| Author | Message | ||
     Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.122.108.107 |
I got this for £2 the other day, never really used to like it but thought another go might put me straight. A swift gander (yet to watch it properly) makes me think it's time to rejudge it - it looks absolutely stunning on 'old' dvd. I remember so much excitement and indeed shock at the casting of Cruise, but if I remember right he stole the thing. It's like Rice's star has waned, now, too, which makes the film feel something of a curio. I absolutely adored the book - read it when I discovered Ramsey, and thought it one of the best things I'd ever read at the time. Anyone else any thoughts? | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.253.77 |
I've always liked the film - the sets, direction, and acting are all top notch. Loved the book when I first read it (at a young age), but can't stand Rice's vampire stuff now. | ||
| Allybird (Allybird) Username: Allybird Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 88.104.137.65 |
I remember working in The Royal Exchange in Manchester, as an usher, and talking with the actors about if Cruise could play the part. I think he did very well. Yes. Liked the book when I first read it. | ||
| Kate (Kathleen) Username: Kathleen Registered: 09-2009 Posted From: 86.137.108.144 |
I absolutely loved the book when I first read it, despite not being a vampire fan (or a Rice fan). And like many, I couldn't imagine Tom Cruise in the role when I heard he was cast but was very pleased to be proven wrong. I agree completely with Zed - everything is top notch. | ||
| John Forth (John) Username: John Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 82.24.1.217 |
Never read it. I tried one of Rice's other novels a few years ago (Telos?) and thought it was garbage. The film was great fun, though. Just the right side of ridiculous. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.163.176 |
Stylish, agreeable hokum with some well-made historical scenes and a few powerful moments – 'Just the right side of ridiculous' is right. At the time it was a postcript to the extended vampire fiction craze. Now, of course, it appears to be a prelude to the second extended vampire craze. Heavens above, if garlic can stop them surely any town with a Pizza Hut provides ample resources for their control. Enough already. Having said that, 30 Days of Night is due an RCMB revival as well. It rules. | ||
| Rosswarren (Rosswarren) Username: Rosswarren Registered: 11-2009 Posted From: 81.132.146.48 |
I first read it while also listening to Carry on up the charts by the beutiful South and the songs really suited the book | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 82.26.213.180 |
I thought it was shit. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 81.96.253.77 |
Having said that, 30 Days of Night is due an RCMB revival as well. It rules. Hear-hear - I love that film. I was defending it (again) only recently on Facebook. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.91.98 |
I thought the film managed to make something inherently interesting, like vampires, boring, much like NASA did with space travel. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
I' have to disagree, Proto. I thought 30 Nights returned the vampire to his most primeval persona, shedding any semblance of humanity. I think it was unfairly knocked. The film oozes atmosphere. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
I'd | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Found the book boring at the time, and couldn't understand all the hullabaloo about it, and I positively loathed the film. Anything that turns vampires into pretty romantic figures has always been anathema to me. I grew up on 'Dracula', 'I Am Legend', 'Salem's Lot' & 'They Thirst' - now that is what I call proper scary vampire horror! | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.56 |
Neil Jordan is one of those directors for me who has never put a foot wrong. I loved the film. Never read any of her books though - and the sequel was complete garbage apart from a rather good soundtrack... | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Neil Jordan has had more peaks and troughs in his career than any other modern director I can think of... I would always make a point of watching anything with his name on it but always with my fingers crossed. His genre films vary wildly imo: 'The Company Of Wolves' (1984) - one of the Holy Trinity of "best ever" werewolf movies made in the early 80s - you know the other two. For me they represent the cinematic pinnacle of that entire sub-genre and anytime someone tries to defend CGI effects over make-up and animatronics I point them here. The film itself is a visionary distillation of Freudian dream logic on screen using the imagery of fairy-tales to magnificent effect. 'High Spirits' (1988) - rubbish supernatural comedy that is best forgotten by all concerned. 'Interview With The Vampire' (1994) - pompous and overblown romantic tosh that no self-respecting vampire would want to be associated with. 'In Dreams' (1999) - decent but overly familiar supernatural thriller that entertains but fails to stick in the mind. So not great but not bad... 'Ondine' (2009) - haven't seen it but liked the sound of it. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
