The Magicians

The Magicians was discussed in class as being a kind of college students Harry Potter. And it could be classified as such; it certainly has all the appeal of an escapist novel. Very well written and fast paced the characters are realistic and relatable, which is what makes the read so enthralling. Quentin reacts to be suddenly disturbed out of his normal life into the fantastical one just as we would. He doesn’t step into Narnia, so to speak, have a series of adventures and be all smiles. He gets angry that no one is explaining anything right away, just as anybody would. And we, as readers, feel that frustration along with him. Quentin himself is a guy we all know. My favorite line pretty much sums him up stating that “the Fillory books were both a consolation for Julia not loving him and also probably a major reason why she didn’t”, (page 6).  This book takes the genres of urban fantasy and pairs it with that of spiritual education.  While I am still reading this novel I am finding it truly engrossing and a nice break from finals week when I need it. 

The Picture of Dorian Gray

I adore Oscar Wilde so of course I had to read his novel. I love this story. I truly enjoyed that the monster is simply man and his hubris. Dorian represents the epitome of excess with absolutely zero ramifications on his physical person. His “mentor” Harry attempts to live the same life style, in fact he leads Dorian into it. Harry also tends to have the best lines of the novel such as, "There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence is immoral--immoral from the scientific point of view," and “The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it,”(chapter 2). Yet Harry pays the price for his behavior, old age. Harry is also much more talk then action.  Dorian will never experience this tiring that comes with old age. Therefore Dorian never fully learns this lesson. The language is fluid and flamboyant at times to reflect Dorian’s vain view of the world.  After reading this novel I stumbled across the recent adaptation of it made in 2009 simply titled Dorian Gray starring Ben Barnes and Colin Firth. I loved this movie. I had high expectations visually because the book explains each scene so well and gives the reader a real emotional reaction in each description. But from the opening credits you get the overwhelming eeriness of he story.  Of course the movie takes some liberties and doesn’t always show events in order but with the help of lighting and music they are able to show Dorian’s transition from an innocent young boy to a monstrosity of a man.  I can’t help but see the parallels to Frankenstein here, particularly in the film.  While Harry doesn’t create, that’s Basil’s job for which he pays for, the painting he helps to shape the man.  Then of course it is Harry who must put a stop to him as well.  In the book however, Dorian is his own downfall. His paranoia, regret, and emptiness lead him into a desire to destroy any evidence of his ugliness. That includes the painting. This story does make you wonder whom you are influencing and how. 

Tan- Tan and the Rolling Calf By Nalo Hopkins

            The use of language is hugely important in this short story and sets the tone and imagery for the short story. Ones the dialect and use of grammar was established I couldn’t help but imagine a world that appears like a twist on the Deep South.  The place where Tan- Tan hides out in, the bush, even sounds southern mixed with Australian landscape. Also the use of the bandit and robber gives a western feel. It is just with the monster (the rolling calf) and the statement about coming into this world “Then he grab his little girl and flee through plenty dimension veil” it doesn’t seem like an unattainable idea of a place.  The background of the main character is also a very human one with a young strong woman rebelling against her murdering rapist father and having the stepmother not really want to comprehend.  I really enjoyed the dialogue here particularly the monologue that Tan- Tan gives. This allows the reader to feel her strength and then also have insight into her thoughts and how she is struggling to live up to her legend wile also being pregnant which profoundly demonstrates her humanity. And it is hard to be larger than life when she is dealing with such a set back physically. Overall a very fluid read that demonstrated a powerful female protagonist. 

Bloodchild by Octavia E. Butler

Bloodchild is narrated by the host of the soon to be young of the Tlic that adopted his family. Gan’s insight shows the suspense and horror of the story. The plot is a mix between a story of childbirth and the film Alien. This story literally gives you the creeps from the very beginning. When it fist describes the many limbs of T’Gatoi and the way she moves, her size and how she keeps members of the family close for warmth was a tad unnerving. Her sterile eggs are used to keep her humans healthy and high when they first consume them. The power exchange between Gan and T’Gatoi is seen in their conversation towards the end of the story before the egg-laying act is consummated. There is a definite blending of what defines the sexes here with indistinguishable differences between the male and female in characters behavior. Gans father actually “birthed” T’Gatoi and now Gan would “mother” her young.  The dialogue in this story keeps you invested in the characters and their decisions. The story is also very fast passed and keeps the tension until the very end. It’s a story at its core about family and what a person is willing to do for them.

