‘Only Lovers Left Alive’ Captures Every Angle of the Vampire Genre (original) (raw)
Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston in Only Lovers Left Alive
Image via Sony Pictures Classics
Published May 25, 2023, 1:00 PM EDT
Colton Peregoy is a Features Writer at Collider and the Creator/Editor of Foremost Film. After studying World Cinema at university, he has gotten the opportunity to attend some of the world's most renowned film festivals, including Cannes, Sundance, Telluride, and Toronto. Some of his favorite filmmakers include Sofia Coppola, Claire Denis, Pablo Larraín, and Roberto Rossellini. In Colton's work for Collider, you will find that he loves to platform international cinema and independent film, which he feels still holds an important role in communicating the stories of many people and places across the globe and introducing audiences to unique perspectives far outside their own. So far in 2023, some of Colton's favorite movies have included Do Not Expect Too Much from the End of the World, Evil Does Not Exist, and The Zone of Interest.
Sign in to your Collider account
Between last year's television reboot of Interview With a Vampire and the recently-released film Renfield, pop culture is once again seeing a resurgence of the vampire genre, which has captivated audiences since the birth of cinema. As formidable figures living in the shadows of society, vampires have taken on shape-shifting metaphors throughout time to epitomize the world's anxieties. While representations of vampires onscreen almost always play into their macabre folkloric origins, they are commonly blended with romantic elements or comedic tones, typically sticking within the formal constraints of these genres with little overlap (think **Twilight**or Dark Shadows.) However, Jim Jarmusch's 2013 film Only Lovers Left Alive, starring Tilda Swinton, Tom Hiddleston, Mia Wasikowska, and John Hurt, is one of the few specimens of the vampire genre to combine elements of horror, romance, and deadpan comedy to create a wholly unique and unparalleled vampire movie.
What Is Only Lovers Left Alive About?
Image via Sony Pictures Classics
A decade later, _Only Lovers Left Alive_still holds a top spot as one of the most intriguing and refreshing vampire flicks of recent times, injected with Jarmusch's unique sense of effortless style from the film's first frame to its last. The movie premiered in competition at the 66th Cannes Film Festival on May 25, 2013, wowing critics and audiences before being released in US theaters nearly a year later by Sony Pictures Classics. As one of the authorities of independent filmmaking in America since the 1980s, Jarmusch continues to explore his fascination with music, literature, science, and world culture in Only Lovers Left Alive, but for the first time in his prolific career with a supernatural genre twist, which the director went on to explore in his last movie, 2019's The Dead Don't Die. Like many of Jarmusch's films, characterization and tone take precedence over the narrative arc, allowing Only Lovers Left Alive's small but mighty cast to fully flesh out their undead characters over the movie's two-hour runtime.
RELATED: How ‘Mystery Train’ Dissects Elvis Presley’s Legacy While Barely Showing Him Onscreen
Only Lovers Left Alive takes place in contemporary times between Detroit, Michigan, and Tangier, Morocco, centering around Hiddleston and Swinton's vampire characters, the lovers Adam and Eve (THAT Adam and Eve? Maybe so!) Eve makes a phone call to Adam, and she can instantly tell that her husband, many times over, is in a depressive state. When Adam, an underground musician resentful of his growing fanbase thanks to YouTube and the state of the modern world, shares that he has been writing funeral music, a concerned Eve decides to fly across the globe to check in on her beloved, to remind him of the resilience of their centuries-spanning lives and love. The caring couple shares meaningful moments spent on night drives around Detroit, listening to records and meditating on the passage of time until their harmony is shattered by the sudden visit from Ava, Eve's younger sister, a chaotic and glam-rock decked Wasikowska, who has been corrupted by the vapidity of the 'zombies' of the current age. Only Lovers Left Alive's central cast is supported by memorable performances from Hurt as a vampiric Christopher Marlow and the late Anton Yelchin as Ian, a devoted puppy dog fan of Adam's music.
Horror and Romance Are Connected in Only Lovers Left Alive
Tilda Swinton and Tom Hiddleston hugging in Only Lovers Left Alive.
Image via Sony Pictures Classics
Before bringing Only Lovers Left Alive to fruition, Jarmusch knew he wanted to create a love story. The film fully realizes this vision, infusing each scene with a brooding sense of romance and connection between Adam and Eve while still playing into the horrific concepts of vampire mythology.
