Directed by Joel Schumacher, The Lost Boys is a teen-oriented horror movie that rejuvenated the vampire for a new generation of audiences. With a handsome, charismatic ensemble cast, this 1987 box office hit helped launch the careers of many of its young up-and-coming stars.

Set in the fictitious California beach town of Santa Carla (but in fact mostly shot in Santa Cruz), the film centres on teen brothers Michael (Jason Patric) and Sam (Corey Haim), new in town with their struggling single mother Lucy (Dianne Wiest). Michael soon becomes infatuated with mysterious local girl Star (Jami Gertz) and falls in with her friends, a rebellious gang of long-haired, leather-clad bikers headed up by David (Kiefer Sutherland).

After drinking a strange red liquid as part of a gang initiation, Michael finds himself experiencing nightmarish symptoms, and the younger Sam quickly realises the horrifying truth: his big brother is turning into a vampire.

With a title that nods to Peter Pan, The Lost Boys was originally conceived as a children’s film for Richard Donner to direct, as a companion piece to his earlier hit The Goonies; but when Donner decided instead to offer Joel Schumacher the director’s chair, Schumacher ‘re-vamped’ the project into something hipper, edgier and more mature.

The Lost Boys marked the first collaboration of the ‘Two Coreys,’ Haim and Feldman, the latter of whom appears as comic book store clerk and self-proclaimed vampire hunter Edgar Frog; the teen idol duo would re-unite in several other films in the years ahead. It also gave an early role to Alex Winter, who would achieve fame alongside Keanu Reeves in 1988’s Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Meanwhile, Kiefer Sutherland would re-unite with director Joel Schumacher in another teen-friendly horror, 1990’s Flatliners.

Two direct-to-DVD sequels would follow in 2008’s Lost Boys: The Tribe and 2010’s Lost Boys: The Thirst, while a TV reboot of the franchise is currently in the works.