Eldergays, tell me about the original release of Interview With The Vampire

The Movie SUCKED....Literally!! Miss Cruise was laughable& totally scared as cumming across as a Vampire Faggot. Miss Pitt wouldn't stop whining about everything in Life. My buddy screamed out "Would someone stick a cock in his mouth to shut him up". We liked the little vampire girl, Durst, and Antonio Banderas.

I love the movie and don’t understand the hatred for it. I wish they’d have homo’d it up more but it was the 90’s.

Such an overrated movie. Was a huge let down to finally see it after all the advance hype.

Somehow I always forget that my 80s closet-case bisexual drunk mess fave Christian Slater is in this.

Guess it’s because his part is so small and pointless, he puts in almost no effort, and he wasn’t really meant to be in it anyway. Not that I think a strung-out River Phoenix would have been any better.

[quote]I was young but I remember what a huge deal it was that Oprah walked out of the film.

It wasn't a comment on the quality of the film, OP. Her reason for doing so was rather like that of Marguerite Perrin, the 'God Warrior': "It's so Dark-Sided!" Pure Christian prudery.

[quote]"I believe there are forces of light and darkness in the world, and I don't want to be a contributor to the force of darkness," Winfrey said.

Did Oprah smell bread wafting from the concession stand?

WHERE'S MY MAC AND CHEESE?

IIRC there were other actors rumored to be in the movie like Travolta and Rutger Hauer, but they aged out and they eventually got Tammy and Pitt. It was pure eye candy.

I thought the fat cow walked out after the scene where Lestat grabs a rat and drains it into a goblet to drink it?

Anyway, the movie was okay. Banderas was still not used to speaking English and it was hard to understand what the hell he was saying.

I was sort of disappointed that they didn’t use a younger actress as Claudia but that could have been too traumatizing for all involved. 😳

very cool movie poster though and the cinematography was great....

I agree Slater didn't work, but he was last-minute casting. A healthy River Phoenix would have been fantastic.

In the theater where I saw it, a lady fainted during the scene where Cruise is killing the pretty prostitutes. Too much blood, I guess.

All the gays in my dorm loved Anne Rice. This was 1991-92. Reviews were mixed. I thought it was fine.

I also remember Oprah falling all over herself to Pitt when he was kn her show about how it was the scariest movie she had ever seen. Christ, what a fucking liar.

The second half of the movie is a snooze.

Anne Rice just passed away this week at age 80..

i remember Oprah going on and on about how it was too dark and why oh why did they include the rat sucking scene by cruise... at least cruise was a good sport about it in their interview, although gosh knows what he was really thinking about her comments..

It wasn't a great movie but it was ok. Cruise of course was miscast. A European actor should've played Lestat.

Travolta would have at least brought the homoeroticism

I was 14 at the time and all I remember is being confused why it was being released in November and not in October pre-Halloween.

I loved it as a young gayling, but now realize how terrible it is. Cruise and Pitt are wildly miscast.

Dunst is excellent though. One of my favorite child acting performances ever.

Oprah walked out because she couldn't relate to it. No lesbian vampires.

In retrospect, I’m surprised nobody ever thought of casting *Brad* as Lestat. He was right there!

Cruise was miscast and plopping Antonio Banderas in it seemed forced. However overall it’s good and I enjoy it.

[quote]plopping Antonio Banderas in it seemed forced.

How do you mean?

I remember Brad Pitt talking about how he felt dragged down by the darkness of the material. I also remember the VHS had an introduction by Anne Rice.

Pitt just pouted through the movie, but I actually liked Tom Cruise as Lestat. I wish he played against type more often.

He was still a pretty new in Hollywood—but a hot new actor. I seemed to remember he learned his lines in Mambo Kings phonetically because he didn’t speak English. I already loved him in the Almodóvar films.

I loved the film then and still do today. It’s campy fun with attractive people.

Brad was beautiful, Antonio was sexy and Dunst was perfect as Claudia. I’m not a TC fan but he played his role well enough.

I thought Cruise was good in this. This was back when he took some risks.

The film could have been a touch campier and I agree that Pitt was kind of a downer as Louis. At least Cruise seemed like he was having fun.

Dunst should have been nominated.

