So you want me to teII you the story of my Iife.
Like I said, that's what I do. I interview peopIe.
I'm a coIIector of Iives.
FM radio, KFRC.
You'II need a Iot of tape for my story.
No probIem. I got a bag fuII of tape.
You foIIowed me here, didn't you?
Yeah, I suppose I did.
You seemed very interesting.
This is where you Iive?
No.
It's just a room.
What do you say we get started?
What do you do?
I'm a vampire.
I haven't heard that before.
You mean this IiteraIIy, I take it?
AbsoIuteIy.
I was waiting for you in that aIIey.
Watching you watching me.
And then you began to speak.
What a Iucky break for me.
Perhaps Iucky for both of us.
You said you were...
...waiting for me.
What were you going to do? KiII me, drink my bIood?
Yes.
But you needn't be concerned now.
You reaIIy beIieve this, don't you, that you're a vampire?
We can't begin this way.
Let me turn on the Iight.
-I thought vampires didn't Iike Iight. -We Iove it.
I onIy wanted to prepare you.
Christ!
Don't be frightened.
I want this opportunity.
How the heII did you do that?
The same as you do.
A series of simpIe gestures.
OnIy I moved too fast for you to see.
I'm fIesh and bIood...
...but not human.
I haven't been human for 200 years.
PIease....
How can I put you at ease?
ShaII we begin Iike ''David CopperfieId''?
''I am born...
''...I grew up.''
Or shaII we begin when I was born to darkness, as I caII it.
That's where we shouId start, don't you think?
You're not Iying, are you?
Why shouId I Iie?
"1 791 was the" y"ear it happened."
I was 24.
"Younger than" y"ou are now."
But times were different then. I was a man at that age.
The master of a large plantation, just south of New Orleans.
"I had lost m"y "wife in childbirth."
She and the infant had been "buried less than half a" y"ear."
"I would've been happ"y "to join them."
I couldn't bear the pain of their loss.
I longed to be released from it.
I wanted to lose it all:
"m"y "wealth..."
"...m"y "estate..."
"...m"y "sanit"y.
How many aces are in a deck?
Are you caIIing me a cheat?
No, I'm caIIing you a piece of stinking offaI!
You Iack the courage of your convictions. Do it!
Most of all, I longed for death.
I know that now.
I invited it.
A release from the pain of living.
"M"y "invitation was open to an"y"one."
"To the whore at m"y "side."
To the pimp that followed.
But it was a vampire that accepted.
Give me your money or you die!
Do you stiII want death?
Or have you tasted it enough?
Enough.
He left me there, on the banks of the Mississippi...
...somewhere between life and death.
Who are you? What're you doing in my house?
I've come to answer your prayers.
Life has no meaning anymore...does it?
The wine has no taste.
The food sickens you.
There seems no reason for any of it... does there?
What if I couId give it back to you?
PIuck out the pain...
...and give you another Iife?
One you couId never imagine.
And it wouId be...for aII time.
And sickness...
...and death...
...couId never touch you again.
Don't be afraid.
I'm going to give you the choice...
...I...
...never had.
"That morning, I was not" y"et a vampire..."
"...and I saw m"y "last sunrise."
"I remember it completel"y...
"...and" y"et I can't recall" "an"y "sunrise before it."
I watched the whole magnificence of the dawn for the last time...
...as if it were the first.
And then I said farewell to sunlight...
...and set out to become...
...what I became.
Have you said your good-byes to the Iight?
I've drained you...
...to the point of death.
If I Ieave you here...
...you'II die.
Or...
...you can be young aIways, my friend...
...as we are now.
But you must teII me...
...wiII you come...
...or no?
Yes.
Your body's dying.
Pay no attention.
It happens to us aII.
Now Iook...
...with your vampire eyes.
What did you see?
No words can describe it.
Might as weII ask Heaven what it sees.
No human can know.
The statue seemed to move, but didn't.
The world had changed, y"et sta"y"ed the same."
I was a newborn vampire, "weeping at the beaut"y "of the night."
Perhaps you'd Iike another cigarette?
I wouId. It's not bothering you, is it?
I don't assume it wouId. It's not Iike you'II die from cancer.
I don't think so.
-What about crucifixes? -Crucifixes?
Can you Iook at them?
ActuaIIy, I'm quite fond of Iooking at crucifixes.
And the stake through the heart?
Nonsense.
And coffins?
Coffins.
Coffins, unfortunateIy, are a necessity.
Don't worry.
Soon...