Snow Crash

Snow Crash was my first experience reading anything in the cyberpunk genre and it exemplified the style and definition of the genre itself. You have technology being for the elite. This is shown in the metaverse. You have the different styles of avatar for different types of people. You have to be wealthy or smart (good at hacking) to have a good avatar. The novel even mentions the bargain store types of avatars you are able to have.  The way you get to the metaverse is through your  private “home” or if you can't afford it or don't have the skill there are public domain type of entries into it. This again shows a class distinction. This class distinction though does not translate into the real world. Hiro Protagonist (love the name) is living in an old U-Store-It in the real world and has his own mansion in the metaverse. It is no wonder that people take more worth out of the metaverse and spend more time there in this type of future. I did enjoy the humoristic elements in the novel. Such as the idea that one of the things American still does best in the world is delivering pizza. Also I noticed hat often these genres we are studying take an idea to its extreme. This is shown with the freedom in America being taken to its height.  I really enjoyed the double narrative from Y.T and Hiro, I thought that allowed for a nice difference in view points and it kept the story fresh. It is definitely a high velocity plot. There are a lot of anime elements to the style of cyber punk and this is reiterated with out protagonist in not only his heritage but also his use of weapons and in the fight scenes of the novel. Over all I am really enjoying reading Neal Stephenson’s work.

Cyber Punk

·      1980s

·      Definition:  technology is elite, everyone controlled by technology, post human, sub realities, virtual realm/ internet

·      William Gibson- “noir prophet” of the cyberpunk- cyber cowboys and adventure elements- data becomes more important than anything

·      Post Human- humanist construction of the world changes into the human just being a part of the system// a movement away from humanist preoccupation

·       Post human vs. fundamentalism (idea that there is an absolute and a truth as we know it)

·      Cyber punk as a style

o   Hackers

o   Dystopian view

o   Corporations rule

o   Money

o   Retro

o   Film noir

o   Cyber punk heroine – influenced by 70’s feminism- “ still has babe powers”

·      Donna Haraway- Cyborg Manifesto 

Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

Cat's Cradle is a dark comedy at it's very core with Sci-Fi themes layering over it. This novel deals with science and religion in an end of the world scenario. There is extreme foreshadowing through out the novel so the reader already knows that doom approaches. Yet the fresh wit of the narrative keep the story lively.  There are riddles and interweaving story lines that connect the dots of destruction, as it were, so that we clearly see how the narrator reached his fate. The rapture is a growing popular theme in science fiction and connects to the religious elements of the novel. Martyrdom as well reinforces this theme. It is very well written and a captivating read. It also presents the idea of accepting the end of the world and in what way different people handle it. It presents a dark reality with the concept of Ice 9 and the possibility of man's self districting nature. Great read but be warned, do something happy after you read it.

Narratives from the Multiverse

Notes

·      Interested in the development of humans

·      Dune film directed by David Lynch

·      Odd tone to the movie- melodramatic

·      Bedouin references

·      Genetic “death clocks” biochemical clocks

·      Life extension qualities and what it takes

·      60s and 70s Sci-Fi deals with life extension and mind expansion

·      Fiction of ideas vs. fiction of technology

·      Paranoia

·      Women Writing Space Opera

·      C.L. Moore- original space opera writers //30s and 40s// focuses more on the internal lives of her characters, psychology, intuition, emotion

·      Esp is very big for fantasy heroines

·      Leigh Brackett- The Big Sleep

·      Lois McMaster Bujold- Aral Vorkosigan and Cordelia Maismith- family sagas

·      Catherine Asaro- combines the romance novel with the conventions of science fiction- heavy science

Aye and Gomorrah by Samuel Delaney

This short story does a wonderful job at captivating its audience right away. It is shown through a very interesting viewpoint, that of a spacer.  “He” is a spacer, a genitally mutilated astronaut of sorts. I like that this story didn’t out right explain anything to the reader. It just starts off and through the events the narrator goes through we are able to understand the world he lives in, to an extent. I was thoroughly surprised at the subject matter in the work but that is also why it was so fascinating.  The characters, no matter how briefly they are mentioned, all seem unique and interesting. The interaction between the girl” Frelk”, in Istanbul is a very interesting interaction because it really allows us to see how our narrator thinks and understand a little more about him.  This is definitely a look at the development of humans both mentally and sexually. Body modification is a casual subject matter here as well as our protagonist seems at peace with his becoming essentially an androgynous a-sexual character. The issue of population control also arises for a moment in the story to help justify what has happened to parts of society.  By the end of it nothing is resolved but it definitely gives the reader something to think about.

