Parents' Guide to The Lost Boys

Parents need to know that The Lost Boys is a 1987 horror movie mixed with some campy comedy about vampires wreaking havoc on a California beach town. There are some gory and bloody deaths, with stakes through hearts, electrocutions, and skin melting from holy water and garlic, with blood spraying, spurting, and even gushing through the plumbing. There are also two dog attacks, one in which a woman narrowly avoids getting bitten, and a teen sustains injuries to his hand. There are moments of peril, including one in which a teen succumbs to peer pressure and hangs from a rod underneath a bridge as a train rolls overhead, causing him to lose his grip and fall into the foggy unknown. There's one gross-out scene in which a character about to eat Chinese food hallucinates maggots instead of fried rice and worms instead of noodles. Teens smoke cigarettes and drink beer. Profanity includes "s--t" and "a--hole." Essentially, this is a very 1980s take on vampires, with lots of punky haircuts, goth music, and "the Coreys" (Corey Haim and Corey Feldman) providing most of the comic relief through absurd dialogue at just the right moments to temper the horror.

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