The movie was OK. Not a great piece art, but competent in some parts, and glossy and a bit sexy. Middlebrow kitsch. The men were all attractive and doing campy evil things.

You're all whining that Louis/Pitt was a downer, but Rice created him that way--existential, angsty, unhappy.

I liked the movie when it came out; Cruise and Pitt were hot, Durst surprisingly effective, didn't care for Banderas as Armand--that terrible black wig; agree that the second half was rather slow; but the costumes and cinematography were terrific. The ending was perfect I thought--Guns 'n Roses covering Sympathy for the Devil as Cruise and Slater cross the GGB.

Disappointed, appalled, queasy, appreciative of some mood visuals, creeped out by Pitt and Cruise, with the former being bearable if you could avoid hearing him, a little amusement.

R24, the message from Anne Rice was a form of damage control, something she owed the studio since, long before the film's release, when the news that Cruise had been cast as Lestat dropped, she held a press conference to ostentatiously shit all over the film. It was shot against the headwind of her opposition.

I do not mourn the loss of Anne Rice because of these sorts of back-and-forths; against the film adaption, then for it. Non-Christian, then Christian, then non-Christian again. Anti-gay, then pro-gay, then anti-gay again. Intolerably fickle. I gradually became unable to overlook and forgive her for positions she'd taken. One never knew when the other shoe would drop again. I got tired of her bullshit, and abandoned reading her books.

Anne Rice was never anti-gay.

R32, she flirted with it during her high-church Christian phase; she was prepared to concur with the Catholic Church's pronouncement that homosexuality was fundamentally disordered, and that marriage should be between a man and a woman. All that, her son Christopher notwithstanding.

Her subsequent flip-flop, when she re-renounced Christianity, was couched in terms of criticizing its homophobia, which she'd recently concluded was unacceptable. Fickle.

Wrong r33. Anne Rice was never anti-gay, even when she went back to the Catholic Church. Your information is completely false.

No, R34. In 1998, she embraced the Church and all it stood for, dismaying her fandom and her son. It took over a decade to talk her down from the Christian ledge; what was at issue was "the Church’s stance on several social disputes." Eventually, in 2010, she relented. But one has to wonder about her sincerity, especially since she took the Church's side for so long.

I remember being shocked that Cruise could create a character so different than himself. He really hadn't shown much acting chops up til then.

Rice gave many interviews about embracing Catholicism again and then rejecting it. She tried to reconcile her belief in Christ with some of the teachings of the church but then decided she couldn't remain a Catholic. It took a lot of soul-searching. At no time did she endorse anything anti-gay. Human beings are complicated creatures, each on their own journey. It's not a black and white world.

Yeah say what you guys want about this movie but Kirsten Dunst played the bell out of Claudia.

I saw that movie when I was young and I remember being haunted by her death. It was the first time I’d seen someone young die in a movie. And she died horribly!

They took out a lot of the homoerotic stuff from the novel. Obviously, since this was a mainstream studio movie in the early 90s and it starred Tom Cruise. They weren't going to put all the gay stuff in there. The novel is much better.

I meant to say "They took out a lot of the homoerotic stuff from the novel out of the movie." Sorry!

[quote]At no time did she endorse anything anti-gay.

She did when she embraced the Church, R37. And it took twelve years for her to finally renounce it - specifically for its homophobia. Until then, she indulged them - with mixed feelings perhaps, like a victim of spousal abuse, but who nonetheless clings to her abuser.

She never renounced Christianity, though. Once she started writing about Jesus Christ, her books went to shit.

It all went over my head as a kid.

Did Antonio’s character purposely let Claudia die? I think he let Brad out after knowing Claudia burned to death.

[quote]Did Antonio’s character purposely let Claudia die? I think he let Brad out after knowing Claudia burned to death.

Yes, R42. He wanted Louis all to himself. The Theatre vampires were acting on Armand's express orders to lock Louis away until after it was done.

You can be Catholic and not be anti-gay.

R41 So you've gone from claiming she specifically said she agreed with the church's anti-gay positions to now saying she implicitly agreed with it by embracing the church?

PoisonedDragon is a nutcase, pay him no mind. He's seriously unbalanced.