Fantasy

Kiki’s Delivery Service

·      Matriarchal society

·      Initiation

·      Female mentor

·      Beta men

·      Maternal figures

·      Nurturing, the setting being a bakery

·      The city isn’t terribly welcoming or receptive

·      The roots of female power are rural

Position of Women in Fantasy

·      Archetypal story telling

Illustrated Horror- women in horror vs. women in fantasy

·      Frankenstein- damsel in distress

·      Posing language and the general composition- vulnerable, wearing white- innocent thing

·      Same posed used- paperback book of the 50s- lurid covers

·      Bride of Frankenstein- interesting concept- kind of occurs in the book

·      “ Always with the neck”

·      Idea of Dracula as a seducer

·      Seduction- all about the denial of female sexual experience

·      Against contraception – they will be out of control

·      Dracula’s Daughter- female desire out of control in the other way- fem fatale

·      Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde- all men are two faced- the civilized and the real guy underneath (The Wolf Man)

·      The Mummy- all about male obsession for the female

·      Invisible Man- stalker

·      Edgar Allan Poe- Mystery an Imagination- abstract art

·      Cat People

·      Victim or fem fatale- not a lot of room for safe sex so to speak

·      Cultural clutter over the top of the genre

·      Women spend their lives rediscovering sex

·      Women being anxious

·      Women waiting to be victimized/ frequently tied up or just laying their (fainted)

·      Overt sexuality- “ bondage liberates you”

·      Weird tales

·      Woman who runs with wolves

·      Sex and violence

·      Misogyny – horror in general is a very misogynist genre

What does fantasy do?

·      Women up the pedestal that they aren’t real

·      Virgin Mary quality

·      How dare they have their own set of sexual desires and real lives

·      Attempt in contemporary fantasy to make it more real

·      Still dealing with misogyny- Twilight

·      Kiki- admirable in the ways that she is rooted in real female power

·      Positive model

·      Disney is all very “mans world”

·      Is a princess movie an anecdote?

·      Worshiping the object of desire which is the status

·      Warbreaker

·      What about gaming? – what is happening there and what are those girls like?

·      Pans Labyrinth brings politics to the front of fantasy- fantasy does this in general Pans Labyrinth just pushes it right to the front

·       Pagan  

Foucault Reading

·      The imperfect was the earth- everything else was increasingly perfect- heaven should be more perfect and so should the moon- but it wasn’t

·      If everything we know is wrong????

·      Layers of perfections was incorrect

·      It didn’t stop

·      Space

·      Time- relative- not anything you want to base your cosmology around

·      When you disturb hierarchies in this way

·      Sites- place- sacred-

·      Heterotopias- mirrors

·      Cemeteries

·      Virtual space

Urban Fantasy

Class Notes

Coraline

§  Loses track of where one is

§  Henry Selick (Tim Burton Producing)

§  Staged

§  Not a very natural flowing dialogue

§  Hint of Gaiman in the dialogue

Anansi Boys and Gaiman Video

§  Takes mythology and weaving a contemporary story

§  Mythic story bones

§  African mythology

§  Central assumption of the work differs from most novels, he assumes all the characters in the work are black unless otherwise described

§  What is Genre?

