culture outside the occasional children's novelty toy or magic tricks, watching him browse through stores and his amazing reaction to the sight of a suicide victim, is downright priceless. Romero's foremost focus in Martin is irony. And the film is chock full of incidences of that. Usually, it's nothing impressive. But one scene really blew me away. Martin breaks into a thrift shop at night, which trips off a burglar alarm. The cops are quick to arrive and Martin has to cut it close to evade capture. This scene is the pinnacle of Romero's brand of suspense. As Martin clings to the walls and ducks and dives around objects to hide himself from the cops' eye- I'm on the edge of my seat. Martin leaps out the door and flies through the streets, desperately looking for somewhere to hide out. As he enters the first dark place he sees, he finds himself in the hide-out of some kind of black gang. Because of Martin, the police have inadvertently caught more criminals. But brilliantly, the two sides have a shoot-out and everyone dies... everyone except Martin.Now, that's a stroke of genius. Irony is what makes it happen. But what makes it so enjoyable is that it is completely unpredictable. Though there are several other scenes in Martn that are unpredictable, none are as filling as this one. Perhaps the film's greatest attribute is that it serves as something of a response to the pressure from Christians or Catholics to conform to what is a normal manner of behavior, etc. When Martin is seen as having "unnatural" impulses, his religious Uncle (was he his uncle? I don't remember) brands him as evil and Satanic, etc. This is some small comfort for the viewers who have experienced psychotic religious people before in their lives, and living in America- it's almost impossible to avoid all of them. But, consider this: I'm getting schooled in religious ethics by a film whose main character is raping and killing women. Which is my second biggest complaint about the movie (the first is how boring Martin the character is). I guess I understand why he wants to rape the women. But, why do I want to watch him doing it?