Crummy movie. But I didn't like the book, either. There was whiny, milquetoast Louis, and over the top evil Lestat with his Robert Plant flowing blonde hair, and little Claudia, who you're supposed to feel sorry for even though she's as evil as Lestat

There was a lot of homo-eroticism in the novel. Louis seems to "love" his mentally ill brother with a love that is not exactly brotherly. When he dies he's devastated. In the movie he doesn't have a brother, instead he obsesses over his dead wife and children. Of course he and Lestat have a relationship similar to two gays, one dominant and one passive. Louis meets a red haired vampire named Armand and they fall in love. Armand brings a young boy named Dennis to Louis, so Louis can "have" him by drinking his blood but not killing him. Claudia wants a red haired woman made into a vampire and the "love" between them seems incestuous and unnatural. Seems the woman had lost her little daughter (who of course looked like Claudia) and wants to be the mother of Claudia, a child who will never die. But her passion for her seems more lesbian than motherlike. At any rate, I thought the novel was dull and the movie crap.

r47 is one of those people who wants their characters to be "likable."

Here we go again with the insecure Catholic poster using socks (like R45) to multiply support for his opinions...

And if he can't get his way, the thread will mysteriously disappear.

It was so unmemorable.

I can remember almost nothing about it except the New Orleans and Paris settings.

Now I see what you mean, R46

During production Rice expressed grave misgivings over Tommy Girl having been cast. She spoke of it loud and often. However, after SEEING the finished product, she was very happy with La Cruise indeed.

She gushed over her. She said she was embarrassed and felt badly for having doubted the director and casting folks. Somehow, she brought Edward G. Robinson into the discussion, and that's when I kinda checked out.

It was thought at the time be a kind of career changer for TommyGunn- one where she would begin to take on more daring and varied kinds of roles, but that didn't really take, did it? She kinda stuck with action, Magnolia and Vanilla Sky notwithstanding.

Any thoughts about the AMC remake coming out in 2022? Lestat is being played by ginger Aussie actor Sam Ried, and Louis by Jacob Anderson (who is black which makes no sense given the slavery aspect of the novel).

God, so sick of these foreigners! Can't wait until moderates are in charge of Hollywood again. I don't understand why radical leftists hate their fellow Americans. 🤷‍♀️ But they sure love foreigners and illegal immigrants. Go figure. 🙄

𝑇𝑤𝑒𝑙𝑣𝑒 𝑦𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑠, Catholic R46 & socks, before she stepped back from announcing that she believed in the "One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church." And it wasn't just homosexuality - during that time, she left in limbo her stance on several issues, like abortion. If she'd never been anti-gay and always pro-choice, she could have clarified that at the outset. But she didn't.

It's an immoral middle ground to occupy. Kind of like how the Catholic Church never excommunicated Hitler, not during, and not in the aftermath. But that's another discussion altogether. ;)

[quote]You can be Catholic and not be anti-gay.

That's debatable, R44. Not honorably, to be sure. A believer might insist so, but the Church and its clergy would tend to differ. If they knew you were a 𝑝𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑐𝑖𝑛𝑔 homosexual, most would deny you communion and absolution.

For twelve years, she was fine with that, or allowed it to be thought of her.

[quote] During production Rice expressed grave misgivings over Tommy Girl having been cast. She spoke of it loud and often. However, after SEEING the finished product, she was very happy with La Cruise indeed..

She gushed over Cruise's performance in order to promote the movie. She just wanted it to be a success and saying she disliked Cruise's performance would might have made people not want to see the movie. Anyway, Cruise's performance WAS bad. Laughable, really. He looked so man silly in that blonde wig.

[quote] If she'd never been anti-gay and always pro-choice, she could have clarified that at the outset. But she didn't.

She actually did. She was critical of several stances the Catholic Church held while she was a member. Then she decided they weren't going to change and left. Your memory is distorted.

The remake sounds awful. WHY do they have to fuck with source material that doesn't need fucking with? I would love to see a faithful adaptation of the novel as a limited series.

Louis is going to be BLACK in the remake? Well, that isn't going to make a lot of sense. I guess Claudia will be black too. And the slaves will be white. Sounds like this remake will be a pile of shit.

[quote]She actually did. She was critical of several stances the Catholic Church held while she was a member. Then she decided they weren't going to change and left. Your memory is distorted.

