FBMR - Interview With The Vampire
Film-Buff Movie Reviews


INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE: THE VAMPIRE CHRONICLES (1994) ***

I was very excited for this movie to come out. It looked very intriguing, different from all the other vampire movies out there at the time, and with a stellar cast including Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, Christian Slater, Kirsten Dunst, Antonio Banderas, that sealed the deal. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of reading the book before watching the movie. I find that when I do that, I often prefer the book, the movie doesn’t often live up to it, and as a result, I don’t like the movie as much as I would have had I waited to read the book after. This isn’t to say that I didn’t like the movie, I did, quite a bit, but had I seen the movie first, then read the book I would have like the movie even better. The movie is actually very close to the book and accurate, but has a number of large omissions. I realize that it would have made for a very long movie had everything been included, but I still missed the part that weren’t included.

This is the first story in Anne Rice’s The Vampire Chronicles. Told by the vampire Louis (Pitt) to an unsuspecting interviewer (Slater), it is the sad story of his life from tragedy in his life to his eternal inner struggle as a vampire. He feels too much. His vampire-creator, Lestat (Cruise) is a predator who thrives on feeding, whereas Louis has issues with taking lives. The live by night as regulars in society, not sneaking around as Nosferatu or Dracula have been known to do. Lestat, a foppish courtier, lives up the extravagance of the late 18th century, where Louis wallows in self-pity, yearning to find meaning in his new existence as the undead.

Brad Pitt was fantastic as Louis. I didn’t always believe Cruise as Lestat. He did a good job, but feel he was miscast. Kirsten Dunst in her first major role was brilliant. Christian Slater, taking the role that was originally the late River Phoenix’s, was very good. And Antonio Banderas was very good as well, but I was distracted by his hair. It seemed too much like a wig.

Some graphic scenes, a very frank use of blood, an engaging film.