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ON KIRSTEN DUNST:
Magnificent and flawless as Claudia, shocking in her soft, perfectly paced shifts between adulthood and childish innocence. The role as she played it is far less sinister than the Claudia of the book, and perhaps even a little more innocent then my first draft script. But the change seemed to work wondrously to deliver the heartbreak of Claudia's dilemma to the audience. She was a woman, but she was in a child's body. The actress showed incredible intelligence and cunning, and yet a child's tragic vulnerability and heartrending capacity to be disappointed.
Anybody who doesn't see what this is about -- all women are locked in the bodies of dolls; all self contemplating human souls are locked in mortal and often confounding bodies -- isn't perhaps asking enough of himself or herself as a viewer. To say this film contained only one idea or no ideas as Janet Maslin said in the New York Times, is, I think to severely underrate it.
The better part of the ideas of this film revolve around Claudia, and her dilemma is truly one shared by everyone. That the film arouses and sustains sympathy for her so that her inevitable fate is tragic is a great cinematic accomplishment.
What Kirsten did in this film has dealt a body blow to the rigid, stupid cliche of the demonic child. Kirsten blew THE BAD SEED out of the water. She is utterly beyond the evil puppetlike child vampires of other movies. She drew us into her motives for violence and offered us a deeper understanding of all the moral rules given us, or created by us. That none of her gestures, words, or actions was prurient was a major achievement.
Favorite moments with Kirsten:
The entire transformation scene in the bed from suffering waif to glorious child killer.
When she looks down from the balcony in the Rue Royale and says, ``It means...I shall never grow up.''
Her quiet voice in the scene where Lestat brings her the doll (again, about half of what I wrote survived there, maybe less, but I liked Jordan's changes except for one minor point which I'll make below).
Her seduction of Lestat and subsequent attack on him, especially the moment when she tumbles back on the couch next to the young boys and smiles up at Lestat. Perfection.
Her loving and intimate scenes with Louis in which she becomes a woman, remaining both a daughter and a mother.
The perfect pitch of prepubescent innocence throughout. The movie isn't about peephole sex, and nobody exemplifies that better than Claudia. It isn't about perversion at all. It never was. It is about the attempt of all of us to live in the light and with grace. Kirsten got the whole thing.
Her final scene.
Again,
there are many, many other moments throughout the film with Kirsten.
This
section last modified 11-11-99
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