R57, there was no call for it to be such a struggle for her. And I was watching rather closely; at the time, it mattered to me. I don't sympathize with her dilemma.

Let's agree to disagree here, as we do on so many issues. I'm done discussing Anne Rice.

Bye, PoisonedDragon! Wrong and annoying as usual.

I suspect the character of Louis has been completely changed for the upcoming remake because having him be a white slave owner would just be too problematic and controversial in the current climate. The showrunners just don't want to deal with all the headaches that would ensue.

Oh, I haven't left, bitter Catholic/R61. I will continue to discuss the film as it suits me. Between 1994 and 1995, I probably saw it maybe thirty times at the theater. I don't have anything like that stamina anymore. But I know it pretty well.

'The Queen of the Damned' was a terrible sequel. I'd have much preferred they adapted 'The Vampire Lestat' instead.

I'm not Catholic. Never have been. I just understand where Anne Rice was coming from. She was a woman born in 1941 and raised Catholic in New Orleans. After the death of her husband she returned to the church in her grief. Then she left again. No reason to "cancel" her for that. Your lack of compassion and understanding, due to your own abusive childhood and shitty life has poisoned your thinking and the way you view the world.

[quote]No reason to "cancel" her for that.

I didn't. In the end, I stopped reading her because her books became religious trash.

[quote]Your lack of compassion and understanding, due to your own abusive childhood and shitty life has poisoned your thinking and the way you view the world.

Mmm-hmm. You lost this argument back at R46 and subsequently, when you went ad hominem. We have a history, you and I (the 'Did Jesus Christ Exist' discussions) and you're still upset about it. Your statement at R64 reinforces that.

This isn't even about Anne Rice. For you, it's personal.

If you don't want to discuss the film, then you can go off and sulk. Again.

Sorry r65 you're uninformed as usual. Read any interview from Anne Rice from the period in question. Your argument is not supported.

Cruise was not playing against type, he was channeling Miscavige, a character he knew well...

[quote] We have a history, you and I (the 'Did Jesus Christ Exist' discussions) and you're still upset about it.

That wasn't me.

[quote] Read any interview from Anne Rice from the period in question. Your argument is not supported.

I formed my opinion reading her output during that period of time, R66. If you've got any interviews from that period of time you'd like to link, feel free.

[quote]That wasn't me.

It's still in your posting history, R68. From 𝐓𝐚𝐥𝐜𝐮𝐦 𝐗: 𝐖𝐡𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐉𝐞𝐬𝐮𝐬 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐚 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦 𝐨𝐟 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐬𝐮𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐦𝐚𝐜𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐦𝐮𝐬𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐧:

[quote]Are you just pulling shit out of your ass? That is insane. Jesus did exist, he is in the historical record. Of course he wasn't the son of God or Divinely created, he was a regular human being like everyone else. He just had a lot of followers and his legend grew. But there was a man named Jesus Christ who did exist.

[quote]Within a few decades of his lifetime, Jesus was mentioned by Jewish and Roman historians in passages that corroborate portions of the New Testament that describe the life and death of Jesus.

[quote]The value of this evidence is that it is both early and detailed. The first Christian writings to talk about Jesus are the epistles of St Paul, and scholars agree that the earliest of these letters were written within 25 years of Jesus’s death at the very latest, while the detailed biographical accounts of Jesus in the New Testament gospels date from around 40 years after he died. These all appeared within the lifetimes of numerous eyewitnesses, and provide descriptions that comport with the culture and geography of first-century Palestine. It is also difficult to imagine why Christian writers would invent such a thoroughly Jewish saviour figure in a time and place – under the aegis of the Roman empire – where there was strong suspicion of Judaism.

[quote]They were passed down through oral tradition, as most things were back then... Oh for fuck's sake just stop.

[quote]Virtually all scholars support the historicity of Jesus and reject the Christ myth theory that Jesus never existed.

You and I have clashed repeatedly, on many other threads since, with you using different sock accounts. You always use the same arguments.

Everything he says there is factual, of course other people are going to use the same arguments lol. Of course, I guess I must be a sock puppet too.

The ego needed to think that only one other person could possibly disagree with you.

Sorry r69 but that wasn't me. You must be looking at another poster you blocked.