§  A sense of assumptions between a creator and its audience

§  Book shelf 

§  Places not to look that is the simplicity of book shelving, telling you what nto to read

§  Sturgeon’s law is a law that said 90 percent of fiction is crap but then 90 percent of everything is crap

§  Genre- is not subject matter

§  The story is within the genre as long as it doesn’t leave the reader feeling cheated at the end

American Gods

§  Detective spun out to a mythic tale with Scandinavian mythology mostly 

Mirror Mask

§  Unsettling

§  Dream world

§  Valentine 

§  Mirror world/ masks/ through the looking glass

§  Things aren’t explained until later

§  Different narrative

Being John Malkovich

Being John Malkovich was nothing like what I had expected it to be. I heard about this movie when it came out originally and hadn’t seen it until now. The trailers are very misleading.  It is definitely a mix of the mundane and the fantastical with a darker tone.  It is not dark in the way that it is depressing but more that not of the characters are really all that sympathetic with the exclusion of John Malkovich himself and this could be done on purpose.  It is set in a city, specifically in very cramped crowded settings be it the office floor 7 ½ or the apartment where Craig and Lotte live.  This cramped feeling could be a reflection on the confinement of their lives and how they seek being John Malkovich as a way to escape that.  This urban fantasy also explores sexuality and being both male and female. Maxine, whom both Lotte and Craig fall in love with is probably the least sympathetic character out of all of them and yet she is the object of their desire and they both spend the whole film trying to be who Maxine wants them to be.  This film plays with the idea of free will and is a very interesting look into some of the ‘what ifs” of reality. 

Labyrinth

I loved this movie. And really what is there not to like. David Bowie, puppets, musical numbers, a fantastical quest, all very fabulous.  The spiritual education genre is defined as tales that are meant to instruct and enlighten typically younger audiences.  Sarah, the female protagonist of the film does go through a spiritual journey and is educated about growing up along the way. She first is shown as this selfish young girl giving up her baby brother for her old life back and then ends up being proposed to essentially by David Bowie’s character, as she becomes a young adult.  The educational journey is literally riddled with puns and puzzles that push her in either the right or sometimes very wrong direction. Misconceptions and judgments guide her decisions at first around the Labyrinth until she takes charge her self of where she is going and starts to get a bit more creative in her thinking.  Labyrinth is a film that can be enjoyed by both the younger generation as well as the older, who can appreciate the innuendos and references to adult life more (such as drug use etc.) Jim Henson does a wonderful job at conveying the different creatures in all areas of the journey be them sinister or otherwise. Often we notice that the creatures simply appear confused or bewildered as to what they are meant to be doing. It is not necessarily their fault that they are not adept enough to help Sarah find her way. Also we see the fear that governs character like Hoggle, controlled by the Goblin King. Spiritual Education often has a theme of control and how it has to change hands for the protagonist to complete their Journey. Sarah is initially helpless and confused but becomes strong and determined. She is able to play the game so to speak and we see this when she and Ludo are attempting to cross over the bridge and the bridge master says something along the lines of no one can pass here with out my permission. To which Sarah responds can we have your permission? And it is granted.  Sarah’s spiritual education is concluded with the return home along with her younger brother after having grown up and learned her lesson along the way. Be careful what you wish for. 

Spiritual Education

Notes

   The function of fantasy

Harry Potter

-       Establishes itself my word of mouth at this point

-       Published by Scholastic

-       Work of a single editor David Levine

-       Paid a fairly big amount

-       JK Rowling J.K stands for nothing)- they were afraid that boys wouldn’t buy the book so they hid the gender by making it an initial

-       Welfare mom

-       Good student

-       Her mother was sick and died when she was reasonably young

-       Teaching English to foreign students

-       Met her first husband in Portugal

-       Single mom and becomes a secretary

-       Waiting in a train because it breaks down and that is where she gets the whole story

-       Her friends believed in her- one of them cashed in her retirement funds to pay for her to live while she wrote the book

-       Book is auctioned off

-       Harry Potter becomes larger than the books

-       More people have seen the movies than have read the books

-       Embeds values that are relevant

-       Moral education

-       Leads you to the kinds of understandings you get when you are 18: shows societal norms in an absurd way (muggles etc.) 

The Magicians

-       Different kind of college experience

-       Harvard in a way (where the author went)

-       What are the real things you have to watch out for (binge drinking)

-       Mentions Harry Potter
-       Conceived of prior to harry potter but he writes it after
-       How it really is going to school in the magical world-not a façade
-       Darker- not so “nice”

