Interview With the Vampire

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Note: In the following joint Blu-ray review both John and Tim wrote up their opinions of the film, with John also writing up the Video, Audio, Extras, and Parting Thoughts.

The Film According to John:
I love vampire flicks, going all the way to the silent "Nosferatu" through Lugosi and Lee to "Bram Stoker's Dracula" and "The Lost Boys." But the first time I watched "Interview With the Vampire" I found it tedious, despite my high regard for its look, feel, costumes, sets, and atmosphere. This second time out on Blu-ray I decided to try a different approach. Instead of viewing it as another vampire flick filled with the despair and loneliness of these societal outcasts, I viewed it as a black comedy. The film worked a little better for me that way and provided a few macabre smiles. Still, I can't say I'd want to watch it again any time soon.

Adapting the screenplay from one of her best-selling novels, writer Anne Rice, along with director Neil Jordan ("The Crying Game," "Michael Collins," "Mona Lisa") concoct a kind of vampire soap opera, filled with enough high-powered stars--Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Christian Slater, Antonio Banderas, Stephen Rea, Kirsten Dunst--to ensure a degree of success. A two-hundred-year-old vampire, Louis de Pointe du Lac (Pitt), tells the story in flashback as he recounts his life history to a journalist, Daniel Malloy (Slater), in a seedy San Francisco apartment.

The first forty minutes or so are given over to Louis's seduction into the allures of vampirism by Lestat de Lioncourt (Cruise), an older and remarkably persuasive vampire. In 1791 Louis was a rich, young plantation owner in the Deep South before succumbing to the Dark Side. Once a vampire, he had to learn certain vampiric necessities, like killing human victims and drinking their blood, which he steadfastly refused to do, preferring rats instead. When he finally came to accept who and what he was, however, he went about his business with relish.

Louis's first human victim is a little girl named Claudia (Dunsten), whom Lestat subsequently turns into a vampire. (It seems a vampire can turn anyone else into a creature of the night by first sucking the person's blood and then combining it with his or her own.) Lestat, you see, is lonely and in order to make Louis stay with him, he gives him Claudia. She becomes the two male vampires' adopted "daughter" and, by implication, Louis's lover. (Like most vampire movies, this one doesn't openly explore the sex lives of the creatures, but it's clear that sucking blood is exhilarating in more ways than one). Later in the movie we see another vampire, Armand (Banderas), with a young boy vampire in tow, so I guess these creatures are not so different from humans in the diversity of their preferences.

Anyway, because vampires never age, they see the world growing old around them, and before more than a few decades have come and gone the happy little family members of Louis, Lestat, and Claudia are at each other's throats, literally. Claudia gets ticked off not being able to grow up and become a real woman, blames Lestat for her condition, and winds up slitting his jugular. Not to worry; vampires are resilient; you can't keep them down. Temporarily left to themselves, Louis and Claudia seek their roots in the Old World, going to Paris and joining up with a whole tribe of blood suckers led by Armand, supposedly the oldest living vampire on Earth. The group earns its keep by performing in a theater, pretending to be humans playing at being vampires. That's a cute twist. All of this goes on without end until we reach the present, where the journalist gets more than he bargained for.

The filmmakers try their best to make us take things seriously, but the movie comes off as part pretentious, pseudo, pop psychology and part parody. Yes, parody, or at least the black comedy to which I referred earlier. I mean, how else can you interpret bits such as the little girl being told not to play with her food (humans), or the girl's demand that she be given her own little coffin in sleep in, or the trio devouring whole families of humans at a single meal? Is that Mel Brooks I spy smiling in the wings? As far as concerns the psychology of the story, do we really need a two-hour treatise on the ethos and animus of vampirism? It rather takes the fun out of the proceedings, you know? I found it more enjoyable to view the film as an sardonic discourse on family values. An unusual family, to be sure, but values nonetheless.

Ultimately, I thought the movie failed to achieve what it strove so hard for--to make us feel any sympathy whatsoever for Louis. We may pity him, yes, but we cannot sympathize. Then there's the matter of everyone speaking in an exaggerated, overly precise, stylized, and hugely melodramatic manner that makes them all sound too unreal to worry about. Worse, the filmmakers give us absolutely no one else in the film to care about. The vampires are the only characters in the plot, the humans mere fodder, and these vampire beasts are cold-blooded murderers who have no concept of right or wrong. How can we feel for them? Unlike conventional vampire movies where there's a hero and a heroine to root for, this film gives us nothing but empty-headed monsters who care not a whit for their prey and even less for one another.

The movie generated no tension for me, no suspense, no fright, and no thrills. OK, I found a few laughs in it. Not exactly what Anne Rice probably intended. And not even the presence of Tom Cruise could save the day for me since he goes missing for half the film! Is it any wonder some of us wind up not caring about the story or any of its participants? The whole thing is overly long, overly dreary, extraordinarily redundant, and, except for the occasional bits of caustic humor and the extraordinary set design, often dull.

John film rating: 5/10

The Film According to Tim:
You really cannot watch any vampire film these days without comparing it to just about every other vampire movie ever made. I can only imagine that movie creators realize that anytime they are about to embark on a vampire project, they are basically reinventing the wheel. The trick is to make a better wheel every time, so not all vampire films ever hit the mark. In fact, there are many that are a complete waste of time, and probably space, too. However, in the case of "Interview With the Vampire," there are few gems like this one that have graced the genre. And it is a genre that has been adored by millions over many decades. For me, "Interview With the Vampire" is the gravy train on biscuit wheels of vampire movies. I adore this film so much that I find it a public embarrassment to see it in the Wal-Mart five-dollar DVD bin. Well, meaning, I feel it's a movie worth more than five dollars and is one of the few films I'd pay full price for on Blu-ray.

In a nutshell, the film is based on one of Anne Rice's "Vampire Chronicle" novels, "Interview With the Vampire." Rice also contributed the screenplay for the movie, and if memory serves, she was not too keen at first on hearing about Tom Cruise playing one of her favorite creations, Lestat de Lioncourt. However, director Neil Jordan proved Cruise was perfect for the part. Nevertheless, all works out, as we are told the story of Louis de Pointe (Brad Pitt), and his tale is revealed in his perspective while being interviewed by a curious, ambitious young writer named Daniel Malloy (Christian Slater).

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