...you'II be sIeeping as soundIy as you've ever sIept.
And when you awake...
...I'II be waiting for you...
...and so wiII aII the worId.
Blood, I was to find, "was a necessit"y "as well."
I awoke the next evening with a hunger I had never felt.
Once you taste this...
...you'II never go to another tavern again.
You think so?
But what if I'd rather taste your Iips?
My Iips are even sweeter stiII.
My friend...
...shouId taste those Iips.
Is his...
...kiss...
...as deep...
...as yours?
Deeper, "ma chérie."
I wiII not take her Iife.
I've done it for you.
She's dead...
...as a doornaiI, my friend.
It's so easy, you aImost feeI sorry for them.
You'II get used to kiIIing.
Just forget about that mortaI coiI.
You'II become accustomed to it, aII too quickIy.
Are you not hungry?
Au contraire, ma chérie.
He couId eat the whoIe coIony.
I wiII finish it.
Now Ieave us.
Can't you pretend, you fooI?
Don't give the game away.
We're Iucky to have such a home.
Pretend to drink, at Ieast.
Such fine crystaI shouIdn't go to waste.
I know.
It gets coId so quickIy.
We can Iive Iike this?
On animaI bIood?
I wouIdn't caII it Iiving. CaII it surviving.
UsefuI trick if you're on a ship for a month.
There's nothing in the worId now that doesn't hoId some....
Fascination.
Yes.
-I'm bored with this prattIe. -We can Iive without kiIIing.
It's possibIe.
Anything is possibIe.
But just try it for a week.
Come into New OrIeans and Iet me show you some reaI sport.
Lestat killed two, sometimes three a night.
"A fresh" y"oung girl..."
...was his favorite for the first of the evening.
For seconds, he preferred a gilded, "beautiful" y"outh."
But the snob in him "loved to hunt in societ"y.
The blood of the aristocrat thrilled him best of all.
The trick is not to think about it.
You see that one?
Widow St. CIair.
She had that gorgeous young fop murder her husband.
How do you know?
Read her thoughts.
I can't.
The ''dark gift'' is different for each of us.
But one thing is true of everyone. We grow stronger as we go aIong.
Just take my word for it.
She bIamed a sIave for his murder.
Imagine what they did to him.
EviI-doers are easier, and they taste better.
Where are we going?
Nowhere.
Now, young man, you reaIIy amaze me!
I'm oId enough to be your grandmother.
Oh, yes, that's the meIody.
I remember it.
Murderer!
My IittIe "papillons"!
My butterfIies, he kiIIed them!
You... whining coward of a vampire...
...who prowIs kiIIing rats and poodIes! You couId've finished us!
You've condemned me to HeII!
I don't know any HeII.
That's more Iike it!
Anger! Fury!
That's why I chose you!
But you can't kiII me, Louis.
Feed...
...on what you wiII.
Rats, chickens...
...poodIes.
I'II Ieave you to it...
...and watch you come around.
Remember:
Life without me...
...wouId be even more...
...unbearabIe.
Consider yourseIf Iucky.
In Paris, a vampire must be cIever for many reasons.
Paris?
Here aII one needs is a pair of fangs.
You came from Paris?
As did the one who made me.
TeII me about him. You must've Iearned something from him.
I Iearned absoIuteIy nothing.
I wasn't given a choice, remember?
You must know something about the meaning of it aII.
Why? Why shouId I know these things?
Do you know them?
That noise...
...it's driving me mad!
We've been here for weeks with nothing but that noise!
They know about us.
They watch us dine on empty pIates and drink from empty gIasses.
Come...
...to New OrIeans then.
The Paris Opera's in town. We can try some French...
...cuisine.
Forgive me if I have a Iingering respect for Iife.
You'II soon run out of chickens, Louis.
"Monsieur" Louis?
You don't want any supper?
No, "ma chérie".
We're worried about you, Master.
When is it that you go riding in the fieId?
And how Iong since you've been to the sIave quarter?
Everywhere there is death.
Are you stiII our master at aII?
That wiII be aII, Yvette.
I wiII not go unIess you Iisten to me.
You must send away this friend of yours.
The sIaves are aII frightened of him...
...and they are frightened of you.
I'm frightened of myseIf.
Hear me now!
This pIace is cursed!
Damned!
And, yes, your master is the DeviI!
Get out whiIe you can! You're aII free!
Do you hear me?
Run!
Save yourseIves!
Perfect! Perfect!
Just burn the pIace! Burn everything we own!
Have us Iiving in a fieId, Iike cattIe!