You forgot his best work: Angel, Mona Lisa, We're No Angels, The Crying Game, The Butcher Boy... All excellent films. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
They are indeed, Zed, but I was only singling out his genre films. You forgot 'Michael Collins', another great movie, though overshadowed now by the much superior 'The Wind That Shakes The Barley'. | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.56 |
"one of the Holy Trinity of "best ever" werewolf movies made in the early 80s - you know the other two." Silver Bullet and My Mom's a Werewolf? | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.56 |
Is High Spirits the Peter O'Toole comedy? Didn't realise that was Neil Jordan... The Butcher Boy is definitely a genre film - one of the best psychological horrors of the 90's - also a brilliant brilliant book by Paddy McCabe. I'm not sure if I've seen In Dreams. I stand by my statement though. I've not seen a neil Jordan film that I haven't liked if not loved (that includes the overblown romantic tosh, as you put it, that is IWAV). | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
I'm with you, Weber - Jordan's a very fine director. I was obsessed with Mona Lisa when it forst came out. It's astonishing. The Butcher Boy is a minor masterpiece. | ||
| Mark West (Mark_west) Username: Mark_west Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.39.177.173 |
I wasn’t overly impressed with the film, as I recall (I seem to remember that Brad Pitt was too whiny for me), though I loved the novel. The Lestat series tapered off considerably though and I don’t remember getting through the third book - I haven’t read another Rice since. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.148 |
Sorry Frank, I was talking about Interview, not 30 Days... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.122.108.107 |
Ugh! It counted for 30 Days, tho, IMHOtep. Proto - I think the vampires were meant to be dull. It came across in the books. They were how they were partly (mostly) because of the boredom. Hard to convey dramatically, I suppose. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 213.122.108.107 |
Pitt thought the part whiny, too. He hated it. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Liked the book at the time I read it (I was around 17), but I threw the sequel across the room, it was so fricking whiny. | ||
| John Forth (John) Username: John Registered: 05-2008 Posted From: 217.20.16.180 |
Silver Bullet and My Mom's a Werewolf? Pfft. Teen Wolf 1 and 2, surely!  Haven't gotten around to 30 Days of Night due to my aversion to anything involving Josh Hartnett (I'm also no great lover of Steve Niles' comic work). Worth a look you'd say? | ||
| Weber (Weber_gregston) Username: Weber_gregston Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 194.176.105.56 |
Howling 5 and 6 even... | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
'The Butcher Boy' is a strong contender for his masterpiece (though I'd still pick 'The Crying Game') but I don't consider it a horror film. It's a highly disturbing and darkly funny psychological character drama in Stevie world. | ||
| Jonathan (Jonathan) Username: Jonathan Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.143.178.131 |
Loved 30 Days of Night. Really good film. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
Interview with the Vampire- loved the film, especially Cruise's line at the end: 'Still whining, Louis? Have you heard enough yet? I've been listening to that for centuries.' I've read very little Rice, and have a big problem with anything that romanticises vampires. A vampire is essentially a rapist and a killer. Using hypnosis to seduce your victims is basically on the same level as dosing them with Rohypnol. Hearing them whine about how difficult it is being a vampire and trying to claim the status of a persecuted minority... um, basically, fuck off. Not seen 30 Days yet, though I've heard it's ace. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.200.116 |
Well, in theory we're talking about fictional entities. A vampire is not a person with inhumane behaviour patterns. It's an undead creature that preys on humans as a hawk preys on sparrows or a snake on mice. It knows no other possibility. Both sympathy and moral condemnation are irrelevant. However, the fact that the van Helsing types talk about vampires as 'evil' shows that the myth is ambiguous: when we talk about vampires we are really talking about the people for whom vampires are a metaphor. And at that level, your comment is perfectly fair. The 'supernatural romance' sub-genre appears to identify vampires as Goths: languid, pale romantics with a death fetish. However, that's a metonym rather than a metaphor, and is driven more by marketing than by creative imagination. Brite doesn't endorse it, for example. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.16.1.76 |
On a lighter note. http://www.the-isb.com/?p=703 | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
