Written By Rick Ellis, Saturday, June 19th, 2004

I understand that Stephen King has sold tens of millions of books and has millions of devoted fans. I'm just not one of them.

Oh, it's nothing personal towards Mr. King. Having waded through a couple of books, I can appreciate his talent. But for the most part, I just don't enjoy the type of stuff he writes.

I find myself especially bored with what has come to be the stereotypical King genre. That story that takes place in some small town or secluded village. A town that seems quiet on the surface, but holds a lot of deep, dangerous secrets. Then a mysterious stranger visits, and all hell breaks loose.

That's a pretty apt description of Salems Lot and about a half dozen of his other hits. So the prospect of sitting through three hours of King was not thrilling me in the least.

As it turned out, I had nothing to worry about.

Even for a non-King fan like myself, TNT's take on Salem's Lot is a guilty pleasure. It's fast-paced, action-packed and filled with good performances.

Rob Lowe plays Rick Mears, an infamous writer who grew up in Jerusalem's Lot. As a boy, he discovered a gruesome murder/suicide and the experience scarred him. After a great deal of success as an adult, he has returned to the small town to relive the experience, and somehow make sense of it all.

As it turns out, he is not the only new face in town. Two men (Donald Sutherland and Rutger Hauer) have bought the ramshackle home where Mears discovered the bodies, and it doesn't take anyone long to realize there is evil in town.

Before you know it, vampires are chewing on folks left and right, Mears has befriended the cutest girl in town (played by Samantha Mathis), and the audience is careening towards the expected showdown between good and evil.

What ultimately keeps Salem's Lot from collapsing are the stellar jobs of acting from many of the leads. Lowe does a solid job in the lead role, and while he's not very compelling in the voice-overs, he more than makes up for it everywhere else.

Andre Braugher is his usual amazing self, this time playing Mear's old Engligh teacher, and the man who first suspects something may be going horribly wrong in the town. James Cromwell also does a typically good job, playing a town priest whose disenchantment with his faith leads him to the dark side.

But the best performance may come from Samantha Mathis, who manages to steal every scene she's in. Her character is charming, sweet and wistfully beautiful. And when she becomes a vampire, you can see what would lead any man to be at least a bit tempted to cross over to the dark side just to be with her. Mathis is always wonderful, and this role makes me wish she could find a meaty acting job on some weekly drama.

But not every actor gets off so easily. Both Sutherland and Hauer play ther typical character roles once again, even though Sutherland tries to mix it up a bit by affecting a goofball stare that makes him seem as if he's high on cheap painkillers.

Salem's Lot ends in an ambiguous way, albeit after killing off nearly everyone in the cast. But in the end, it was an enjoyable ride. Even for a Stephen King movie.