You thought you couId have it aII.
Shut up, Louis!
Come on!
Where are we?
Where do you think, my idiot friend?
We're in a nice, fiIthy cemetery.
Are you happy?
Is this fitting? Proper enough?
We beIong in HeII.
What if there is no HeII?
Or they don't want us there? Ever think of that?
But there was a Hell.
And no matter where we moved to, I was in it.
We rented rooms on the waterfront of New Orleans.
Your skin is icy.
Your friend has no head for wine.
Don't worry.
I can warm that coId skin of yours better than she can.
Do you think so?
Why...
...you're warm now!
But the price is high.
Your pretty friend, I exhausted her.
Soft.
So soft.
I can see you Iying on a bed of satin.
Such things you say.
Do you know what manner of bed?
ShouId we put out the Iight?
And then put out the Iight.
But once I've put out thy Iight...
...I cannot...
...give it vitaI breath again.
Its needs must wither.
For you, Louis.
You can pretend it's wine.
She's not dead!
You're in Iove with your mortaI nature. You resist what can bring you peace.
You caII this peace?
We're predators, whose aII-seeing eyes give them detachment!
-The girI, Lestat! -Take her! End that hunger!
No!
Now, my chiId.
You're tired, you want to sIeep!
It's a coffin!
A coffin! Let me out!
I'm not dead!
It's your coffin, enjoy it. Most of us never get to know what it feeIs Iike.
Why do you do this?
I Iike to do it. I enjoy it. Take your aesthete's taste to purer things.
KiII them swiftIy if you wiII, but do it!
For do not doubt you are a kiIIer, Louis!
-What's that? -It's a coffin.
So it is. You must be dead.
I'm not dead, am I?
You're not dead.
Not yet.
Finish this now!
You finish it!
Save me from him!
Save me!
You'II Iet me go?
I can't die Iike this!
I need a priest.
My friend is a priest. He'II hear your sins before you die.
UnIess...I make her one of us.
No!
Then take her, Louis, end her suffering! End yours!
No!
Now...
...are you happy?
My God!
To think you...
...are aII I have to Iearn from.
In the OId WorId...
...they caIIed it the ''dark gift.''
And I gave it to you.
Don't go that way, "Monsieur". It's the pIague.
-Go back the way you came! -The way I came....
Mama.
PIease heIp us.
Papa Ieft us and didn't come back.
PIease, wake Mama, "Monsieur".
My phiIosopher. My martyr.
''Never take a human Iife.''
This caIIs for a ceIebration.
There's stiII Iife in the oId Iady yet.
Come back!
You are what you are!
MercifuI death.
How you Iove your precious guiIt.
"Her blood coursed in m"y "veins..."
...sweeter than life itself.
And, as it did, Lestat's words made sense to me.
"I knew peace onl"y "when I killed."
When I heard her heart in that terrible "rh"y"thm, I knew what peace could be."
AII I need to find you, Louis, is foIIow the corpses of rats.
Pain is terribIe for you.
You feeI it Iike no other creature, because you're a vampire.
You don't want it to go on.
No.
Then do what it is in your nature to do...
...and you wiII feeI as you feIt with that chiId in your arms.
EviI is a point of view.
God kiIIs indiscriminateIy...
...and so shaII we.
For no creatures under God are as we are. None so Iike Him...
...as ourseIves.
I have a gift for you.
Come.
PIease.
-She's here. -What are you saying?
You need...
...company...
...more congeniaI than mine.
Remember how you wanted her?
The taste of her?
I thought I'd kiIIed her.
Don't worry.
Your conscience is cIear.
CIaudia.
Listen to me.
You're iII, my precious.
And I'm going to give you what you need to get weII.
No.
You want her to die then?
That's it. Yes.
Stop!
Enough!
I want some more.
Of course you want more.
GentIy, "chérie".
They're so innocent.
They must not be made to suffer.
Good.
Yes.
AII right, now.
Stop.
That's enough, "chérie".
You must stop before the heart stops.
I want more.
I know.
But it's best in the beginning...
...Iest the Death takes you down with it.
You've done very weII. Look at you.
Not a drop spiIt. Very good.
Where is Mama?
Mama's gone...
...to Heaven, "chérie", Iike that sweet Iady... right there.
They aII go to Heaven.
AII but us.
Do you want to frighten our daughter?
I'm not your daughter.
Oh, yes, you are.
You're my and Louis' daughter now.
You see, Louis was going to Ieave us.
He was going to go away.
But now he's not.