The Epic and Tolkien

Class Notes

o   The epic exists to give a large cultural message

Tolkien

o   Spent most of his life studying languages

o   Born in South Africa

o   His father was middle class merchant kind of family

o   His father died as soon as Tolkien went back to England to cure his own respiratory illness

o   Tolkien’s mom converts to Catholicism causing a rift between her and her family

o   Where is the money coming from? They moved into a small house under the patronage of the priest- in a small house on a pond at the end of town

o   Industrialization of the country side reflected in the movie more than the book

o   Countryside being idealized

o   Destruction of nature

o   His mother dies when he is 12

o   Interested in linguistics

o   Make up languages to play with it when you learn the rules

o   If you are making up a language you have to make up a culture to go with it (why middle earth is so detailed)

o   Joins up for World War I

o   Marries the teenage sweetheart from the orphanage

o   Eventually ends up in Oxford teaching early languages and linguistics

o   He knows epics

o   The Hobbit is written before the 2^nd World War

o   The Bird and the Baby pub club meetings every week

o   The Inklings (college club) form the center of English fantasy club

o   He mumbles all his lectures

o   The lord of the rings was originally one big volume

o   The publisher divides it into three parts- this affects the entire realm of fantasy

o   Doesn’t really catch fire until the late 60’s in the United States

o   “Big hippie thing”

o   Gigantic revival with the movies

Time Bandits

This heroic journey film was full of random Monty Python humor slapstick comedy and famous moments in history. This movie, I would imagine, is what you would get if you combined Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure with Labyrinth.  It combines adult humor with a child’s imagination, with rather an oddly depressing ending.  At times while watching this film I had ”what the ***” moments as the movie progressed.  I could, however, at times see some parallels between this film and The Hobbit. Here, though we have a young boy with crummy parents who needs an escape. We see this from the get go as his parents are more obsessed with their appliances then they are with him and his well-being.  I did like how Bilbo Baggins made a starring appearance as Napoleon (thank you Ian Holm).  You actually heroes or heroic figures show up in the film, such as Napoleon or Menelaus. And of course you have the battle of good and evil clearly laid out for you and the hero defending the good and clearly defining it for his peers. As discussed in class this film takes us through the stages of the journey with the Innocent world of childhood (boy in his room with his figurines and toys), call to adventure (when the dwarves appear out of his closet), refusal of call( his reluctance to follow them when the Supreme being shows up), crossing first threshold ( when he finally follows them down the path they create and through the time whole).  Trials and tribulations await him before he can return home. He has to help his companions attempt to live the life they wanted and face facts of what is actually good for them before he can go back to his time.  This is not blatantly said yet clearly is defined in the very concept of the film.  This was a very strange movie, but it did show a good example of the heroes' journey. 

The Hobbit

This book is the epitome of a heroes' journey. You go out and journey through the wilderness and triumph over your greatest fears in order to obtain something, an elixir or grail of sorts. The elixir would be either knowledge or power that changes the point of view of the character in question. In the beginning Bilbo Baggins is called away, leaving his humble existence.  Gandalf plays the mentors role in this journey. He is someone that helps Bilbo but isn’t always there for him or his companions.  Towards the middle-end of the story Bilbo gets the ring, which is essentially the elixir. Elixir is the symbolic thing you get in a heroes journey and is the very basis for the rest of the series. Although, there is a theme of growing maturity in this book as Bilbo develops, there is a clear difference between this heroes’ journey and some others. In that Bilbo is not an adolescent growing up and facing life for the first time. He is set in his ways as a peaceful almost middle age hobbit at home in the Shire. Yet he ends up facing whole new experiences that he wouldn’t have been part of if it weren’t for the push from Gandalf. Bilbo was reluctantly persuaded to join, and the hero is often persuaded to join against their better judgment or against what they would typically elect to do.  To embark on this journey with this group of strangers is completely against what Bilbo knows.  There is a series of battles, missteps, arguments and discovery along the way that set up the various obstacles along any heroes’ quest for adventure.  This story sets up an entire world and leads us through the most relatable character’s eyes in this wonderful escape of a tale. 

The Horror!!!!!!

