The night she’s turned, Louis tries to get Madeleine to share a coffin with him (not out of love it seems, but just that the sun is rising and he doesn’t want her to wreck herself), but we don’t know if he’s successful with that, the scene ends without it being confirmed.
After that, I don’t think Louis mentions the sleeping arrangements, but doubt Madeleine would sleep alone at that point. So either with Claudia or Louis, but I headcanon that the night of Madeleine’s turning was the end of Louis sharing his coffin with Claudia ;A;
♛I love decorating my body with jewelry and clothing, why not tattoos? The artistry with some of them has become quite stunning. Especially the ‘watercolor’ methods. Abstract or specific, body art is very much art. I like biting directly into it on my victims, too. These neck tattoos… *licks lips*
A little story for you… I discovered sometime in the 90’s that we can be tattooed, but that the tattoo will fade away entirely during the deathsleep. Daniel may have been involved. Of course we decided that I absolutely had to get a large tattoo across my chest that read, “Property of Louis”in huge black calligraphic lettering, just to see Louis’ reaction. When I spread open my shirt to reveal the work of art, every drop of blood drained from his face!
He was frozen in that special moment before the judgment begins. It was a sight to behold. Instead of lay in with the judgment as usual, he actually shifted into damage control, terrified it would last forever, and immediately started looking into laser-removal treatments! He fell asleep at the computer that morning and had to be carried safely to bed.
How relieved was he when my branding had disappeared by the following night? After some heavy physical punishment to my person, he treated me very well for the entire night. How so? Read between the lines, mes petits.
♛It’s no inconvenience, Louis and I have both experienced our share of bad parenting, and done some of it ourselves, so we’re glad to reach out and help when we can.
We read your message many times and can’t quite unravel what the issue is, but the fact that you have a mother who you feel is fabulous (and I assume you mean in her personality, more than just the contents of her closet *winks), and some friends for support, that’s a good start.
Some people really shouldn’t be parents, others are wonderful at it… it took Louis and I plenty of trial and error to figure it out ourselves. It sounds like your parents may not be working together on it themselves.
As badly as my father treated me, I took him in when the roles were reversed. He needed care, and only then, with his defenses down, were we able to have some of the communication I never got to have with him as a child. Perhaps he didn’t like children, didn’t see them as people, but as animals that needed taming. Louis’ mother seemed perpetually disappointed in Louis, no matter how hard he tried to please her. Perhaps she was disappointed with her lot in life and scapegoated her misery onto him.
It may be that your father doesn’t deserve to be part of your life. It may be that you still have something to resolve with him, like I did with my father. Follow your instincts, and seek advice from your mother. She knew him before you were born, she may have the guidance you seek.
It’s a sad truth that your father will be dead, and there will come a time when you won’t have the chance to try to communicate with him ever again. If it’s too painful to be alone with him, have it be in a setting with others involved, or at least nearby.
Ummm, I’ve never heard of Enneagram of personality before! I went on Wiki for answers, and I’m still not really clear on it… but anyone is welcome to comment/reblog this post with their ideas re: the character’s alignment on it.
^Gluttony (in the Enthusiast category) would definitely be a vice for Lestat, tho.
I feel like ppl who see Louis as predominantly Melancholy (and ”Fantasizing”, on the chart), well… he is melancholy at the beginning of IWTV, and he’s always been more of an introvert than Lestat, but his revenge on the TdV, and then his rather icy breakup w/ Armand,
…and as canon progressed, I guess I see his strength and dignity such that I don’t see him as all that melancholy anymore. If anything, I see him as more of a Peacemaker, bc that is what he did for 65 years in NOLA. He wanted peace of mind so badly. And I think, over time, he found it in pursuing intrinsic goals and not looking to anyone else to validate his existence.
such delish *u* altho Lestat was pretty much comatose… and it did end in Armand getting…
Ohh yes I do hope for more A/L stuff in PL since that last we saw if them two together was heartbreakingly sweet and tbh I wanna see more of how their relationship has built. You know i was talking with monsieur-le-rockstar
over the phone a week ago about how Armand, having never been properly taught by Marius or the Children of Darkness how to approach the scene in Palais Royale, really had no clue Lestat would reject his gesture of ‘vampire romance’ —for lack of a better word. That and Lestat himself had NO clue how that kind of thing happened because he still was confused about how to vampire and like—that whole scene would have gone entirely different I think if they had communicated more (also if Armand stopped with that glamouring). But ye…I could ramble about the palais royale scene bc it is just—another part of tvl that really set up and defined Lestat and Armand’s relationship….)