Joel- But vampires were human once, and in many versions of the myth as well as a lot of the fiction, retain some vestige of the original personality. Certainly, the mythology of vampirism is divided on whether the body is brought back to life by a demon or the original soul of the deceased. The former indicates an entity mimicking the original personality. The latter implies a choice has been made by the dead person. It's a blurred line. Vampires can be portrayed as non-human predators, yes, but there's also the (past) connection with humanity and the ambiguity as to how much of what you see is human and how much... other. Of course, a non-supernatural explanation (a la 'I Am Legend') means we can deal with the personality-change aspect a lot more easily. An ex of mine used to talk about how she wanted to be a vampire (gah.) To me, that's actually a fascist mentality on top of the rest- 'I am superior, I have more right than you to exist...' | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
Stu-  | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.16.1.76 |
>>An ex of mine used to talk about how she wanted to be a vampire (gah.) To me, that's actually a fascist mentality on top of the rest- 'I am superior, I have more right than you to exist...' You're sure she didn't just mean that she wanted to rip your throat out with her teeth? | ||
| Matthew Fryer (Matthew_fryer) Username: Matthew_fryer Registered: 08-2009 Posted From: 90.195.182.189 |
I enjoyed the book at the time, but now Louis does my head in with the whining. The best scenes are when Lestat is having a go at him, like this one... "You whining coward of a vampire who prowls the night killing alley cats and rats and staring for hours at candles as if they were people and standing in the rain like a zombie until your clothes are drenched and you smell like old wardrobe trunks in attics and have the look of a baffled idiot at the zoo." Brilliant. People should talk to moody vampires like that more often. | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.16.1.76 |
I get annoyed when I see lifestyle books about How To Become a Vampire. Step 1: Have someone bite open your neck and drain all the blood from your body. Step 2: There is no step 2 'cos now you're dead you stupid idiot! | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
>>You're sure she didn't just mean that she wanted to rip your throat out with her teeth? Come to think of it, that would explain a lot.  | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.254.215 |
I always read the vampire myth as demonic possession of the soul after the body had physically died. This possession ties the person's soul to their corporal form which can only be stopped from decomposing by drinking the blood of the living, who then, in their turn, becomes vessels for the possessing entity as well. The vampire has to be willingly allowed in by the victim, usually through seduction, and it is this choice that gives the demon power over their soul, until despatched from the corpse by any of the tried and true methods - stake & decapitation, etc... | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.254.215 |
I believe it must have started as a simple religious allegory warning against the danger of putting material things of the earth over the higher spiritual plane of existence. The body over the soul. Fire and brimstone preaching and the gullibility of the populace would have done the rest, creating a powerful myth that looks set to run and run... | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
The whole 'willingly allowed' thing is a bit of a blurred line, though, Stevie- with vampires' 'seduction' is usually shown as being a form of hypnosis, then as I said above it's more akin to spiking the victim's drink with Rohypnol. And that's not seduction, it's rape... | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 82.17.254.215 |
Yeah, Simon, I believe that line became blurred after the fact due to different literary adaptations broadening out the myth. Turning the vampire into an even scarier predatory archetype. | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.37.199.45 |
Stevie, you might appreciate this remasrk from French historian Michel Foucault: We have had sexuality since the eighteenth century and sex since the nineteenth. What we had before that was no doubt the flesh. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
The earliest versions of the vampire myth - begun in eastern Europe, I think - didn't even feature blood-drinking, "seduction", or stakes through hearts. Those initial creatures were more like ghouls: they dug themselves out of the grave and ate carrion, and they attacked anyone they saw passing by. I recall the method of despatching these things was to drive an iron spike through the mouth, thus nailing them into their coffins. Decapitation, too. Disease and premature burial seem to be the roots of the vampire myth. Everything else - the need for blood, the garlic, the crucifix, etc - seems to have been invented by the later fictions. | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 147.252.230.148 |
One Eurpoean legend said you should scatter seeds around the vampire's coffin. He would feel compelled to count them all and by the time he did, the Sun would be coming up. | ||
| Zed (Gary_mc) Username: Gary_mc Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 195.166.117.210 |
Yes - I've heard that one. I always liked that. I imagine a grubby creature hurrying to count the seeds, and when the sun comes up over the horizon he says "Oh, bugger. Not again!" and trudges wearily back into his grave. | ||
| Frank (Frank) Username: Frank Registered: 09-2008 Posted From: 85.222.86.21 |