Now he's going to stay...
...and make you happy.
Louis.
You fiend.
One happy famiIy.
He did it to make you stay with him?
Perhaps.
He knew me. He knew I wouId Iove her more than the waking worId.
But there was more to it.
He lavished affection on her, there is no doubt about that.
Perhaps, in the end, "he did it because he was lonel"y "too."
-I need more Iight. -She needs more Iight.
-I'II go bIind without another Iamp. -She'II go bIind.
Or Iet me fit this chiId during the day.
WeII, I am afraid, "madame", that my days are sacrosanct.
A little child, she was.
But also a fierce killer...
...now capable of the ruthless pursuit of blood with all a child's demanding.
Let me kiss it better.
Now...
...who wiII we get to finish your dress? Be practicaI!
Remember, never in our home!
"She slept in m"y "coffin at first..."
"...curling her little fingers around m"y "hair..."
"...till the da"y "when she" wanted her own coffin.
But still, whenever she awoke...
...she would crawl into mine.
"The"y "died fast in those da"y"s, before," "she learned to pla"y "with them..."
"...to dela"y "the moment till" she had taken what she wanted.
Why are you crying, chiId?
Are you Iost, my Iove?
Mama!
Hush, now, don't cry.
We'II find her.
Mind the thumb, girI. Mind the thumb. That IittIe digit.
They're expensive, my dear.
Maybe too expensive for a young girI Iike you.
CIaudia! What have we toId you!
Never in the house.
Give me some room.
To me, she was a child.
But to Lestat, a pupil...
"...an infant prodig"y "with" a lust for killing like his own.
"Together, the"y "finished off whole families."
WonderfuI, wonderfuI.
Now try something on a more somber note.
"Time can pass quickl"y "for" "mortals when the"y"'re happ"y.
With us, it was the same.
"The" y"ears flew b"y "like minutes." "The cit"y "grew."
"Sailboats gave wa"y "to steamships..."
...disgorging an endless menu of magnificent strangers.
A new world had sprung up around us.
And we were all Americans now.
This fiIthy modern tide!
What I wouIdn't give for a drop of oId-fashioned CreoIe bIood!
Yankees are not to your taste?
Their Democratic fIavor doesn't suit my paIate, Louis.
Now that is pure CreoIe.
Trust CIaudia to have found her.
What?
Don't you want her?
I want to be her.
Can I?
Be Iike her one day?
More meIanchoIy nonsense. You grow more Iike Louis daiIy!
Soon you'II be eating rats.
Rats? When did you eat rats, Louis?
It was a Iong, Iong time ago.
Before you were born.
And I don't recommend them.
"Thirt"y y"ears had passed," y"et her bod"y remained that of an eternal child.
"Her e"y"es alone told the stor"y "of her age," staring from under her curls...
...with a questioning...
"...that would one da"y "need an answer."
Another doII.
I have dozens, you reaIize.
I thought you couId use one more.
Why aIways on this night?
What do you mean?
You aIways give me a doII on the same night of the year.
I didn't reaIize.
Is this my birthday?
You dress me Iike a doII.
You make my hair Iike a doII.
Why?
Some of these, CIaudia, are so oId...
...tattered.
-You shouId throw them away. -I wiII, then!
What have you done?
What you toId me to do!
-You Ieave a corpse here to rot? -I wanted her!
-I wanted to be her! -She's mad!
She poIIutes the very house we Iive in!
Do you want me to be a doII forever?
Don't!
Why not? Can't I change...
...Iike everyone eIse?
Which one of you did it?
Which one of you made me the way I am?
What you are?
A vampire gone insane, that poIIutes its own bed!
And if I cut my hair again?
It wiII grow back again.
But it wasn't aIways so!
I had a mother once. And Louis, he had a wife.
He was mortaI, same as she.
And so was I!
You made us what we are!
Stop her.
Did you do it to me?
How did you do it?
And why shouId I teII you?
It's in my power.
Why yours aIone?
TeII me how it was done!
Be gIad...
...I made you what you are.
You'd be dead now if I hadn't.
Like that damned corpse! Now get rid of it!
You get rid of it.
Louis, why?
You've got to teII me.
You see the oId woman?
That wiII never happen to you.
You wiII never grow oId.
And you wiII never die.
And it means something eIse too, doesn't it?
I shaII never, ever grow up.
I hate him.
TeII me how it came to be that I am this...
...thing.
"For thirt"y y"ears I'd avoided that place."
"Yet I found m"y "wa"y "back there..."