ABSOLUTELY AGREED. The first time I read that scene I was all “Ooooh Armand you lil monster! Beating earned.” But yeah, after all the subsequent VC information, I see that scene very differently now, more like: “Lestat you dumbass, he wasn’t attacking, that was leurve/making-out vampire style omg”
Well it may have been some of both but still.
I came across this old thread digging for smtg else, and there’s a good point here. Armand had some mixed feelings about fledgling!Lestat, both wanting to crush him into submission, but also, he might have been attracted to him.
@faceofabotticelliangel makes a good suggestion that Armand might have been trying to seduce Lestat in the vampiry way, which he hadn’t really been taught, and Lestat was a fresh vampire and didn’t know that’s what it was, so of course, when Lestat rejected him, of course Armand’s going to react badly:
And as he struggled, as he sought to resurrect himself with a burst of force, he shot his declaration at me that he would kill me because he had my strength now. He’d drunk it out of me and coupled with his own strength it would make him impossible to defeat.
^I don’t know whether Armand really believed what he was saying but it must have really hurt to be rejected. Whether or not Armand really was trying to seduce, @faceofabotticelliangel makes a good point, “that whole scene would have gone entirely different I think if they had communicated more (also if Armand stopped with that glamouring)… another part of tvl that really set up and defined Lestat and Armand’s relationship….)”
♛”Ma petite!” *pets anon* “You know, I wish I could fight off every one of the bullies out there, but there are just too damn many of them and only one of me. There’s also the scheduling issue; my days are sacrosanct.”
//ooc; my Lestat is very out of touch with these issues, and he tried to continue with this answer, but it kept coming off as insensitive or flippant, so I decided not to let him finish.
He’s more often insensitive and cruel, even when he’s trying to be good.
He
intentionally AND unintentionally bullies Louis,
the person he loves most in the whole world, through his first and very difficult years as a vampire, and Lestat continues to bully him, even now. Lestat bullies a lot of other characters. My Lestat has a somewhat short fuse and really not enough patience for anything that’s delicate, he’s not very good at thinking before he acts/speaks, especially to people who deserve more consideration. Introspection is more for when he’s talking about himself or someone he knows very well, and even then, he has a lot of trouble truly understanding other people outside of what he wants them to be.
So I’m going to answer for him. TL;DR: Lestat’s general motto would probably be:F*ck the haters.
Ignorance and pity well… Sometimes people make these statements without meaning to hurt you. I’ve mistakenly made ignorant or pitying statements about people and I’m glad when someone corrects me. Some of your antagonists may not be trying to make you feel insecure.
HOWEVER, some of them really are trolls/bullies/whatever and they DO want to belittle you to make themselves feel bigger. The thing with bullies is that they will bully anyone for any reason. If not for your physical appearance or capabilities, then for your name or where you live, there are endless things for them to criticize, you’ll never scrub yourself free of something to be commented on. Even Mother Theresa had haters!
While we can’t change others opinions of us, as much as we’d like to, we can decide how we react to it. Basically: Don’t.
You wrote, “people that have been making me feel insecure recently…” No. NO. Stop. Don’t let them. Don’t give them permission to make you feel anything. Comments about you that seem pitying or ignorant? To adapt a quote Lestat from TOBT: They are like many silk banners unfurled around you. That weak. (He was referring to smtg else but still it’s applicable here)
Lestat has a partner and it doesn’t stop the bullies from attacking them separately or together, I think it makes them more of a target when they purposely go out hunting for homophobes. One of the benefits of having a partner is that Lestat can just wrap his arm around Louis a little tighter and they pick up the pace and go where they can enjoy each other together without any bullies trying to interfere *winks*
Let’s be real here, AR probably forgot how she had described it or hadn’t decided on how it should be, bc IIRC it’s only those two instances in all of canon that it’s described as straight, and those were in books 1 and 3, while she might still have been developing him as a character.
IIRC, Armand’s hair is described as curly when he was mortal and when he was a fledgling, so I think that’s the natural state of it. I don’t recall him ever mentioning straightening it, but when it’s mentioned in IWTV, it’s the 1970′s, and in QOTD, it’s the 1980′s, so he had access to straightening products if he felt like straightening his hair.
