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Interview with the Vampire Movie Review

Interview with the Vampire is a 1994 period horror film directed by Neil Jordan and starring Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt. It’s a problematic, but mostly interesting movie.

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“Don’t be afraid.

I’m going to give you the choice I never had“

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After the death of his wife and daughter, Spanish lord Louis is turned into a vampire by Lestat de Lioncourt. To keep Louis by his side, Lestat converts a plague-ridden girl. Based on a popular book, this movie turned out to be a major blockbuster in 1994, earning a ton of money and popularity. Nowadays however, its status is somewhat tainted, and I do understand why.

First and foremost, the movie is solid. It would have been great had they done some things differently, but it remains a solid, mostly very engaging vampire flick that is much better than most belong to its subgenre. I particularly liked its historical, more grounded approach. Although that made the film less scary and lacking in true horror scenes, the realistic application to vampires did lead to the film feeling sophisticated and meticulously detailed and also believable throughout.

But it did lose some of its steam in the less memorable, prolonged second half. The biggest problem, however, has to be the casting. I honestly found the casting for this film truly horrid. Brad Pitt is barely believable in the main role, and I know that this came out just before he became a true star, but still his performance is so mediocre.

But an even worse offender is Tom Cruise who is simply entirely unbelievable and just weak in the role of Lestat. I never at all believed him and I could only see Cruise trying desperately to play this sexy, mysterious vampire when in fact he was never that. But Christian Slater is good and in particular Kirsten Dunst is fabulous as this fascinating girl Claudia, a woman forever trapped in a young girl’s body. The scenes with her are truly the film’s highlights.

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Interview with the Vampire benefits from a solid Gothic atmosphere to it, good attention to detail and some terrific set pieces. As a period piece, it’s excellent, but not so much as an effective horror feature unfortunately. Still, it’s much better than I expected it would be, which is enough for me.

While there is no denying the power in some of the Gothic imagery at display here, a very engaging story and a more grounded approach to vampire fiction as a period piece first and foremost, Interview with the Vampire has such horrid casting that really negatively impacted the whole project. Yes, Kirsten Dunst is excellent as fascinating Claudia, but Brad Pitt and especially Tom Cruise are never believable at all as Louis and Lestat. The horror elements are also lacking, but again as a technically splendid historical film, it succeeds with flying colors.

My Rating – 3.5

You can get the Blu-Ray of Interview with the Vampire on Amazon.