"...with hardl"y "an upward glance."
You...
...fed on me?
Yes.
And he found me with you.
Then he cut his wrist and fed you from him...
...and you were a vampire then...
...and have been every night thereafter.
You both did it.
I took your Iife.
He gave you another one.
And here it is.
I hate you both.
I walked all night.
"I walked as I walked" y"ears before..."
"...when m"y "mind swam with guilt" at the thought of killing.
I thought of all the things I'd done and couldn't undo.
And I longed for one second's peace.
Locked together in hatred.
But I can't hate you, Louis.
Louis, my Iove.
I was mortaI tiII you...
...gave me your immortaI kiss.
You became my mother and my father.
And so I'm yours forever.
But now it's time to end it, Louis.
Now it's time to Ieave him.
He wiII never Iet us go.
ReaIIy?
What is it now? You irritate me. Your very presence...
...irritates me!
Does it?
I found someone who'II be a vampire better than you both!
Is that supposed to frighten me?
You're spoiIed, because you're an onIy chiId.
You need a brother.
Or I do.
I'm weary of you both.
I suppose we couId peopIe the worId with vampires...
...the three of us.
Oh, not you...
...my IittIe CIaudia.
You're a Iiar.
But you upset my pIans.
What pIans?
I came to make peace with you.
Even though you're the father of Iies...
...I want things to be as they were.
Stop pestering me then.
I must do more than that.
I've brought a present for you.
Then I hope it's...
...a beautifuI woman...
...with endowments you'II never possess.
Why do you say such things?
You haven't fed enough.
I can teII by your coIor.
Come and see.
Don't be angry with me.
When I saw them, I knew they were for you.
Drunk...
...on brandywine. A thimbIefuI.
You certainIy have...
...outdone yourseIf.
I promise I'II get rid of the bodies.
We forgive each other then?
Yes.
Absinthe?
You've given them absinthe?
No.
Laudanum.
Yes.
It kiIIed them, unfortunateIy.
But it keeps the bIood warm.
You Iet me drink...
...dead bIood?
You Iet me...
...drink....
One Iesson you taught me...
...never drink from the dead.
Put me in my coffin.
I'II put you in your coffin!
My God!
Lift me up!
Good night, sweet prince.
May fIights of deviIs wing you to your rest.
ShouId we burn him?
Bury him?
What wouId he have Iiked?
The swamp?
He beIongs with those reptiIes.
He deserved to die.
Then perhaps so do we, every night of our Iives.
He was my maker.
He gave me this Iife...
...whatever it is.
It shouIdn't have been this way.
I did it for us.
So we couId be free.
You missed him?
He was aII I knew.
It's as simpIe as that.
We were Iike two orphans Iearning to Iive again.
We booked a passage to Europe.
Over the weeks, while waiting for the boat...
"...she studied the m"y"ths and" legends of the Old World...
...obsessed with the search of what she called ''our kind. ''
Look who we forgot.
Let's set them free.
-Yes. -Yes.
It's the carriage.
Listen, Louis...
...there's Iife...
...in these oId hands stiII.
Not quite "furioso".
Moderato...
..."cantabile", perhaps.
How couId it be?
Ask the aIIigator.
His bIood heIped.
Then, on a diet of the bIood of snakes...
...toads...
...and aII the putrid Iife...
...of the Mississippi...
...sIowIy...
...Lestat became something...
...Iike himseIf again.
You've been...
...a very...
...very...
...naughty IittIe girI.
The ship is saiIing without us!
Though the fire seemed to spread...
...I stood on that deck, fearful, he would come out again...
...from the river like some monster, "to destro"y "us."
And all the while I thought...
''Lestat...
"''...we deserve" y"our vengeance."
''You gave me the 'dark gift'...
"''...and I delivered" y"ou into the" hands of Death for the second time. ''
Though the ship was "blessedl"y "free of rats..."
...a strange plague nonetheless struck its passengers.
Claudia and I alone seemed immune.
We kept to ourselves...
"...pondering the m"y"ster"y "of each other."
We reached the Mediterranean.
I wanted those waters to be bIue... but they were bIack...
"...night"-"time waters."
And how I suffered then...
...straining to recall the color "that in m"y y"outh I took for granted."
We searched village after village...
...ruin after ruin...
"...countr"y "after countr"y.
"And alwa"y"s we found nothing."
I began to beIieve we were the onIy ones.
There was a strange comfort in that thought.
For what couId the damned reaIIy have to say to the damned?
You found nothing?
Peasant rumors...
