Queen Of The Damned, the second installment of The Vampire Chronicles:

The Synopsis from RottenTomatoes.com:

After years of slumber, the legendary vampire has awakened and found acceptance in a tattooed, pierced and black-clad world. He's a rock star. And his...he's a rock star. His awesome punk-chic sound has echoed around the globe...and stirred to life the fearsome Mother of All Vampires. Based on "The Vampire Chronicles" by Anne Rice, whose work previously came to the screen in "Interview with the Vampire."

The producers of this sequel to the smash adaptation of Anne Rice’s “Interview With The Vampire” had expected great things from this second installment of the story.

It never happened. With a scant $31.5M from the box office, it has evoked a moderate rebirth as a cult movie in the Rental and Streaming venues....kind of a “guilty passion” for Vampire Flick enthusiasts, of which I am one of more of us than would admit to it. The success of Francis Ford Coppola’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula”, “The Brothers Grimm”, and of course, the “Twilight” saga are testimony to all that.

Yet, watching the film again and recalling the year it was released, I gave it a critical look for another reason. The music, styles, and imagery, in general, were very “Goth” at a very pivotal time in the evolution of “Goth” popular culture.

Many of the Bands that participated in the music were to go on to be world recognized purveyors of the Goth, Metal, and Rock industry, and included Slipknot, Evanescence, Korn, Marilyn Manson, and others, at a time when they were lesser known. This was also the first and last movie for Aaliyah, who was just being recognized as a world-class performer in her own right.

If you re-watch this movie, view it as a pivotal influence in the popularity of “Goth” Culture around the planet. Though the styles have, indeed, diversified, the dark vision of this film and it’s music captured the imagination of a whole generation, achieving a greater reach in influence, than it’s “Swan Song” at the box office might have indicated.

There are videos here that include the original Studio Trailer, as well as some of the unique music that this screenplay spawned. Many critics saw the movie as a “stinker”, but I see it as a widely influencing “Sleeper.”

Queen Of The Damned starred:

 

 

Aaliyah
(Queen Akasha)

Stuart Townsend
(Lestat)

Vincent Perez
(Marius)

Paul McGann
(David Talbot)

Lena Olin
(Maharet)

Claudia Black
(Pandora)

Marguerite Moreau
(Jesse Reeves)

Directed By: Michael Rymer

Written By: Scott Abbott, Giulio Petroni

Movie Info Site: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0238546/

Music Videos from the Movie:

The Vampire Lestat/Korn: “Forsaken”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLfM-g8i9Aw

“Slept So Long”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCajucE048E

“System” Korn/Lestat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjQUhA0U37U

“I Hate Everything About You” Lestat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOT9yxo97po

“If I Was Your Vampire” Lestat/Marilyn Manson:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVkecoIRmO4

“Jagged” Lestat:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voubN7nyprk

‘Suck’, a Goth Metal Rock Musical Action Comedy Horror Flick. This movie is one of the later milestones in the evolution of the Vampire Myth in modern consciousness, one which is well on it’s way to being a Cult Classic.

The SUCK Story, from http://www.suckthemovie.com/, the official movie site:

This is a rock’n’roll vampire spoof about a down and out band, The Winners, who will do anything for a record deal. When their disgruntled manager (Dave Foley) tells them that they are getting “long in the tooth”, he doesn’t know that his words are truly prophetic. During a road trip, their humdrum image radically changes when Jennifer (Jessica Paré), the bass player, disappears one night with a hip vampire (Dimitri Coats). She emerges with a sexually charged charisma that drives the audiences wild.

As the band members succumb, one by one, to blood lust, their “gimmick” launches them into the limelight. Following an “incident” on a national radio show with “Rock’n Roger” (Henry Rollins), they hit mega-stardom beyond their wildest dreams. Joey (Rob Stefaniuk), the lead singer, is haunted by an eerie bartender (Alice Cooper), who turns out to be much more. Meanwhile, legendary vampire hunter, Eddie Van Helsig (Malcolm McDowell), is tracking them down, despite his fear of the dark. When a veteran music producer (Iggy Pop) calls them on becoming a vampire freak show, they begin to realize that fame is not what it’s cracked up to be.

Suck is a wild ride down a highway to hell, with a killer soundtrack that includes Iggy Pop’s, “TVeye” and “Success”; Alice Cooper’s, “I am a Spider”; Lou Reed’s Velvet Underground’s “Sweet Nuthin”; David Bowie’s, “Here Comes the Night” and The Rolling Stones, “Sympathy for the Devil”.

Haliwood Insider’s Carsten Cox had this to say:

“...Speaking of vampires, I have seen my first film of the 29th AFF. It was Suck, by Rob Stefaniuk, a Canadian rock and roll-vampire-road-movie-musical. Yes, it is all of those things. It features Stefaniuk as a guy trying to keep his band, The Winners, together, while they face the publics wild disaffection with their current tour. Bass player Jennifer (Jessica Paré) has a rough night with a nest of vamps and voila, she becomes a bloodsucker, but her sudden supernatural magnetism draws positive attention to the band and its fortunes rise as the bodies start to pile up. Director/actor/composer Stefaniuk has collected a fairly impressive roster of rock gods for supporting roles, including Henry Rollins, Alice Cooper, Iggy Pop, Alex Lifeson (who has a great moustache and a scene with Malcolm McDowell, who plays vampire hunter Eddie Van Helsing... get it?!).

I liked that the picture is rife with direct visual rock and roll references, from The Who, The Beatles and Bruce Springsteen, and movie references, including moments liberally inspired by Hard Core Logo, the greatest of all Canadian rock road movies. Also, Stefaniuk pulls the same trick Steven Soderbergh did in The Limey. Soderbergh used a clip of his star Terence Stamp from an older Stamp picture Poor Cow (1967) in a flashback scene. Here Stefaniuk cops a couple of clips from O Lucky Man (1973) for McDowell flashbacks in his film. Very cool. Suck is fun, diverting and, somehow, a very Canadian rock and roll-vampire-road-movie-musical: It's quite polite.”

As far as entertainment, this movie is a wild fun ride, a worthy descendant in the long family tree of Vampire Films from the silent era’s “Nosferatu”, Bela Lugosi’s subtly “sexy” adaptation of the deadly count, through Christopher Lee’s campy Hammer Films incarnation to now.

The cameos by Iggy Pop, Malcolm McDowell, and Alice Cooper as well as music by some of the legends of rock make it a campy, yet memorable tour de force. Standing out, however is the music of “Burning Brides” from where Dimitri Coats hails from, as well as songs produced and performed by “The Winners”, themselves. The videos below feature the trailer, as well as “stand out” songs (my opinion, of course...” from the cinematic sound track.

Pardon the expression, but it seems that Vampires are “in our blood”, a pun with more truth than humor, as well as a cultural phenomenon spanning millenia. The influence on pop culture remains obvious and compelling.

There’s no doubt more to come in the telling of this story, so stay tuned.

The Official Movie Site: http://www.suckthemovie.com/

The ‘Suck’ Trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOHghfrww8I

Burning Brides: “Flesh & Blood”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNJ9N_KvT0A

HD Burning Brides Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqV7FTetNQc&hd=1

The Winners “So Close It Hurts”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38zLBln88FE

The Winners “I’m Coming To Get You”:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whCa90tvFEc