Companionship and the Vampire, Research Paper Example

Much of Candace Benefiel’s essay, “Blood Relations: The Gothic Perversion of the Nuclear Family in Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire” is dedicated to tracing the genealogy of the vampire in Gothic fiction from Anne Rice’s novel, published in 1976 up to the turn of the twentieth century.  Benefiel tracks the various treatments of the vampire made by authors, film makers and critics before finally arriving at the 1994 film adaption of Rice’s novel.  Benefiel’s analysis from the beginning of her essay, centers on the idea of  “the power of the theme of the incestuous, nuclear, vampiric family” (Benefiel, The Gothic Perversion, 4), and concludes with the remark that, “the need for family, in whatever configuration, remains constant (Benefiel, 10).  While the theme of family is no doubt present in the film, Interview with the Vampire, it is by no means the central theme of the film.  In this essay, I attempt to understand the “incestuous, nuclear, vampiric family” as no more than a vehicle for the exploration of a more fundamental notion (Benefiel, 10).   Interview with the Vampire is, in the final analysis, about the need for companionship in its most general sense; incest, eroticism and the nuclear family are merely iterations of this principal theme.

We will begin where Benefiel ends.   Benefiel, in her concluding paragraph on Interview with the Vampire writes,

“The family group of Interview with the Vampire… allows the reader to explore issues of alternative family structures and incestuous attraction within the family and to play out the consequences for good or ill of these imagined scenarios.” (Benefiel, 10)

It is strange that Benefiel finds herself here at the end of her investigation.  Throughout the foregoing pages, Benefiel makes clear that she does not wish to engage in yet another analysis of vampire sexuality: “Vampire sexuality,” she writes, “has been the focus of many studies, and it is not intended that this article cover that well-trodden ground” (Benefiel, 2). Try as she might, by the end of her analysis, Benefiel makes her way back to “that well-trodden ground” with a final statement about incest (Benefiel, 2).  While the critics’ propensity to continually turn toward investigations into the sex lives of vampires may shed light on their own preoccupations, it does little to illuminate the concerns of Interview.  While the relationship between Louis and Claudia is definitely intimate, there is little evidence in the film that relationship is actually sexual. In the same way, much is made of the homosexual undertones that pervade the relationship between Lestat and Louis; these undertones are suggestive at best, but not indicative. Understanding these relationships as explorations into the need for companionship and the various ways this needs can filled is more fruitful, and more faithful to the film.

The dramatic action of the film is initiated in the first place by the need for companionship.  Lestat was looking for a companion when he found Louis. If his desire had been simply nutritive he would have let Louis die.  If his desire was simply sexual, he would have either relieved his desire and gone on his way, or forced Louis into immortality and made Louis his concubine.  When Lestat offers Louis “the choice [he] never had,” Lestat reveals something about the nature of his motive.  It is important to Lestat that Louis chooses to go with him (Interview).  Companionship requires mutual consent in a way that sex does not; Lestat is sensitive to this and extends an invitation, albeit a violent one, to Louis.

We can come to a similar understanding of the relationship between Louis and Claudia. There is an aspect of a father/daughter, mother/daughter dynamic at play. There is also an aspect of a “lover lover” dynamic at play as well (Interview). However, the relationship between Louis and Claudia seems to express itself most honestly after the ‘death’ of Lestat when we hear of the two traveling from place to place in search of others like them, when we see them walking alone, side by side, down the streets of Paris.  In these moments we see two people who been with one another for a long time, seeking others to be with realizing that each is all that the other has.  To reduce these moments to an “exploration of alternative family structures,” and “incestuous attraction” seems too simplistic (Benefiel, 10).

Just as the dramatic action was initiated by a desire for companionship, so to does it end.  The final scenes of Interviewwith the Vampire speak to this fundamental and undying desire to find a companion.  When Louis returns to New Orleans and meets with Lestat, Lestat reaches a frail hand out to him, begging an old friend to stay.  In the final scene, Lestat finds a new victim.  One can see the cycle beginning to repeat, poetic gesture that seems to emphasize the eternality of man’s quest to find a companion.

While Benefiel is by no means wrong in her analysis of Interview with the Vampire, her fixation on the notions of family and filial dynamics renders her analysis a bit too narrow.  Everything that Benefiel sees in Interview is there, however, it is there as iteration of the more central theme of man’s desire for companionship.  The vampire is the perfect vehicle to reflect on this desire: the solitary creature of the night that looks like a man, feeds on men, but has no place among men is an apt locus for these reflections.  By examining the relationships between the central characters and paying particular attention to opening and closing scenes of Interview with the Vampire, we have attempted to show that this film and vampire genre as a whole has the capacity to attain to meaning that is far more universal than family structure case studies or idle explorations of incest.  This essay is not a refutation of Benefiel’s analysis, but an indication toward a theme that underlies Benefiel’s analysis.  If we understand “the need for family” as an iteration of the need for a companion, then there is no reason that Benefiel’s concluding remark could also stand at the conclusion of this essay: “the need for family, in whatever configuration, remains constant” (Benefiel, 10).

Works Cited

Benefiel, Candace R. “Blood Relations: The Gothic Perversion of the Nuclear Family in Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire.” The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol. 38, No. 2, 2004

Interview with the Vampire–the Vampire Chronicles. Dir. Neil Jordan. By Anne Rice. Perf. Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Christian Slater, and Kirsten Dunst. Geffen Pictures, 199