A TRUE PAIN IN THE NECK

 

People ask me what to watch all the time. One would think they are not paying attention to these notes from a warm Island and…turns out… these particular people are not. They are mostly neighbors on my Island and not recipients of my columns of views, reviews, and opinions.

As is the case with so many members of the privileged class, these folks do not deign to look up commentary on such sites as Alive on South Beach, let alone CagneyandLacey.com.

I try not to get too involved with the neighbors. Long ago I resolved never to attend any event in which more than six of the locals gathered at any one time, and to always do everything possible to avoid eye contact. A plaque that adorns the wall adjacent to my front door reads “Mr. Rogers did not adequately prepare me for the people in my neighborhood.”

I am easier about my rigidity regarding my tiny community when we are on a one-on-one basis, and that is generally when I get asked about what I recommend in the realm of entertainment.

So what is it that now brings me to the word processor? In these brief conversations with the neighbors, I have found myself enthusiastically recommending a television series about which, up until now, I have not written a word.

I thought that strange at first, but the reason is understandable. I do not think I really know how to write about this new show I am about to recommend. I certainly do not know how to write about it with any authority.

The series is Interview with the Vampire, the latest incarnation of The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice which you can see on AMC or stream on Amazon Prime. I think it is very good… maybe excellent… but honestly, I don’t know.

Why the equivocation? A confession: I know almost nothing about this genre. Not just vampire flicks but horror movies in general. The closest I got to being any kind of a fan of these films was as a kid when Abbott & Costello met (you name it) The Mummy, Frankenstein, or both. I never read the books by Ms. Rice and never saw “the original” of her films, which starred no less than Tom Cruise and Brad Pitt.

That said, I confess to doing a fair imitation of Bela Lugosi’s Count Dracula:

“Bateman, Bateman, let me out. I’ll fix your face.” Or “Only one moment of pain, and then… eternal life.”

Okay, okay. You sort of have to be there and catch me after the second martini.

Onward:

I watched this two-season series because Allyn, the second of my three daughters, showed up at my doorstep on Father’s Day as my surprise for the holiday. Father’s Day, and every other day, Allyn is a horror film freak. Literally… A FREAK! We “had” to watch this show, she insisted, and so, watch it we did.

Well, what can I say? It is pretty damn good. I cannot compare it with much, because… well, you know why, right? No real frame of reference with which to make a comparison (I vaguely remember Bram Stoker’s Dracula…the movie and not the 19^th century novel… which I only attended because  Francis Ford Coppola directed). I have no real passion for the art form, let alone any knowledge of the historical context of the genre. But there are some good special effects, great sets, a nice bunch of actors, though truth to tell, there were only a few I recognized.

A lot of the time I did not know what was going on… no, not because I am heterosexual and the leads… well, they just aren’t… but because I don’t understand all of the rules about vampires that (according to Allyn) “everyone knows.”

My admonition is that you read the books by Ms. Rice to better understand the terrain. I am told they are good and that they sort of provide a road map for all that goes down (no pun intended) in this 12-episode series which takes place over multiple decades (centuries?) and goes from Dubai, to New Orleans, then Paris.

Footnote number one of two:

Want to read an erudite commentary on this current series? Here is a link provided by the kinder:

https://www.vulture.com/article/interview-with-the-vampire-recap-season-2-episode-6.html

Footnote number two:

As a result of this introduction, I paid out the five bucks to Amazon and rented the 1994 adaptation with Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise. Turned it off in less than 15 minutes. What a stinker. Not only does it not compare with the current Interview with the Vampire, messieurs Cruise and Pitt must have made some deal with the dark side which enabled them to keep their careers intact after this piece of junk. Fifteen minutes… a lot more than “one moment of pain.”

 

Barney Rosenzweig