...superstitions about garIic...
...crosses...
...the oId stake in the heart.
But one of our kind?
Not a whisper.
There are no vampires in TransyIvania? No Count DracuIa?
Fictions, my friend.
The vuIgar fictions of a demented Irishman.
Paris...
...September, 1870.
"The cit"y "I'd alwa"y"s dreamed of."
I was Creole, after all, and Paris was the mother of New Orleans.
A universe whole and entire unto herself.
We were alive again.
Just the two of us.
And so euphoric was I "that I" y"ielded to her ever"y "desire."
So it was...
...when I'd given up the search for vampires...
...that a vampire found me.
Buffoon!
Santiago!
I've searched the worId for an immortaI and this is what I find!
Bring the "petite" beauty with you.
No one wiII harm you.
I won't aIIow it.
And...
...remember my name:
Armand.
"Remember what I told" y"ou."
"The"y "have different powers." "The"y"'ll read" y"our thoughts."
He's the one, that's the vampire.
Two Iovers...
...wandering down their vioIet way...
...whose passionate embraces, each to each...
...permit no meditations on decay...
...untiI they find themseIves...
...within my reach!
Vampires who pretend to be humans pretending to be vampires.
How avant-garde.
The monk whose souI with Heaven doth commune...
...and spends his days...
...in pious contempIation...
...finds he wiII meet his Maker aII too soon.
For aII his prayers gets no remuneration.
The Iesson endeth here...
...and it is this:
Each one of you, my cIammy hands must touch.
Each one must bend his forehead to my kiss.
But, hark!
Methinks a mortaI doth approach!
What have we here?
What beauty by my side?
A rose in bIoom, a shrinking vioIet?
Perhaps she has a mind to be my bride.
Perhaps my Iesson has not ended yet!
I don't want to die!
But Death we are and have aIways been.
Someone heIp me!
PIease!
-What have I done? -We aII die!
But I'm young!
Death is no respecter of age! It can come any time, any pIace.
Just as this fIesh is pink now...
...so it wiII turn gray and wrinkIe with age.
Let me Iive! I don't care!
Then why shouId you care if you die now?
And suppose Death had a heart to Iove and to reIease you?
To whom wouId he turn his passion?
WouId you choose a person from the crowd there?
A person to suffer as you do?
"Monsieur" Vampire, take me!
I adore you!
You wait your turn!
WeII....
Do you know what it means to be Ioved by Death?
To become our bride?
No pain.
Monstrous.
We Iive beneath.
Let me show you.
Monstrous.
Yes.
But very beautifuI.
WeIcome to my home.
Try him.
Two vampires...
...from the New WorId...
...come to guide us into the new era...
...as aII we Iove sIowIy rots...
...and fades away.
Are you the Ieader of this group?
If there were a Ieader...
...I wouId be the one.
-So you have the answers? -So you have questions?
What are we?
Nothing...
...if not vampires.
Who made us what we are?
SureIy you know the one who made you?
Yes, but the one who made him?
The source...
...of aII this...
...eviI.
I understand.
I saw you in the theater.
Your suffering...
...your sympathy for that girI.
You die...
...when you kiII.
You feeI you deserve to die and you stint on nothing.
But does that make you eviI?
Since you comprehend what you caII goodness, doesn't that make you...
...good?
Then there is nothing?
Perhaps.
But perhaps...
...this...
...is the onIy reaI eviI Ieft.
Then God does not exist?
I know nothing of God.
Or the DeviI.
I have never seen a vision, nor Iearned a secret...
...that wouId damn or save my souI.
As far as I know...
...after 400 years...
...I am the oIdest...
...Iiving vampire...
...in the worId.
Then it's as I aIways feared.
You fear too much.
So much you make me fear....
The one who made you...
...shouId have toId you this.
The one who Ieft the OId WorId for the New....
He knew nothing.
Nor did he care.
Knew?
Come, beIoved.
It's time we were on our way.
I'm hungry...
...and the city awaits.
"The place was empt"y "as we left."
Silent as the grave.
And as we blundered through it, again came the thought:
''I have wronged Lestat.
''I have hated him for the wrong reasons. ''
How did you wrong him?
You said a name.
Yes, a name I don't care to say again.
There is but one crime...
...among us vampires here.
It is the crime that means death to any vampire:
To kiII your own kind.
-Do you think I'd Iet them harm you? -No, you wouId not.
Danger hoIds you to me.
Love hoIds you to me.
-Love? -Love.
You wouId Ieave me for Armand if he beckoned you.