And Anne Rice never said anything anti-gay. She turned to the Catholic Church for comfort after her husband's death. I personally thought it was odd, but it didn't make me form a negative opinion of her

[quote]with you using different sock accounts.

I only have one account. You ARE disliked by other posters, you know. Not just one.

Ooh, the plot thickens. Those posts ARE in R71's post history, so R71 is a liar, at least about that.

This is, at least, more interesting than any of Anne's works since she turned Catholic and then back.

Anyone can verify it by putting R68 on ignore, going into ignore and reviewing the comments. That you would lie about something which can be objectively verified makes your protests of not using socks equally suspect. They all sound exactly like you.

You've also got a sock account presence on the current thread on that issue, 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐦𝐚𝐬 "𝐔𝐧𝐰𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐝". Same arguments, same posting voice. I'm not participating there, but I have been reading it.

Tammy’s wig was too, too much.

[quote]ou've also got a sock account presence on the current thread on that issue, 𝐂𝐡𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐦𝐚𝐬 "𝐔𝐧𝐰𝐫𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐞𝐝".

Nope, haven't posted in that one. You're just being paranoid now.

It came out when I was in early high school. It wasn't on my radar at all.

But my first semester in college, a fellow insomniac on my floor in the dorms was obsessed with it. She and I would get stoned in the middle of night, beg for sleep, and watch it. Over and over.

I grew to love it.

I remember it being a big release at the time, but was it a huge hit? I was in high school and can't really remember. It was a decent enough movie.

R76, no, babe. You're a proven liar. Every time you perceive Christ or Christianity being under attack, you come riding to the rescue with your socks. 𝐿𝑜𝑡𝑠 of socks. Sometimes you forget which one is supposed to be which, and answer with the wrong one. Damned near everyone here has experienced your tiresome troll act firsthand.

You're part of the Dejure cohort, aren't you?

Neil Jordan's movies usually at least look great, but otherwise he's very hit or miss. He made another less hyped vampire movie in 2012, "Byzantium", which, unlike "Interview", bombed at the box office, but it has some stunning images and a few wonderful performances.

PoisonedDragon you are officially batshit. No socks, not nothing. Jesus, go harass someone else with your fuckery.

[quote]Damned near everyone here has experienced your tiresome troll act firsthand.

A star at last lol! Seriously, you need to calm down with your paranoia. I don't have the ambition or interest to do sock accounts. You're just a nutter.

Sorry, R81/R82, you've been caught out.

Cute story, R77. Gave me a nostalgic feeling.

Nope. Again, you're insane. And your opinions about Anne Rice are ill-informed

Gods, Oprah just went ON AND ON about the ‘sense of evil’ permeating the movie, and i, who saw about 90% of the horror movies released in the eighties, almost detached a retina from rolling my eyes.

As far as ‘horror’ goes, I always found it pretty mild, and her reaction really silly. I’d be more sympathetic if it were something like ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre,’ or something else even remotely related to the real world, but they’re VAMPIRES!!! It’s fucking make-believe!

I read ‘Interview’ when it was released, and yes, Louis was always a mopey little fuck. It was the first time I’d encountered the ‘child vampire’ trope, and yes, Claudia was rather sympathetic in the book.

She was all of five when she was turned, so had never been taught anything different from the predatory lifestyle she’d been brought up in. The horror of her situation only came up gradually as the interviewer realized from Louis’s hints that, while her body remained small, her mind had matured into adulthood, and the intense frustration of knowing she could never live an independent life. Then they encounter the old-school vampires who regard her as an abomination, so she’s trapped in a situation she never asked for, and has no way to escape.

I loved Rice for a time, but her writing was always sort of all-over the place. She fell in love with Lestat and walked him back from the evil fuck he’d been in ‘Interview,’ but i found her vampire world interesting, especially when the other vampires decide they don’t WANT their newly risen queen to destroy humanity; that they felt protective of the world, having watched generation after generation of humans rise and fall, including their own descendants.

She obviously had a lot of struggles with issues of faith, considering she wrote a novel with Lucifer as the hero, and God as a smug, clueless, and misguided asswipe, and I concur that her back-and-forth with the church was an attempt to reconcile things that simply can’t easily coexist, like her sympathy for gays and the church’s doctrines.