                                                                             Audition 

There is nothing more profoundly creepy than an innocent looking soft-spoken Japanese girl gone wrong. This movie literally terrified me with its twists and turns, gore and soundtrack. For the first half hour of the film I was, frankly, bored and than it all unraveled before me.  A film with sex, vomit, psychological trauma, physical abuse, deformed humans, family, death and pedophilia, the story became more and more convoluted the more you were able to sit through. The director was great at setting the stage for all of that horror by really making sure you felt like you could understand the father’s life. The shots themselves were often close ups of his face or shots from behind so that we felt like we were actually in the room with him watching what he was doing.  The camera shots from a slight upward angle also made me feel like I was just a fly on the wall witnessing his life. This technique made me feel the suspense even when nothing was actually happening. This is a story that definitely keeps you on your toes.  I had to look away at some parts because they were just so disturbing.  The setting is one that anyone can identify with, as it is a city environment, which is one we all recognize and can imagine well.  The girl herself is portrayed as a very sweet and innocent one, wearing mostly white in her scenes. It isn’t until we find out her past that we see who she truly is. At its core this film is about loneliness and isolation and how we react to extreme amounts of it. The girl continuously leads an unhappy life because she has no one to turn to and is so incredibly lonely and abused. The man’s wife died and he has been lonely ever since.  I love the line in the film, which states, “ All Japanese are lonely”. This statement pretty much sets the tone for the film.  There is also some great foreshadowing in this film with the constant showing of the dog and a line like, “ the unhappy can act well.”  All in all this film was thoroughly disturbing and although I am glad I tried it, as its good to always try new things, it is not an experience I want to repeat anytime soon. I can still imagine her look at the end of the film. It still sends shivers down my spine. 

Well-done Takashi Miike. 

Interview with a Vampire

This book is not simply about good vs. evil. It is a bout two very different types of men going through their lives as vampires. Louis the intellect and Lestat the predator.   They are both charming in a way that completely crosses over to creepy at times.  Louis clings on to his humanity as best he can while there is really nothing left of him that remains human. The death of his brother sparks Luis to seek death and then he spends the rest of his existence resenting the fact that he must cause it.  It was easier for him to believe in the power of vampires and not for him to believe in the idea of her brother seeing visions. This theme of religious doubt is repeated in the novel. By telling the story through the eyes of the interviewee we learn details of the lives of vampires and the rules of their existence. The interviewee seems to ignore the story Louis tells him at times as he is too wrapped up in the idea of becoming one himself. Louis just longs for the past.  The relationship between Louis and Lestat drives the story and is almost homoerotic at times. From the moment Louis describes Lestat the reader can sense the tension.  This book, as we discussed in class, opened up the genre of supernatural romance. And supernatural romances know no bounds so they are all encompassing to any kind of sexuality or preference.  The sexuality really comes out whenever Lestat is manipulating any other character. Manipulation becomes sensuous and reinforces the perceived sexual nature of the vampire.  Understanding where any genre started is truly interesting and the dialogue in the novel captures your interest immediately.  I found it very well written and a fascinating read. 

Bram Stoker's Dracula The Movie or my love for Gary Oldman

When watching Nosferatu this morning I couldn’t help but notice the comparisons between Gary Oldman’s performance as Dracula and that of Max Schreck. Obviously this could have been due to the fact that Gary Oldman was playing Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Nosferatu was essentially the same story. But the play with shadows in both films is really interesting. Seclusion also plays a big part in this film, as each character seems confined in some way, Harker by the castle, Mina by her thoughts, Renfield by the asylum etc.  You have two representations of women in the horror movie, the virtuous thoughtful obedient wife, and the flirtatious frivolous woman.  Obviously it is the latter that dies.  In this movie Dracula is perceived as both the suave romantic with undying love and the horrible grotesque creature that he has become. He begins to have an internal struggle with what is important to him when Mina Harker enters the picture.  Ultimately love prevails in this film but love for whom. Mina seems to do a full 360 and take charge of her own destiny instead of being so compliant with life and she ends up actually choosing the vampire. There is a definite struggle here between the damned and the saved. Lucy is saved but only too late and the question remains if Dracula truly is? You see his appearance change when Mina finally kills him (he was dying anyways) back to that of his “ true nature” so he may have been.  There is also a hint to the fetish quality of vampires when Dracula and Mina finally end up in bed together and only becomes more prevalent as that scene plays out.  The relationship between Dracula and the animals is pretty important here as he cannot only control the “ children of the night” but can also become something of one himself. Again this is the animal sexuality that appears in horror. This is incredibly blatant in the scene between him and Lucy when he essentially rapes her as this man, animal, wolf, bat hybrid.  While this movie doesn’t always mesh entirely with the book it still depicts Vampire Horror in a rather traditional sense then that of the works of today.