At the most fundamental level of understanding vampires, Jarmusch strikingly transforms the ritual of drinking blood into a spiritual, nearly orgasmic act for the undead characters in his film. While other depictions of vampires typically emphasize the gruesomeness of blood drinking, Jarmusch's vampires throw on a tune, burn incense, and drink their life source from ornate cordial glasses, creating a grounding moment of importance for each of the characters in ways unique to their own souls. Another cornerstone of vampire lore interpreted by Jarmusch in his unique form is the film's treatment of the night. His second film to take place exclusively past sundown after 1991's Night on Earth, Jarmusch romanticizes the night as the refuge for Adam and Eve's entire life, filled with periods of immense passion and the vital exchange of ideas. While the night is usually portrayed as foreboding in classic vampire movies, Only Lovers Left Alive embraces it as a tranquil sanctuary.
Jarmusch's approach to his characters of Adam and Eve in Only Lovers Left Alive presents two distinct visions, conforming to and diverging from conventional vampire figures onscreen. First, Adam's character depicts more of a traditionally romantic, morose, moody vampire who isolates himself farther to the margins of society through his unwillingness to accept the changing times. Traipsing about in dark colors and contained mainly within the interior of his home (except for his essential trips to the local hospital to buy blood, preferably o-negative), Adam's melancholic outlook often aligns his character with audience expectations of tragically romantic vampire characters. Creating Eve's romantic essence is where Jarmusch got to have the real fun, perfectly casting Swinton, who gets the opportunity to let her otherworldly beauty and spirit shine in the role. In contrast to Adam, Eve wears predominantly white and beige, fabricated in linens and other light textiles to reflect her ethereal soul, and spends her days "surviving things, appreciating nature, nurturing kindness and friendship, and dancing!" Intriguingly, Only Lovers Left Alive has moments where Eve's character condemns key figures of the early 19th century Romantic Era, including Byron, Keats, and Shelley, for their self-obsessive influences over Adam in the past. Yet, many of Eve's attitudes seem directly connected to the ideologies of Romanticism.
Only Lovers Left Alive MixesHorror With Deadpan Humor
Deadpan humor is an essential element of Jarmusch's distinct filmmaking style. As a result, a stony sense of comedy is present throughout Only Lovers Left Alive while remaining in harmony with the film's horror components, diverging from other vampire comedies that often rely on parody or satire. Despite the movie's introspective tone, it maintains a lightness and humor that distinguishes it from many other vampire films. In terms of its excessively cool sensibilities, a particular awareness is present throughout the film that keeps it from taking itself too seriously, allowing the characters to poke fun at their uber-hipness and permitting Jarmusch to explore his own cultural image as 'the master of cool.'
Having survived plagues, inquisitions, and wars, Adam and Eve can still have a decent laugh, especially after Eve arrives to reinvigorate her husband's outlook on life. One night Eve pulls blood popsicles out of the fridge, and later on one of their night drives, Adam randomly takes his wife to see the house where The White Stripes frontman Jack White was raised. Even the movie's most grisly moments are instilled with off-beat humor: when the vampire couple is forced to get rid of the corpse of the film's most unfortunate victim by off-loading it into a mysterious acid pool where it is instantly dissolved, Eve comments, "That certainly was visual." This comic relief during Only Lovers Left Alive's most horror-filled scenes constructs a fascinating dynamic that contributes significantly to the movie's unique impact.
Image Via Soda Pictures
More than once, Only Lovers Left Alive's principal vampire characters reference Albert Einstein's theory of entanglement, saying, "When you separate an entwined particle, and you move both parts away from the other - even at opposite ends of the universe - if you alter or affect one, the other will be identically altered or affected." This moving sentiment perfectly captures the profound love between Adam and Eve, which has ultimately withstood all tests of time. Although the film does not commit to showcasing any spectacular narrative turns, its quiet confidence and amalgamation of cultural references and homages perfectly platforms Jarmusch's sensibilities as one of America's most compelling auteurs of the past 40 years. Furthermore, Only Lovers Left Alive combines the horror associated with vampire stories with both romance and humor with an approach unlike any other movie, forming a film that flawlessly captures all angles of the much-loved vampire genre unlike any other, even a decade after the film's original release.