George Romero’s haunting 1977 vampire classic Martin had to grow on me when I first saw it about 20 years ago. With its tongue-in-cheek humor, low-key atmosphere and unconventional storyline, it was a little more of a thinking man’s horror film than I was prepared for at the time, being a gore-hungry preteen. Once I “got it”, I was proud to add Martin to my Top 10 list of all-time favorite horror films. Filmed on an incredibly low budget of only $80,000 in Pennsylvania (like most of Romero’s films) during the fall of 1976, Martin is yet again proof of Romero’s talent for stretching a dime and packs more of a wallop than most big-budget vampire films. It’s also supposedly the famed director’s personal favorite of his own films and boasts effective gore and makeup effects by Tom Savini (who also has a cameo in the film) early in his career and an eerie woodwind score by Donald Rubinstein, brother of producer Richard Rubinstein who also provided the score for Romero’s 1981 action film Knightriders .
Martin begins on a train car en route to Pittsburgh, where Martin (John Amplas), who looks young but is actually an 84-year-old age-defying vampire, is on his way to live with his elderly, God-fearing, Roman Catholic cousin Tata Cuda (Lincoln Maazel), who knows Martin is a creature of the night and intends to save his soul before destroying him. He warns Martin , however, that if he ever learns that his toothy cousin has fed on someone from the neighborhood, he will destroy the bloodsucker without salvation. Cuda hangs garlic and crucifixes around the house to taunt his cousin, and even brings Father Zulemas (J. Clifford Forrest, Jr.) around to perform an exorcism on Martin , but our hero pays his superstitious uncle no mind — although he does have enough respect to take the train out of Pittsburgh and stalk his prey in another town nearby.
Cuda gives Martin (who can stand sunlight) a day job in his grocery store as a delivery boy, and one day while making a delivery the “boy” meets unhappily married housewife Abby Santini (Elyane Nadeau), with whom he begins the first “normal” sexual relationship in his life. In the meantime, between clandestine meetings with Abby and blood-drinking sessions with unwilling victims that he drugs in the neighboring town, Martin lets off steam by calling in to a local radio chat show and unloading his problems to glib host Barry (Michael Gornick, who also served as cinematographer on the film). The show ratings go up when Martin begins calling in on a regular basis, detailing how he drugs his female victims before ravishing them and cutting their wrists with razor blades in order to feast on their warm blood supply. The film makes Martin appear to be as much of a victim as the unfortunates he feeds from, likening him to a drug addict who cannot control his urges.
John Amplas, a talented stage actor and current acting teacher who has appeared in several other Romero films (Dawn of the Dead , Knightriders and Day of the Dead ) but never got the breaks for or wasn’t interested in a film career, is the spirit of Martin and makes the part truly his own. I’ve always wished he had done more film work and am a long-time fan based solely on his nuanced work in Martin . Lincoln Maazel, whose sole film credit is Martin and who passed away in 2009 at the age of 106, is superb as the crotchety old Cuda, who values tradition above all else and won’t tolerate profanity or disrespect from Martin or his live-in granddaughter Christina (Christine Forrest, wife of Romero who also appeared in Dawn of the Dead , Knightriders , Creepshow , Monkey Shines , Two Evil Eyes , The Dark Half and Bruiser ). Romero reportedly wanted to film Martin completely in black and white like his own classic Night of the Living Dead , but producer Richard Rubinstein demanded it be done mostly in color to appeal to a wider audience — thus the film is in color and crisply photographed by Michael Gornick (who would later direct Creepshow II , the follow-up anthology horror sequel to Romero’s original ), with the exception of a few brief but haunting flashback scenes showing the ageless Martin in his home country years before, wooing nubile females in bed and fending off torch-wielding townsfolk.
Martin is, like the director himself, my own favorite Romero film and in my Top 20 favorite films of all time, regardless of genre. In check with the George Romero trademark, it is not just a horror film but a critique of contemporary American society. I give Martin my highest rating, 10 of 10, and recommend it to all film buffs, especially those looking for a unique vampire film that’s miles off the beaten path.