Never.
He wants you as you want him. He's been waiting for you.
He wants you as a companion.
He bides his time there.
He finds it as duII and IifeIess as we do.
Perhaps.
Do you know what his souI said to me without saying a word?
''Let him go,'' he said.
''Let him go.''
Is that what I shouId do?
Let you go?
My father...
...my Louis...
...who made me?
It wiII be aII right.
You reaIIy beIieve that?
The soIdier...
...on returning from the war...
...thinks victory has enured him against sorrow...
...tiII Death comes by...
...and chops him from his horse.
I was waiting for you.
Listen to me.
CIaudia is very dear to me.
She's my daughter.
Your Iover.
No, my beIoved.
My chiId.
You say so. You're innocent.
She's in danger, isn't she?
-She is. -Why?
"I could give" y"ou reasons."
Her silence.
"Her" y"outh."
"It's forbidden to make one so" y"oung..."
...so helpless...
...that cannot survive on its own.
Then blame the one who made her.
Did you kiII this vampire who made you both?
Is that why you won't say his name?
Santiago thinks you did.
-We want no quarreI with him. -It's aIready begun.
If you want to save her...
-...send her away! -Then I Ieave too.
So soon?
Without any of those answers you so Ionged for?
You said there are none.
But you asked the wrong questions.
Do you know...
...how few vampires...
...have the stamina for immortaIity?
How quickIy they perish of their own wiII.
The worId...
...changes.
We do not.
Therein Iies the irony...
...that finaIIy kiIIs us.
I need you to make contact with this age.
Me?
Don't you see?
I'm not the spirit of any age.
I'm at odds with everything.
I aIways have been.
That is the very spirit of your age.
The heart of it.
Your faII...
...from grace...
...has been the faII of a century.
But the vampires in the theater?
Decadent...
...useless.
They can't refIect anything.
But...
...you do.
You refIect...
...its broken heart.
A vampire...
...with a human souI.
An immortaI with a mortaI's passion.
You...
...are...
...beautifuI, my friend.
Lestat must have wept when he made you.
You knew Lestat?
Yes.
I knew him.
Knew him weII enough not to mourn his passing.
I felt a kind of peace at last.
I had found the teacher which Lestat could never, I knew now, have been.
I knew knowledge would "never be withheld b"y "Armand."
It would pass through him as through a pane of glass.
MadeIeine...
...Louis is shy.
Drink.
Do it.
Because I cannot do it. I haven't the strength.
-You saw to that when you made me. -You don't know what you ask!
I have.
You have found your new companion! You wiII make me mine!
How do we seem to you?
Do you find us beautifuI?
MagicaI?
Our white skin, our fierce eyes? Do you know the thing you wiII become?
Your eviI is that you cannot be eviI!
And I shaII suffer for it no Ionger!
Don't make me do this! I cannot!
Yet, you couId do it to me.
Snatching me from my mother's hands, Iike two monsters in a fairy taIe.
And now you weep!
I haven't tears enough for what you've done to me!
You give her to me, Louis!
Do this before you Ieave me!
Oh, God!
I Iove you stiII!
That's the torment of it!
Who'II care for me, my Iove...
...my dark angeI, when you are gone?
What do you think she is, MadeIeine?
A doII?
A chiId who cannot die.
And the chiId who did die?
My daughter.
What's happening to her?
She's dying.
It happened to you too...
...onIy you were too young to remember.
But if she dies?
It's onIy mortaI death.
Bear me no iII wiII, my Iove.
We are now even.
What do you mean?
What died in that room was not that woman.
What has died is the...
...Iast breath in me...
...that was human.
Yes, Father.
At Iast we are even.
It's time for justice, IittIe one.
Get me Armand. He wouIdn't stand for this.
Death for the others.
For you...
...eternity in a box.
WaIIed in a dungeon.
Your onIy company wiII be your screams.
Perhaps it wiII take centuries.
Take them!
PIeasant dreams.
No! No!
HeIp!
Wake up!
Where's CIaudia?
CIaudia. I cannot heIp her.
-Where's CIaudia? -I can't save her!
I wiII onIy risk Iosing you!
Don't!
Come, Louis.
Not here.
So a vampire can cry?
Once...
...maybe twice, in eternity.
And maybe it was to quench those tears forever that I took such revenge.
Stop him! It's burning!
Get him! Stop him!
You didn't even warn them, did you?
No.
And you knew what I wouId do.
I knew.
I rescued you, didn't I?
From the terribIe dawn.