^X@amadeo-child-of-the-renaissance found this, another Botticelli angel Armand 😉 AR bases Armand off these Botticelli angels and they have varying straight and curly hair.
I watched it on VHS** for the first time, now I have it on DVD, but I don’t have any other formats. The real crime is that I’ve never seen it in a theatre ;A; I was under 17 when it came out!
Lestat has mixed feelings about watching IWTV, bc he enjoys a lot of it, and he loves to tease Louis about the rats and the poodles, it is visually appealing, the kills are pretty accurate and he does love to revisit his seduction of Louis and the times when they were happy <3. But he also feels like the movie overall paints him in an excessively negative light. There are also many scenes that are painful for him (and Louis) to watch, like, y’know, Louis defensively setting Lestat on fire… and when Louis finds Claudia’s ashes. They’ve been through so much ;A;
I would think it would be hard to watch a movie of a time period in my own life, with other people playing me and my family, loved ones, and the people who antagonized me (intentionally or not). To have some enormously famous actor playing me would be flattering but that I’m portrayed as the antagonist in my lover’s life? That would probably hurt. I DO antagonize ppl and ppl antagonize me. We’re all the protagonists in our own stories, and none of us are perfect cinnamon rolls – except Mojo – we’re all works in progress, and I think Lestat watches IWTV with that in mind. He’s grown a lot since then, through a lot of effort and a lot more obstacle-conquering, he’s proven that he has a place in this world, even if he’s mostly serving as a cautionary tale (basically: ”Don’t do this thing that I did!”)
Asterisked stuff and my own movie!IWTV-watching preferences
under the cut, cut for length.
Re: Which do you prefer? I haven’t bought the Blu-ray bc I don’t have a Blu-ray player; I have a small DVD collection but I didn’t want to have to rebuy them all. I agree, the picture quality is in fact better in the Blu-ray,* bc I’ve seen it, so I should probably bite the bullet and get the Blu-ray *pouts* For now, I’m okay w/ missing out on a few of the actor’s eyelashes and skin pores, lol.
I have to listen to music in order to be productive, and I hum or sing along with it. I love listening to the TV or movies when I’m working on my memes or other artistic things, I make jewelry as a hobby, too. But I can’t listen to TV/movies when doing video edits, bc then the audio clashes. Knowing so many of the lines in IWTV, it’s a good one to listen to and say the lines along with it. My voice sounds like a 12 year old’s, I should dub myself in for some of Lestat’s lines and post vids, you’ll think it’s Claudia making fun of him, pfffft.
So yes, I’ll listen to IWTV sometimes for background noise, but when I want to actually watch it on its own or w/ ppl, the DVD is fine, or the Blu-ray, if I’m visiting someone and they have that format at their place.
**There’s something nostalgic for me about the VHS tape format, which I don’t have anymore. It was a big hunk of plastic w/ a thick protective plastic box in my little tween hands when I was 11, and it seemed more substantial, more worthy of carrying a whole tragic & beautiful movie than these fragile little circles in their skinny little cases that we have now. My copy was well-used, and I took good care of it, I never noticed a decrease in the picture quality even after countless replays even tho I’ve heard ppl say that VHS tapes would get worn.
*Re: Picture quality: At first glance, on a laptop or smaller device screen (and at this teensy size like ugh) these two shots of Louis look identical (it’s not exactly the same frame but it’s as close as I could get w/o going crazay):
But when you see it on a bigger screen, there’s more resolution on the
A little breakdown of this scene, re: why I loved Tom’s Lestat so much in this scene, since we’re talking about it.
^Claudia leads him in, and he’s so trusting. When he sees the boys there, he is not immediately very pleased. He actually looks a little disappointed. The house rule is not to bring victims into the house, and she brought them in, is he going to have to lay down the law again? Bad timing for it, since he’s trying to make peace with her.
She glances up at him to gauge his reaction but looks away before he can meet her gaze. She’s thrilled with what she’s about to do and doesn’t want him derailing her from her mission.
