QUEEN OF THE DAMNED
Reviewed by Sam Hatch
If the ending of Neil Jordan's lush, romantic adaptation of Interview with the Vampire left fans groaning with the thought of Tom Cruise essaying a rock star in the eventual sequel ‘The Vampire Lestat', take heart. Tom is nowhere to found here, and the second novel in sanguine New Orleans writer Anne Rice's vampire chronicles has been instead combined with the third book ‘Queen of the Damned'. Stuart Townsend (who was relieved from the role of Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings due to his youth) steps into Lestat's shoes, and plays a pale shirtless vampire keen on conquering the world of rock and roll.
Said Rock is the film's strongest suit. Instead of some goofy, retro-80s goth band, the producers have embraced the nu-metal bandwagon and have hired Korn frontman Jonathan Davis to write Lestat's songs (and co-score the film with original Oingo Boingo keyboardist Richard Gibbs). Davis is the perfect man for the job, and has crafted some awesomely haunting vocals that could truly come from the undead. Unfortunately, red tape has resulted in the soundtrack album containing versions of Davis' songs sung by other musicians from current ‘hot' bands. Though if you wish to seek out the original tracks, they are available in MP3 form on some Internet fan pages.
When not rocking out with Lestat, the film focuses on Jesse (Marguerite Moreau), a young British lass who is part of a secret society of occult scientists called the Talamasca. They pride themselves on observing the world of vampires, while never actually getting personally involved. Jesse however, is fascinated by Lestat's lyrics and discovers that they disguise references to real vampire hangouts in London's back alleys. Once a copy of Lestat's journal falls into her hands, the flames of her obsession are fanned even higher.
The film then flashes back to a time before the events in Interview with the Vampire, when Lestat is ‘turned' by a wealthy young vampire named Marius (Vincent Perez). Compared with Neil Jordan's film (unfair perhaps, but inevitable) much of the acting during these scenes feels stilted and straight out of a made-for-sci-fi feature. That's not to say that the film doesn't contain it's own charm, but it's more of a B-picture than the previous film.
Lestat is drawn to music even before the advent of rock and roll, and is shown to become a magnificent violinist after a fierce encounter with a local gypsy girl on the beach. His music then leads him to discover that Marius has been harboring secrets deep beneath his manor, and soon Lestat is summoned into the bowels of the building to come face to face with the titular Queen of the Damned (aka Akasha), frozen in stone upon a throne in the deep.
Much has been made of the late singer-turned-actress Aaliyah's performance, and apparently since she did not live long enough to record ADR loops (she perished in a tragic plane crash during an island video shoot), her brother was forced to step in to help. The result is actually a very worthy creepy addition to the sound palette. Once Akasha is revived she is a force to be reckoned with. This is when the film's two best scenes occur – Lestat headlines a burning-man-ish desert concert (at which he has also challenged all of the secretive vampires who resent his openness to a duel), which was created by essentially staging a real concert in the middle of nowhere. The energy in that scene is intense, but the standout is when Akasha strolls into the vampire bar Admiral's Arms and sexily sashays her way through the facility while casually unleashing all hell upon its denizens. All to the throbbing beat of one of those haunting Jonathan Davis tunes.
As a big screen continuation of Anne Rice's sprawling mythology, it pales in comparison to its predecessor. But by embracing it's also-ran status it becomes something greater. Instead of trying to ape the feel of Neil Jordan's work, it comes at us as an original entity, wearing its B-movie creature feature status on its bloodied sleeve. Between this and the excellent soundtrack work, what was scheduled to be a blip on the horror film radar may become a cult entity on television and video. I suspect this may be one of those films that will be fun to watch over and over again despite its shortcomings.