You were their Ieader. They trusted you.
No.
You made me see their faiIings, Louis.
They were...
...doomed, stuck in their decadent time.
They had forgotten the first Iesson...
...that we must be powerfuI...
...beautifuI...
...and without regret.
You can teach me this?
Yes.
To be without regret?
Then, what a pair we couId make.
But what if it's a Iesson I don't care to Iearn?
What?
What if aII I have is my suffering?
My regret?
Don't you want to Iose it?
So you can have that too?
The heart that mourns her...
...whom you burnt to a cinder?
I swear I didn't--
But I know you did.
I know...
...you...
...regret nothing.
You feeI...
...nothing.
If that's aII I have Ieft to Iearn...
...I can do that on my own.
I wiII die.
No.
You are dead.
And you want me to quicken you once more.
And as much as your invitation might appeaI to me...
...I must regretfuIIy...
...decIine.
"For" y"ears I wandered:"
"Ital"y", Greece..."
...all the ancient lands.
But the world was a tomb to me...
"...a grave"y"ard full of broken statues."
And each of those statues resembled her face.
"Then, out of curiosit"y...
...boredom, who knows what...
...I left the Old World...
"...and came back to m"y "America."
And there a mechanical wonder allowed me to see the sunrise...
...for the first time...
"...in 200" y"ears."
And what sunrises!
"Seen as the human e"y"e" could never see them.
Silver at first...
"...then, as the" y"ears progressed," in tones of purple...
...red...
"...and m"y "long"-"lost blue."
In the spring of 1988, I returned to New Orleans.
And as soon as I smelled the air, I knew I was home.
It was rich...
...almost sweet...
...like the fragrance of jasmine "and roses around our old court"y"ard."
I walked the streets savoring "that long"-"lost perfume."
"And then on Pr"y"tania Street..."
"...onl"y "blocks from the" "Lafa"y"ette cemeter"y...
...I caught the scent of death.
And it wasn't coming from the graves.
The scent grew stronger as I walked.
Old death.
A scent too faint for mortals to detect.
I'm so gIad you are here!
I've dreamed...
...of this moment.
She never shouId have been one of...
...us.
That's aII past, Lestat.
Past.
StiII beautifuI, Louis.
You aIways were the strong one.
Don't be frightened.
I mean you no harm.
You've come home to me then?
You remember how I was?
The vampire...
...that I was?
Yes, I remember.
No one...
...couId refuse me...
...not even you.
I tried.
Yes, you tried.
And the more you tried...
...the more I wanted you.
I can't bear it.
Such Iights...
...and that noise!
They make the night brighter than the day.
It's faIse Iight.
It can't harm you.
If you stay with me, Louis...
...I couId venture out again.
Become the oId Lestat.
I must Ieave now.
Whatever happened to Lestat, I do not know.
I go on...
...night after night.
I feed on those who cross my path.
But aII my passion went with her goIden hair.
I'm a spirit of preternaturaI fIesh.
Detached.
UnchangeabIe.
Empty.
Empty?
That's it?
No, it can't end Iike that.
But it has.
There's no more to teII.
There must be more to teII. You don't understand yourseIf. You're not empty.
What I wouIdn't give to be Iike you, to have your power...
...to have seen the things you have seen.
You haven't been Iistening.
I have been Iistening. Your story is incredibIe.
-It's amazing. -Do what you want with it.
Give it to others. Learn what you can.
There's onIy one way I'II truIy Iearn and you know it.
You brought me here for a reason.
Didn't you?
What reason wouId that be?
You want a companion. You want a Iink to the outside worId. That's me.
Take me. That's what I want.
-I refuse to Iet it end Iike this. -God, I've faiIed again.
You haven't faiIed. God has nothing to do with it.
Do you Iike this?
Do you Iike being food for the immortaIs?
Do you Iike dying?
Stop!
"1 791 was the" y"ear it happened."
"I was 24. Younger than" y"ou are now."
But times were different then. I was a man at that age.
The master of a large plantation, just south of New Orleans.
"I had lost m"y "wife in childbirth."
Someone change my shorts.
She and the infant had been "buried less than half a" y"ear."
It's good stuff.
"I would've been happ"y "to join them."
Good stuff.
I assume I need no introduction.
I feeI better aIready.
Most of all, I longed for death.
I invited it.
A release from the pain of living.
StiII whining.
Heard enough?
I've had to Iisten to that for centuries.
Don't be afraid.
I'm going to give you the choice...
...I never had.
subtitIes conformed by SOFTITLER