#hyobe rambles and reviews

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Queen of the Damned

I just rewatched this movie because I was moving and found it in my boxes and I am honestly disappointed by it. I'll explain why.

Queen of the damned is a tale about the vampire Lestat (I know how it's name, I'm just cutting through the bullshit because you won't see the queen that much). It's an adaptation of the book Lestat by Anne Rice. Lestat wakes up after centuries of sleep, intrigued by the sound a local band produces in an abandonnes house. He goes to them and promises them fame and success if they accept him in their band. They do and it's how the movie/book starts. I'll explain in clear points what was negative and positive. We'll start with negative.

The baiting :

This is the jacket, what I see is Akasha (played by Aaliyah) on front with behind her Lestat (Stuart Townsend). So, you would assume by this presentation that Akasha would have an important screentime right ? SIKES, you were wrong ! She is first introduced at 30:11 in the movie (as a fucking statue, a very pretty one though), and she disappears until 49:25 in, where we get to see more of her character. So yeah, if I come for a powerful black lead, I'd like to see them for more than half the movie. Thanks.

The symbolism

We start strong with a black vampire royalty (I was so fucking happy like I remember jumping up and down as a kid), but Akasha kills Enkil. I mean if she wants to reign alone and have all the power she desires, good, perfect even. She don't need no man ! But then, she gets this infatuation about Lestat because what... He shows himself as he truly is to mortals ? I guess it's enough to be friends but give him the title of king ? Try again.

He doesn't have what it takes to be king but I liked this couple because they could have had something. Turns out no. He just betrays him for the love interest who is a whole other negative point to herself. Which leaves him to rule the vampire world with his girl, who happens to be white. Yeah... See what it did there ? Black excellence replaced by white mediocrity. Again.

(Okay maybe I'm reading too much into this, racism is not everywhere but you have to admit that it's... meeeeh.)

Jesse

I know it was a popular trope to have some common girl discover her love into powerful supernatural beings (Bella in twilight, Luce in the Damned series are examples between SO many other) but I swear, why couldn't they make them... I don't know, less common ? And I know it was intentional when I see the panel of characters that we had : The band (they have really diverse styles in them and I think they are inspired by Kurt Cobain, Jolyne in JJBA, Yasu in Nana, etc...), Enki and Akasha, Marius and the international vampires, Lestat, most of the people seen in every big location (The concert, the club, etc...). Add to this that the costumers are very talented so yeah.

And I know that in every movies we need a character that teenage girls in heat need to identify to for mercy purposes, etc... but for fuck sakes she is just irritating. Jesse is a cocktail of bad decisions, trying too hard and please-take-me-oh-weird-stranger. Her whole plot line is boring to me. Like wow, your aunt was a vampire, you study supernatural, good for you dude. But she is better than Bella though.

The vampires

Why so little vampire ? Why so cliché ? Why are they afraid of Lestat and not Akasha ? Why is it so easy to kill them ? Is there a hierarchy other than royalty and the rest I wasn't informed of ?

They focused too much on the romantic aspects and that leaves less time to focus on universe elements (yeah, that's in writing 101, organise what you write so you can explain). They focused so much on it I'm surprised they didn't do a Suicide Squad introduction of characters (just kidding, it's just me being bitter).

Akasha

She's my boo. She's beauty, she's grace, she'll bite you in the face but the demeanour oh dear lord. Did the producers really had to make her belly dance everytime she moved ? And out auto tune on her voice ? No. It's kind of distracting actually but it has it's charm. She's extra.

(By the way, I know damn well that Suicide Squad got REALLY FUCKING INSPIRED BY THIS BECAUSE WHEN YOU SEE THEIR GODDAMN ENCHANTRESS IT'S A WHITE AND MEDIOCRE VERSION OF AKASHA SO FUCK OFF AND GO BACK INTO YOUR LANE WE DON'T WANT YOU HERE. AND CARA DELEVIGNE CAN'T ACT FOR SHIT SO YOU CAN'T EVEN PASS IT OFF AS AN HOMMAGE NOW.)

And I don't think writing her to be this over-confident personality who is so confident in herself she cannot fathom that someone would betray her until it becomes almost naive was a good idea. I think Akasha would actually be more vigilante and careful about who she thrusts and who she includes in her inner circles, that would make her an even more interesting villain since she wouldn't be blinded by her confidence. (I haven't finished Anne Rice's book yet but I don't think she would write Akasha like that either, it's just seemed like an easy out for me). Maybe making her triumph over all of the other vampires and actually seek some sort of punishment for Lestat could have been interesting. I mean, if you replaced the pseudo-build up of Lestat and Jesse's Romane, you could use this time to actually develop something like that. An interesting point.

Anyway, on to the positive points now.

Akasha

I know, I know she was in the negative points but she's what made this movie really interesting for me. I loved her the second she appeared on screen. She has good lines, is well played, somewhat funny and she knows what she wants. She is determined and you don't want to see her defeated in the end.

The soundtracks

Amazing, it's what introduced me to rock and metal music. When you see the whole line up for a movie like this I have to applause. Honestly, you can go and watch the movie only for the soundtracks, they convey the atmosphere in such way you can't mistake in what kind of movie you are. 10/10.

The costumes

They are diverse, very pretty and do their jobs of underlining what is important about the characters (wealth and power for Akasha, originality for the band, Bdsm and darkness for the vampires, plain for Jesse).

Marius

He is the comic relief but on contrary of many other you can't just say he's here only for the laughs and you could take him out it wouldn't change a thing because it'd be false. He is a father figure for Lestat, his conscience in some way. Plus I like the game he plays with David.

The cinematography

Maybe it's just me but I real love it when movies have this darkness about them. With dark colours and tones. Well I'm a big fan of 1995-2010 horror movies. You know what I am talking about, the Friday 13th or Nightmare on Elm Street, House of wax kind of atmosphere.

The decors

Just the bath scene is enough for me (bath, sex, roses, Aaliyah and Deftones ? I'm in) but I can't say I don't adore he rest of them. The crypt, The beach, Death Valley, where Lestat found the band, everything. This movie is magnificent when it comes to details.

So yeah. It's my humble opinion on the matter. It really is a good movie even though I stated it's negative points. Queen of the damned is worth watching and rewatching. Go ahead, be a pig, grab popcorn, your favourite underwear and enjoy.