The film, for those of you who have been living under a rock and never heard of the source material or adaptation, is told from Louis' viewpoint and simply recounts his history of becoming a vampire at Lestat's hands (teeth?), setting him off on his tragic path. The first part of the film takes place in New Orleans in the 1700s, which director Neil Jordan recreates with some elegantly gothic touches. Brad Pitt's Louis is set up as something of a wastrel to begin with, even in his human form, as he mourns the recent death of his wife and daughter (something Rice herself changed from her original novel, where Louis mourned the death of his brother). Lestat (Cruise), sensing an easy neck to feed on, and perhaps more than that--a chance for companionship--offers Louis the chance to join him among the immortals. Louis accedes, quickly realizing that the vampire's life is not all Lestat has cracked it up to be.

Soon Louis crosses path with a young girl named Claudia (Kirsten Dunst), whom he and Lestat make, somewhat to Louis' chagrin, into their vampire daughter, so to speak. Claudia's tragedy mirrors Louis'--she is doomed to forever being a child, as once you're a vampire, you stay the way you were when you became one. As the film progresses down several decades and Claudia slowly becomes more sexually aware, her pint-sized frame becomes a drawback, leading to one of the major conflicts in the film, between her and Lestat.

The second act of the film brings Louis and Claudia to Paris, where they get involved with a troupe of vampires pretending to be humans pretending to be vampires in a nightly theater presentation redolent of the Grand Guignol horrors that were being visited on Parisian audiences throughout the late 19th century. Enter Armand (Antonio Banderas), head of the theater troupe, who may or may not have been the scoundrel who transformed Lestat into one of the undead, and who now has eyes for Louis. A second wave of tragedy subsumes Claudia, leaving Louis more alone than ever as the film finally draws to its kind of jokey denouement.

Interview With the Vampire does a formidable job of creating an unsettling mood. Whether it's watching Cruise bite into a rat and squeeze its blood into a wine glass or Pitt take on a nemesis with a scythe, slicing him in two, Vampire is full of one unsettling image after another. The production design is almost palpably dank throughout the film, with masonry swarmed by tendrils of foliage and dark shadowy abysses lit by flame. Cinematographer Philippe Rousselot purposefully keeps most of this film extremely dark, lending a suitably amorphous quality to not only the surroundings, but the characters themselves. When Cruise or Pitt flit from place to place unexpectedly, it can be more of an aural experience than a visual one, and that actually makes it incredibly effective. Elliot Goldenthal also contributes one of his better scores, full of brooding minor chords and some very effective string writing.

If Rice's characters are fascinating in their own right, they never really totally populate this film in a completely visceral manner. Pitt and Cruise are both hampered vocally by their prostethic teeth, giving their dialogue an almost comical lisp, and Pitt's over-enunciation just sounds ridiculously theatrical at times, especially since Louis is actually the least theatrical of the main vampires in the story. Cruise is creepy, there's no doubt about that, but his Lestat is more of a cartoon than a character, highlighted by the final scene that plays like something out of a very special episode of Rod Serling's Night Gallery. The real stars of this film, at least performance wise, are Dunst and Banderas, both of whom do unforgettable work in supporting roles. While Dunst is obviously still finding her filmic feet in this role (watch especially as she loses a bit of focus as she exits frame in a lot of scenes--you can almost see her looking around for direction), Banderas has never been better. He is intense, moody and, unlike Cruise, truly frightening. Had he played Lestat instead of Cruise, Vampire might have been raised to a level unimagined by even Rice. Also doing some very nice work here is Jordan compatriot Stephen Rea, bringing a little comedy relief as one of Banderas' performing vampires in the Parisian theater. The whole homoerotic subtext of a lot of the film also plays too broadly and unintentionally comically to ever make any kind of statement beyond becoming an instant classic of camp.

Interview With the Vampire is long on atmosphere. In fact you'd be hard pressed to find a more simply atmospheric film in the past 15 years. But it's an atmosphere surrounding a largely empty shell full of histrionic actors chewing the scenery but never really making an emotional impact. They are, in fact, a perfect metaphor for the vampire: soulless, walking through life as if a shadow, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.

The Blu-Ray

Video:
It's hard to really properly evaluate this Blu-Ray release as a Blu-Ray, since Vampire is so unapologetically dark most of the time. The palette is purposely yellow and brown, full of shadows and gloom. Colors, such as they are, are good, though saturation, again from the source elements, is (suitably, I guess) bled out and pale looking. Blacks are relatively solid and consistent and there has obviously been no DNR on this title--grain is abundant, though not distracting. Vampire is offered in a 1080p VC-1 1.85:1 transfer.

Sound:
Unfortunately, Warner gives us only a Dolby 5.1 mix in English, which favors the front end of the mix and is only occasionally as exciting as it could have been. Some of the effects are really well handled--when a vampire flies from one side of the frame to another, there's some great directionality, but over all this is a kind of underwhelming sound design. Fidelity and balance are fine, as they go, and there's no noticable dropout or distortion. There are also French, Spanish, and Japanese 2.0 mixes, as well as subtitles available in all the soundtrack languages.

Extras:
The best extra, ported over from the previous SD DVD release (as are all the extras), is Neil Jordan's informative and interesting commentary, where he talks about the long development history of the project and the problems of actually filming it once it got greenlit. There are some occasional pauses in the commentary, but overall it's one of the better commentaries I've listened to recently, with lots of scene specific detail and general info about the film. There's also a 27 minute puff piece with both archival and then recent interviews with most of the leads (as well as Anne Rice), intercut with scenes from the film. The theatrical trailer rounds out the extras.

Final Thoughts:
Interview With the Vampire tried to reinvent the filmic vampire, much as Rice's source novel had done so in the literary world. Unforunately, the film comes up short, though it absolutely bleeds gothic atmosphere. This Blu-Ray probably isn't enough of an upgrade for all but the most ardent fans to want to purchase, so I recommend you Rent It for Halloween as a start. Plus, there's always that YouTube Scientologist interview if you want a real scare.

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"G-d made stars galore" & "Hey, what kind of a crappy fortune is this?" ZMK, modern prophet