Interview with the Vampire
I read Interview with
the Vampire my senior year of High School and I always found it engaging.
The dialogue was just funny to me I tend to like dark humor and the movie
although not like the book at all did its job as a film representation and
holds its own respects. The plot basically goes like this: a vampire named Louis,
who meets with a boy conducting an interview of his life. Louis tells his story
which begins in a time to when he was a mortal man living in New Orleans. He encounters
the vampire Lestat who turns him into a vampire. They both come upon a five
year old named Claudia and turn her into a vampire as well. Together they live
for seventy years kind of happy, until Claudia begins to question her origins. Cursed
to live for eternity in a child's body, Claudia is furious that she will never grow
into adult. She decides to rise up against Lestat and both she and Louis
believe him dead and so they leave for Europe. In Paris vampires kill Claudia
for her crime against Lestat. Louis gets his revenge and he carries on his
eternal existence in solitude.
The best part of the book is the relationships built within
it, these characters faced and forced to live for an eternity approach this
ordeal in a very human way. A young man forced to live with the man that cursed
him, the sexual tension and fetishism that would naturally come with the ordeal
of having to feed on blood and of course Claudia a revolutionary character if
you think about it. She’s a five year old forced to live forever without
physically maturing…scary.
Modernization of Vampires
If you look at the book with a more general outlook it’s
actually extremely interesting. It’s a horror novel told and narrated through
the monster which by today’s standards is not uncommon it’s a perspective that’s
been explored enough by now but at the time it was written it was the first of
its kind. Should I blame this book for the modernization of vampires? This new
suave and sexy vampire…well yes but that doesn’t mean I hate it. I think Ann
Rice at the time remixed the vampire with taste and integrity that still holds
up today it’s just that this new vampire bled into this whole other monster,
which the media has obviously abused and packaged to…teens.
Other Perspectives
It’s important to really study your vampires though if Ann Rice’s rendition is not for you don’t let it leave a bad taste in your mouth. Although the genre has gone through a bit of a transformation there are still many other sources to “sink your teeth into” giving many other perspectives. If you want a more traditional rendition I would read Dracula by Bram Stoker although Stoker did not invent the vampire he did defined its modernity. On the film side Nosferatu is great it’s disturbing, artful and to this day still holds up as a visual marble, Murnau uses shadows and light with more skill than any modern movie has even come close to and his vampire is truly one of the vilest most loathsome villains in the history of film. Although not my cup of tea if you want to explore a more primal vampire the graphic novel 30 Days of Night by Steve Niles is a brutal representation of the modern Vampire no resemblance to Twilight whatsoever, there was a movie made as well but it’s not great. The last movie I would recommend is the Swedish Film Let the Right One In which is one of my favorite films released in recent years it’s remarkably moving and horrifying and it’s just the right vampire tale for me. It’s a love story; I’m a sucker for love stories.
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