^I use this gif a lot for “such feels,” but there’s really more going on here, and not necessarily happiness. She’s told him that the boys are the gift to him. He starts w/ a facepalm, bc, hey, Lestat would actually rather not kill children.* He tries to go for adult evildoers. It’s clearer in TVL than in movie!IWTV, but he does tell Louis in an earlier scene, “Evildoers are easier, and they taste better.”**
Lestat is also very guarded in his body language here, all closed off w/ his arms across his chest (we don’t usually see him this closed off in the movie). When he shows his face, he’s not smiling at first, bc, this wasn’t really the kind of truce he would have wanted. But then he rallies, shakes his head a little bit, and tries to smile, probably tells himself inwardly, “She did this for me, she has good intentions…”
^”Well, you certainly have… outdone yourself,” he says. He’s struggling to compliment her, that hesitation could have led to a criticism. Trying to convince himself that this is a peace offering and to reign in his usual edgy sense of humor. The main rule in their home was always “Never [kill] in the house” and she wants him to share this kill. In. The. House. A rule she’s broken countless times. He’s still guarded, still has his arms up protectively.
The smile fails as he looks over the boys like he’s looking at something unappetizing at a buffet. For me, that would be the wilted salad area.
^There’s a full second pause as he looks at her bc he’s still struggling to believe it was all this easy. Then he asks: “We forgive each other, then?” This is Lestat without any of his bravado, no games, not asking as her maker, just as someone who loves her and wants her love, too. This is the Lestat who spent most of his childhood unloved or beaten down for trying to find a place where ppl would love him ;A;
^There’s almost a full second pause as she looks at him – bc she doesn’t really forgive him – and then says: “Yes” She’s lying right to his face, so evil! If you cover her mouth, her eyebrows don’t change at all with that smile. But there is still a chance to abandon her plan if she wants to.
^Having secured the peace, putting his trust in her about this gift being OK to consume, he has this little sigh of relief; his usual confidence comes back in, you can see a hint of a smile as he turns away.
(This victim is one of the moments in the film that really pushed the envelope for its time, when Lestat bites into the child. It’s actually a lot less homoerotic/pedophilic than in the book, where he gets his hands wrapped up in the kid’s shirt. Unlike when he bites adults and we see his face, here, we see him from behind. It makes it less sexual, he didn’t choose this victim, it’s seems like it’s more about the consumption.)
^Anyway… he thinks she spiked their blood with absinthe bc he immediately feels drugged/drunk from it.
She tells him it’s laudanum, and he repeats that word, has he heard of it before? Probably not, bc she tells him what it does.
So right up until the moment she explicitly lays it out for him, he still believes they’ve reconciled, and even that she flavored the blood for him as an extra consideration! It’s a very painful betrayal, specifically bc he wanted to believe her SO BADLY that he ignored all the red flags ;A;
You could say he deserved this betrayal, but I think this scene is part of what makes Tom’s Lestat so very good. Even as he’s led into getting his punishment, you still feel sorry for him, it’s hard to hate a monster when he’s being this trusting and gentle and really wanting to well… not be a monster.
I recognize that this is a social media site so you are welcome to reblog and comment and engage on this, but please do so respectfully, and keep in mind that #your headcanon may vary, and we are all entitled to our own interpretations/opinions about canon, and about movie!IWTV.
(Asterisked notes under the cut.)
* It’s implied that Lestat and Claudia finished off whole families together in an earlier scene in the film, including children, but we’ve only seen him kill adults on screen up to this point. In the book, it’s Claudia who insists on killing families (her own, IIRC), and she kills a mother and daughter who worked domestically in the flat for Louis and Lestat. Lestat rarely kills children in the books, typically it’s only in moments of extreme emotional weakness.Tom would have known this, bc he read books 1-4.
**
“Evildoers are easier, and they taste better.” – This is what Lestat tells Louis to try to get him to acclimate to the idea that killing is okay, and in fact, some ppl need to be killed anyway, to protect the general population (like Lestat killing the wolves to save the villagers back in the Auvergne). But in the books it’s implied that innocent blood tastes better, which makes it harder to resist. “…these victims had been taken in the perfect semblance of love. The very blood seemed warmer with their innocence, richer with their goodness.” (TVL)
I might do more of these if you’re interested, but they do take a long time to put together. We’ll see…
B-but… I mean… Didn’t nicki and Gabrielle love him? At least when they were mortals???
Lestat wanted the kind of love he had gotten from Nicki and Gabrielle, yes! He was starved for affection from those he loved, and I think that led to a lot of the frustration he had in the IWTV-era in the book and the movie.
Amy Nicholson is referring to movie!IWTV only. No one who Lestat loved had really done anything nice for him before that point in the film ;A;
^Even here, you can see that Lestat is really apologetic for taunting Claudia just moments before; he really wants peace in their home, he really wants her love. This is one of the few times in the film we see anyone he loves touch or embrace him.
I-want-my-IWTV 