Overview: The mid-nineties were a fertile period for the vampire movie. Big-name stars such as Tom Cruise and Eddie Murphy flocked to genre, as did high-caliber filmmakers like Francis Ford Coppola, veterans Wes Craven and John Landis, independents Michael Almereyda and Jeffrey Arsenault, and up-and-comers Quentin Tarantino and Guillermo del Toro.

Amid the fangs and crucifixes, Abel Ferrara reunited with his King of New York star Christopher Walken for The Addiction, a distinctly personal take on creatures of the night.

Philosophy student Kathleen (Lili Taylor, The Conjuring) is dragged into an alleyway on her way home from class by Casanova (Annabella Sciorra, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle) and bitten on the neck. She quickly falls ill but realizes this isn’t any ordinary disease when she develops an aversion to daylight and a thirst for human blood.

Having made a big-budget foray into science fiction two years earlier with Body Snatchers, Ferrara’s approach to the vampire movie is in a lower key. Shot on the streets of New York, like so many of his major works – including The Driller Killer, Ms. 45 and Bad Lieutenant – and beautifully filmed in black and white, The Addiction sees the filmmaker on his own terms and at his very best: raw, shocking, intense, intelligent, masterful.

4K Blu-ray Verdict: For the record, The Addiction is NOT about vampires, it is about resistance, or lack of it. About what may be right around the corner, about discipline, or about lack of discipline. About being in the wrong place at the wrong time. It can happen to anybody, and it happens to everybody. It’s a cinematic pyramid scheme, if you will.

Beautiful black and white composition by Abel Ferrara tied tightly in a wonderfully creative Joe Delia score and casting the usual Ferrara/indie suspects: Paul Calderone, Edie Falco, Kathryn Erbe, Lili Taylor, Annabella Sciorra, the theme of the movie presents four new questions for every one it answers! Do we have a choice? Can we resist? And just when we think we have it all figured out, Christopher Walken has to show up and throw an entirely new lilt on things.

In closing, and from my own humble point of view, this is one of Abel Ferrara’s more intelligent and less appreciated movies. He had moved far away from the tacky material that he used to make in the 70’s and 80’s. Many may experience a unsettling feeling with the images of a graphic nature, but this is part of what Taylor is studying.

Lily Taylor gives a fine performance and her constant body movements expressing the pain she feels is very realistic. She does more than act. The movie has a fast pace and with a short running time of 82 minutes there is never a dull moment. Buy and watch it today and thank me later!

Limited Edition 4K Special Features:
Brand new 4K restoration from the original camera negative by Arrow Films
4K (2160p) UHD Blu-ray™ presentation in Dolby Vision (HDR10/compatible)
Optional lossless 5.1 and 2.0 soundtracks
Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
Audio commentary by director Abel Ferrara, moderated by critic and biographer Brad Stevens
Talking with the Vampires, a 2018 documentary about the film, featuring actors Christopher Walken and Lili Taylor, composer Joe Delia, cinematographer Ken Kelsch, and Ferrara himself
2018 interview with Abel Ferrara
2018 interview with Brad Stevens
Abel Ferrara Edits The Addiction, an archival piece from the time of production
Original trailer
Image gallery
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Peter Strain
Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring writing on the film by critic Michael Ewins and an archival interview with Ferrara by Paul Duane

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