I recently reviewed a Korean vampire movie called "Thirst" and I figured i would go to the other side of the pond and look at a big vampire film from Hollywood. It's ok. I invite the criticism that is likely headed my way by me having this opinion but i honestly believe that "Interview" has not aged well and in my opinion is an relatively awful movie.

I was a massive fan of Anne Rice novels back in the 90's and was even more thrilled to find out that one of the best ones was being brought to the silver screen circa 1994. I was even more elated when i found out that Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, Christian Slater, and Antonio Banderas were in the cast. However it was a massive letdown for me. Go ahead, tell me I am wrong.

Apparently, even Brad Pitt was disappointed in the script once he found out that Anne Rice (the author of the novels) had decided to write the screenplay herself and kind of made his character, Louis, a bit of a bitch boy.

The movie is entertaining i guess, but this is based almost exclusively on its massive budget of 60 million dollars. I know that doesn't mean much by today's terms where films routinely get budgets exceeding 200 million but trust me, in 1993, this was a really massive amount of money to spend on an untested market.

The film did make the money back and then a lot more (grossing 240 million globally) but for people like me anyway, that appreciate good movies, it fell flat. I had read all the books when it came out and Pitt's portrayal of Louis was well, weak. Louis was displayed as a weakling throughout the film, and only in certain moments did he show his strength in situations that were far too absurd and convenient such as when he slaughters all the vampires in the French theater.

I think the only saving grace for this movie was (and I can't believe i am saying this) Tom Cruise's performance as Lestat. Cruise was an unlikely choice for this role (in my mind) but he nailed it for the most part. The only time that i feel as though he showed weakness (which if you are familiar with the books is not something that Lestat does often) was when he is thrust into the modern world and doesn't understand what electric lights are.

For the most part, this movie was a precursor to what would become two decades of increasingly ridiculous vampire films and that being the case, I suppose I am happy that it came first.

The movie did quite well at the box office but this is perhaps an early example of what I feel is wrong with Hollywood. They got an all star cast and pushed together a script and made a kind of homo-erotic movie about a subject matter that i guess the world was aching for at the time.

While he got a lot of flack from the press for it, I felt as though Tom Cruise might have actually been one of the only performers in the movie that really deserved praise. He does a really good job as Lestat and if you are not familiar with the novels just consider yourself fortunate that the other books were not also made into massive films.

It would have been embarrassing and almost certainly there is no way that Cruise would have accepted the role regardless of the amount of money he was offered (the story becomes completely absurd.)

The movie ended up winning some minor awards for art direction but not a single person in the cast was nominated for anything acting oriented, and this is something I can completely identify with. There are some inklings of information out there about the cast, including Pitt, complaining that the script was "cheesy." I agree with this notion.

Aside from a few moments in the movie, the direction of the film is extremely predictable and boring. Its success has everything to do with the star-power of the cast and really nothing to do with their performance or the story they are displaying.

6 / 10

2 points extra were awarded because Cruise is so good in this otherwise boring and monotone film