I find it interesting that of the central to East European countries I've experience of, superstition, ghosts, myths of vampires and such, are considered strictly the domain of the British and the Irish, and of course, Hollywood. They find out interest in horror, and related subjects, to be rather strange. It's one of the things I miss about Britain, the paranormal Britain, whether you believe in such things or not. I mean everybody knows somebody who claims to have had a paranormal experience. Obviously not with vampires, but I guess you get my drift. Perhaps these countries have had enough of real life horror to want to take much interest in it as cultural trait. Poland for example has made very few horror films, and try as I might, I have yet to meet one Polish person who knows anybody who claims to have had a paranormal experience. I don't know if this makes sense, but it's kind of depressing for me. | ||
| Huw (Huw) Username: Huw Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 220.138.162.5 |
Frank, you should move to Taiwan - practically everyone here believes in ghosts, spirits and demons! | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.63.159 |
I dunno, Ireland's had a grim history, so I'm not sure if it's real life horror that's the cause. I thought that Eastern Europeans were superstitious - one refused to disturb a gull's nest on the roof of a building I lived in because he said it was bad luck to harm a sea bird. Perhaps he was lying? Brilliant idea for skiving. "Yeah, that door is supposed to look like that. Right angles are bad luck." | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Stevie, you might appreciate this remark from French historian Michel Foucault: We have had sexuality since the eighteenth century and sex since the nineteenth. What we had before that was no doubt the flesh. I think Chaucer might have had something to say about that, Joel...  | ||
| Joel (Joel) Username: Joel Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 91.110.218.127 |
Stevie, Foucault obviously doesn't mean that there was no fornication! But you won't find Chaucer's characters (or even Shakespeare's) employing the concept of 'sex'. Part of the reason why the Victorians were so repressive was that they had codified the idea of 'sex' as something that could and should be invisible, something whose mention was 'obscene', something that was not part of decent life because it was animal and dirty. Chaucer would have found that attitude quite incomprehensible. He would have said that fornication was 'wrong' if it involved betrayal or mistreatment, but he would not have said it was in itself shameful, because in his time it was merely fornication, it wasn't 'sex'. Does that make the distinction clearer? It's worth considering that we still have problems when we take 'sex' outide the context of human life and feeling. When a heterosexual couple walk along hand in hand, or kiss in the street, nobody accuses them of shouting from the rooftops that they're having sex together. But when two men, or two women, behave as a couple in public they're often accused of being offensively blatant about their 'sex life'. The implication is that certain types of people make love and are lovers, but others merely have sex. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
I'm with you completely, Joel. Sex is sex and great fun it is too. Love is love and to know it is to know true happiness in this existence. Going right back to the Ancient Greeks it is obvious that the human race has always been aware of the distinction between sex (or fornication - one of my Top 10 words) and love, irrespective of "sexuality". It is our misfortune to live within a period of history that deems public expression of homosexual love as somehow "not right". It is my view that love can never be wrong - unlike fornication lol. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.31.133.89 |
It's the same with wanking. How I lament the days in which it could be performed on street corners. Sigh. | ||
| Stevie Walsh (Stephenw) Username: Stephenw Registered: 03-2009 Posted From: 194.32.31.1 |
Ever read 'The Unlimited Dream Company', Gary? I think you'd get a lot out of it! | ||
| Stu (Stu) Username: Stu Registered: 04-2008 Posted From: 86.24.25.4 |
>>It's the same with wanking. How I lament the days in which it could be performed on street corners. Sigh. You mean we're not allowed to do that? Thanks for the warning. | ||
| Simon Bestwick (Simon_b) Username: Simon_b Registered: 10-2008 Posted From: 86.24.209.217 |
Stu, I think it's still OK in Essex. Actually, it might be mandatory. | ||
| Des (Des) Username: Des Registered: 09-2010 Posted From: 86.165.39.12 |
Hey, I'm a seasoned inhabitant of deepest Essex and I'd advise against it - even here! | ||
| Protodroid (Protodroid) Username: Protodroid Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 109.79.168.153 |
It's all just a mechanism to move a few cubic centimetres of fluid from one body into another. Surely we can find a way to do this that doesn't involve giant Valantines cards and mini-breaks. | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
Proto, you're clearly and old romantic at heart (not!)  | ||
| Carolinec (Carolinec) Username: Carolinec Registered: 06-2009 Posted From: 92.232.199.129 |
"an" not "and" - I'm a silly billy  |