And You Thought It Would Fail: Anne Rice wasn't thrilled with Tom Cruise being cast as Lestat, feeling he couldn't play the character properly and envisioned Rutger Hauer in the part. Once she saw the finished film, she changed her mind and applauded Cruise's performance.
Crosses the Line Twice: Many of Lestat's antics are darkly humorous, such as dancing around with a rotting corpse to celebrate Louis drinking human blood, while Louis is quietly having a breakdown over biting a little girl.
Heartwarming Moments: Louis finally gets to see the sunrise again, with the advent of the motion picture. There's a montage of him watching sunrises in films throughout almost the entire history of the cinema.
"This place is cursed! DAAAAAMNED!" - Brad Pitt looks like he's about to swallow the people he's yelling at, and not because of playing a vampire, which deflates the whole drama of the moment.
When Lestat launches into the air as he's biting Louis, since it looks ridiculous and is clearly accomplished by incredibly obvious wires.
Lestat dancing with Claudia's dead mother, which is clearly a dummy. "THERE'S STILL LIFE IN THE OLD LADY YET!" Though considering the context it is supposed to be ridiculous.
Much like the books, the film works despite (or perhaps because of) its melodramatic nature due to its complex characters, strong performances and Gothic atmosphere, and, as the ending scene shows, doesn't take itself too seriously.
Tom Cruise's performance as Lestat is Camp, operatic and absolutely brilliant.
Once Original, Now Common: Vampires aren't supernatural demons serving Hell, but angsty people stuck in an existential crisis. They are also gay. Revolutionary and almost sacrilegious back in 1976, somewhat quaint already by the time of the film adaptation, and a baseline mainstay ever since. The whole portay of vampires the book invented became so widespread, Feral Vampires it was deconstructing became a subversion by the turn of the millennium.
One-Scene Wonder: No one forgets the terrified prostitute whom Lestat plays with before killing her.
Questionable Casting: Anne Rice took out full page newspaper ads criticizing the choice to cast Tom Cruise as Lestat. She thought he was too short and didn't have the ability to play someone aristocratic. She had originally envisioned Rutger Hauer or Julian Sands in the part. Once she saw the film, however, she did a full 180.
The second New Orleans prostitute is played by Helen McCrory. Her entire performance is having her leg go limp as she dies, and she spends the rest of the scene as a corpse, with her face mostly obscured.
Squick: Claudia's relationship with Louis has strong romantic overtones from her end, even Armand asks Louis if she is his "lover". Though Louis insists on calling Claudia his daughter and she calls him father, her persistent use of the terms "my love" and "beloved", her fixation with adult women's naked bodies, and her and Louis' brief kiss casts an uncomfortable aura over their relationship. Additionally, Louis describes him spoiling Claudia with high society life as "yielding to her every desire". Her Age Lift from 5 in the book to 12 in the movie doesn’t do much to help (Nor the fact that she's eventually Really 700 Years Old).
Also the horribly drawn-out and torturous death of the prostitute Lestat plays with.
Louis killing Yvette, his innocent slave. The poor woman is terrified, and Louis can't stop his vampire urges.
Claudia's biting as well. Louis walks into her house, where he sees the corpse of her mother lying in the chair. Claudia calls to him to see if he can help "wake mama up".
After Lestat makes a venomous remark directed at Claudia, she sadly asks him why he tells her such things and wraps her little arms around his neck. Lestat hesitates, appears to feel genuinely regretful and places his hand on her own. Claudia might have been dissimulating, but Lestat's feelings were genuine - he still cared about her, as much as he was capable of caring for anyone.
Unintentional Uncanny Valley: There is an unwholesome, doll-like quality to the disgustingly-perfect features of our pallid, frozen-in-time protagonists, never allowing you to be completely at ease with them. Thank you, Stan Winston for making this film even scarier!
Vanilla Protagonist: Louis compared from book to film - where his internal angst works better on the page - and in the film comes across as quite dull compared to Lestat and Claudia. Brad Pitt agreed, feeling he was watered down in the adaptation. His misery during the long shoot may explain why he appears to be phoning it in.
