Interview With The Vampire

I absolutely adored Anne Rice's Interview with the Vampire! I found the story so interesting, that after finishing the book, I went and watched the film as well. There were definitely some differences between the film and the novel, but overall I would say that the film was also very good. The idea of lust and sexuality when it comes to vampires is a very interesting topic, especially in the context if this book.  It seems that the main character Louis was homosexual when he was human but this is unclear in the novel and especially unclear in the film. It also seems more obvious that Lestat, the vampire who turned Louis, was bisexual when he was a human. I mention when they were human because from what I can gather from the novel, it seems that once one becomes a vampire there is no longer a need for sexual activity. Vampires lust more after blood or certain feelings but never really for sex. In the beginning, I found it interesting that Louis was much more aroused by Lestat when he was still human. "...Lestat whispered to me, his lips moving against my neck. I remember that the movement of his lips raised the hair all over my body, sent a shock of sensation through my body that was not unlike the pleasure of passion."  After becoming a vampire almost immediately, Louis starts to feel differently toward Lestat. "The first thing which became apparent to me, even while Lestat and I were loading the coffin into a hearse and stealing another coffin from a mortuary, was that I did not like Lestat at all." The boy then goes on to say that once Louis became a vampire Lestat had lost his spell over him. Which is what seemed to be the case. Throughout the novel, Louis and Lestat seem to have this complicated love/hate relationship; similar to that of a failing marriage. Then Claudia enters the story. In the book Claudia is a six year old girl whose mother is dying of the plague and in the film she is closer to the age of 12 which is understandable since getting a six year old to be able to act like an adult once Claudia "ages" would be quite difficult. Louis and Claudia's relationship in the book is that of a parent and child. Their love for each other is clear but not creepy. In the film however, it felt like they tried to cover up a lot of the homo erotica that the book had and then in replacement they formed this creepy lover like relationship between Louis and Claudia. I was not a fan of this because even though Claudia was technically an adult she was still in a child's body. Lastly, toward the end of the novel, Armand's character comes into play. He seemed to be attracted to Louis for his" Humanness". Louis felt more than most vampires. He didn't have that vampire detachment like the others and Armand  loved that about him. After Louis loses Claudia he changes and becomes more detached. He loses his reason to live and stops caring about everything. Armand says this to Louis, "I thought you would at least care about that. I thought you would feel the old passion, the old anger if you were to see him again. I thought something would quicken and come alive in you if you saw him... if you returned to this place." In the end, Louis has nothing. Being a vampire left him in despair and the boy interviewing him didn't even understand in the end. He still wanted to be a vampire because of his selfish want to be immortal and to experience the things that Louis had experienced. The boy believed that he would handle things better than Louis had. The difference in endings in the novel and film are pretty drastic. Both are rather ambiguous though. In the novel, after Louis bites the boy and leaves him there, he wakes up and sets out to find Lestat but the reader never finds out if he finds Lestat and whether or not the boy becomes a vampire or dies. In the film, the boy is driving, trying to get away from Louis and Lestat actually appears in the car and bites the boy. The viewer is left to wonder whether the boy dies or if Lestat will show mercy and turn him into a vampire. Overall, I would definitely recommend both the novel and the film. The story is somewhat of a tragedy and the intensity of the feelings off love and lust in this story makes for a very interesting read.