I don’t personally remember any anti-gay stuff from her, and I’m sure that would’ve stood out to me given how homoerotic her work always was, but either way, if she did align with church doctrine on homosexuality for a time, she eventually saw her error.

As another poster said, people are complicated; we all know how many use religion as a cover for their seething hatred of gays. What she was going through something quite different.

Aw what the hell, I worship the Catholic chuurch!

Everyone complained about Cruise, but Pitt was much more badly miscast imo. Laughable.

They should remake it with Timothee Chalamet.

Cruise in a wig with fangs gesticulating wildly as Pitt walked in a somnambulant trance. Slater's shtick was the best part, and the tiny blonde vampire, ofc. Dunst stole the show. So-so movie.

Rice's son Christopher is gay.

Someone here is hell bent on crucifying Anne Rice, and would make a very good Catholic.

I loved this film. One of my favorite vampire films next to Fright Night.

One of the most overhyped films of the era. Entertainment Tonight and E Entertainment television slavishly covered its every move pre, during, and post production. I was tired of hearing about it before it opened and when I saw it with my friends, we laughed out loud. Cruise was cartoonish and goofy. Totally missed the mark toward the haunting, sad, hot, feral, sexy tone of the books.

First, I really liked the book and some of the others, but after a while Ann sort of lost her way.

The Lestat rock star stuff was just awful.

The movie (which are never as good as the book: see Cider House Rules) isn't awful. The thing I like about it is the set design and costumes.

Every cent spent on the film is on display.

As far as Ann and the Catholic stuff, we all stumble sometimes. Lighten up.

Yeah the Lestat rock star stuff was so stupid.

Queen of the Damned was a bad movie.

I lost interest when I found out she based Lestat on her husband. Such epic frau bullshit.

Here are some things wrong with the movie, which really was an expensive piece of crap:

Miscasting of Pitt. Not only did he not resemble the character of Louis (much is made of Louis's wavy black hair and green eyes) in any way, his acting was crummy. Also, to make Louis seem less twisted, he has a wife and children and the loss of them drives him around the bend. In the novel Louis has incestuous love for his mentally disturbed brother. The brother kills himself, sending Louis in to a despairing downward spiral, which results him coming into contact with Lestat. Way back in the day John Travolta was said to be the front runner for the role of Louis. I wonder how HE would have done the part? Well, at least he would have had black hair like Louis.

Miscasting of Cruise. Tom Cruise in a long, wavy blonde wig...oh my God! He looked ridiculous and his acting was funny rather than menacing or sinister. Rice raised holy hell when he was cast. Of course she would, anybody could see that Cruise was a stupid choice to play Lestat. But later she praised Cruise to the skies, no doubt lying through her teeth. She wanted people to see the movie; that's why she gushed about how wonderful Cruise was. There was no truth to it.

Miscasting of Antonio Banderas. Armand was a red haired vampire, created when he was very young; while still a teenager. He is considered beautiful and has an angelic face "like a cherub." In the movie he's changed entirely; as portrayed by Banderas he's a dark, adult Latin Lover type. And the love Louis and he feels for each other is greatly downplayed.

I suppose Kirsten Dunst acted well enough, but the character of Claudia was quite changed. In the novel she is a tiny child of five or six, Dunst looks twice that old.

The best actor in the movie was Stephen Rea. His role was small but he outshone them all.

As one critic said the movie set was burned down THREE times in the film. I guess it was hoped that would relieve the audience of its tedium.

OP, if you rememberthat then you're an eldergay yourself.

OP is probably 35. These threads are so stupid.

Breaking news! In the remake the part of Claudia WILL be played by an African American child actress with the pretentious name of Bailey Bass. She too is much older than the character. She's a teenager.

R99 - the OP is likely a solid 40-45, just needing somebody to talk to and something to talk about.

It was a fantastic film OP, especially if you hadn’t read the books and had any snobbish expectations. It was gothic, violent, romantic, suspenseful, creepy, beautiful…. My 21 year old self couldn’t wait to see a modern gothy vampire movie. It was a lot of fun. God bless Anne Rice (who used to be my neighbor!) and the stories she left us.

The new series is not faithful to the book at all

R100 The actor playing Louis is also black. I have zero issues with it except that slavery played a huge role in the original novel, something that was significantly played down in the 90s movie. So I'm not sure that's going to work with Louis being a plantation owner.

