A Night for Blood

I was in the mood for vampires last night so I watched an episode of Angel, "That Old Gang of Mine". I wasn't satisfied so I also watched Carl Dreyer's 1932 film Vampyr again.

I guess "That Old Gang of Mine" isn't much about vampires, really. According to the Wikipedia article, writer Tim Minear considers it his weakest script. I would say it's an instance of a Buffy show leaning on one of the more weakly established pillars of its worldbuilding. The drama is about Gunn's new conflict with his old gang who are indiscriminately killing demons, whether they're the kind who eat babies or who generally just chill out in the sewer drinking Big Gulps. I always hate it when some fictional species are made just basically human so they can be used as a metaphor for bigotry or civil rights. Disney is currently making the same mistake with droids in the Star Wars franchise. It's the kind of thing that makes you think these people don't understand why demons and droids are so cool.

Anyway, Vampyr's always a dreamy delight. You have to ease yourself into a Carl Dreyer film, let the atmosphere, created largely by pacing, soak into your bloodstream. I love how the protagonists of Vampyr almost seem like living dolls. Rena Mandel as Gisele calling out her sister's name, standing in a stiff dress, wide-eyed with a plaintive voice, is almost like a lamb alone on a hill bleating for its mother.

Sybille Schmitz, as her sister, Leone, tends to be the one in the posters. It's unsurprising given how effectively maniacal she looks.

Vampyr is available on The Criterion Channel and Angel is available on Disney+ or Hulu, depending on your country.

Vampires Turn Up

I'm still watching Angel and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, now into season two of one and five of the other. The two shows deepen their fantasy cost of living in California--On Buffy, Xander is easily able to get a huge, beautiful apartment using himself as a reference in "The Replacement" while Angel just appropriates a 68 room hotel on Angel in "Are You Now or Have You Ever Been".

Just two episodes earlier, Angel had expressed concern for Gunn's current living situation and Gunn had told him a property owner was allowing his crew to stay there in exchange for keeping the area safe from vampires. Meanwhile, a whole hotel with working utilities just falls into Angel's hands. I know there's a small arc about Wolfram and Hart buying the building under Angel's nose but that elaborate bit of lampshading kind of highlighted the issue more than alleviated it.

I might take a cheap shot at the show's internal logic but, the truth is, that hotel is a big part of why I love Angel. It is a fantasy, but that's not a bad thing. I'd love to live in my own hotel. Few people not named Howard Hughes ever know that luxury. But I think this hotel ties into my love of stories about groups of people trapped in large haunted houses. Which reminds me, of the three boxes of my old books my grandmother sent me before she died, I found my copy of House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski that Caitlin gave me. Maybe I should read it again.

Currently I'm rereading Interview with the Vampire, though. The old paperback I bought in high school, the first copy of the book I ever read, was also in one of those boxes. It's funny, I bought a nicer hardback copy a few years ago but I think I ended up selling it. I find myself marvelling at what things manage to stick around in my life.

I started reading Interview with the Vampire again after my grandmother died because I think it's one of the great books about death. Unlike the rest of Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles, something about Interview really captures a consciousness of death. A few days ago, I was watching Carl Dreyer's Vampyr on The Criterion Channel and it was only then it struck me how, between that, Angel, and Interview with the Vampire, I seem to be circling a lot of vampire fiction lately. I really don't know why. I sought out Vampyr because I wanted something soothing.

I talked to one of the students in art club a couple weeks ago about a manga she's reading called Vampire and Rose, a series about which I can find little information on the internet--a google search turns up a couple different series with a similar title but only a few images of the one my student was reading. I wonder if it's any good.

Twitter Sonnet #1465

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