I would bet money they're not staying faithful to the story by making Louis a white slave owner because it would just be too problematic in the current climate. Remember, Louis is the one the audience is supposed to identify with and feel sympathy for. It's too controversial if he's a slave owner.

[quote]but the character of Claudia was quite changed. In the novel she is a tiny child of five or six,

In today's fascist atmosphere, Rice's book would have been severely criticized/cancelled due to Claudia, age 5, sleeping with Louis (sharing his coffin). I doubt the movie would have ever gotten made.

R100 & R103 The rumor going around about the new AMC series is that it's going to be set in contemporary New Orleans.

R105 I remember reading that Rice was forced to age Claudia up by the studio: not to mention removing virtually all the gay context of the original novel. The only good thing about the new AMC series will probably acknowledge fact that Rice always envisioned Lestat and Louis were gay.

[quote] The rumor going around about the new AMC series is that it's going to be set in contemporary New Orleans.

So it's going to set in the present day? How are they going to do THAT? It was implausible in the novel that vampires would be able to kill people constantly (frequently their victims were rich, prominent people) and not have anybody notice; how will they manage to do that in the present day?

Not surprising that Rice had to remove all the gay content, it was a big-budget studio film in the early 90s and that shit just didn't play back then. And of course, Tom Cruise. No way was he playing gay.

[quote] So it's going to set in the present day? How are they going to do THAT? It was implausible in the novel that vampires would be able to kill people constantly (frequently their victims were rich, prominent people) and not have anybody notice; how will they manage to do that in the present day?

As I recall, ALL of her vampire novels after ‘Interview’ were set in the present, with flash-backs. .

[quote] "...and I don't want to be a contributor to the force of darkness," Winfrey said.

Said the woman who later touted "The Secret" and all other manner of fraudsters & scammers in the media.

The movie had already such a storied history. River Phoenix was supposed to play Christian Slater's role, but died unexpectedly before/during filming in Autumn 1993. I was in my early 20s and thought Phoenix was the shit and Brad Pitt was so sexy. Anne Rice had seen a cut (or something) earlier in the year and backtracked on her original stance that Tom Cruise was wrong for the role. That actually meant a lot back then. The Brad Pitt Rolling Stone cover was pretty hot.

I went to see this on what was probably opening weekend. I think it premiered in November 1994. From memory, I think the reviews were mixed more or less (not terrible, not outstanding, but maybe comfortable enough). I quite honestly don't remember much about the way I felt about it. I didn't love it (I hadn't read an Anne Rice novel). But there were a lot of memorable moments: Lestat biting Louis; Claudia's death scene; the finale on the Golden Gate Bridge; etc. I thought Cruise was fun in the role. AndI loved the filming locales of New Orleans and San Francisco. It definitely had a gay or gay-adjacent vibe that I probably appreciated, in part thanks to Neil Jordan (who was doing this as a followup to The Crying Game). But, I was annoyed a little by Claudia's brattiness and there wasn't enough plot for my tastes. The film had a moodiness that worked both for and against it. For some reason, I never found Antonio Banderas very sexy. I don't remember how I felt about him here.

Commercially, the movie did well. It made over $100M domestically (I think). I don't remember if the industry considered it a hit, but I did. I didn't think it was a "blockbuster" though, because I thought that maybe it should have grossed more having been based on such a popular franchise and starring Cruise and rising star Pitt (who the industry was already building up).

I believe I referred to it as Tom Cruise's coming out movie.

I would only have done it if they pulled out all the fag stuff!

Matt, you were unknown in '94

[quote] As I recall, ALL of her vampire novels after ‘Interview’ were set in the present, with flash-backs.

I never read anything she ever did after IWTV (Lestat as a rock star? Oh my God) but how is it possible for the vampires to kill with impunity but no one suspects a thing? Are there no police investigations at all? No one notices or cares that there are constant murders or disappearances and that the bodies are found drained of blood? Nobody notices that? That's a detail in IWTV that I found totally absurd.

Oprah. Walks out of a movie b/c "too dark." Foists on TV audiences:

1. Dr. Phil

2. Dr. Oz

R116.. exactly! well said!...