R. Jacob’s Honeycut: ‘Vampire’s Kiss’ is More Relevant Today Than Ever

It’s Lonely Out There

The loneliness epidemic. It sounds like a made-up virus from a low-budget zombie movie. However, it’s a very real thing. In fact, the World Health Organization declared loneliness a global public health concern in 2023. That same year, the U.S. Surgeon General called loneliness a public health crisis and an epidemic. 

Why did I just lead with that information in an article about a goofy Nicolas Cage movie from the 1980s? Well, while “Vampire’s Kiss” can come off like a comedic take on the classic blood-sucker tale, if you dig a little deeper, it’s a story of a man driven mad by his isolation and stress. While most people will get a few laughs out of this film, especially with Cage’s overacting, I saw it more as a dark psychological, cautionary tale, centered on the human condition. 

The Story

Nicolas Cage plays Peter Loew, a New York publishing agent who seems to have it all. He’s got a decent job, a nice apartment, and he gets just about every girl he wants. Yet, below the flashy exterior is a sad, broken man. When he believes he is bitten by a vampire, he flies off the deep end, believing he is transforming into a creature of the night. The unfortunate target of his rage is his young secretary, Alva. 

Honey’s Cut 

When you look at this movie from Alva’s perspective, it is as terrifying as it is tragic. Early in the movie, one of Loew’s clients asks him to send over a contract from the 1960s. Loew puts Alva on the job. Because it is an old document, she can’t do a quick record search on the computer. She has to go through countless files by hand. 

Alva does her best throughout the week, but her efforts are never good enough for Loew. Each day his verbal abuse and mental torment of Alva gets worse, until the scene where she doesn’t want to go into work because she is so frightened of Loew. 

This scene is heartbreaking. We see Alva in bed while her mother tells her she needs to suck it up and go to work. She is so scared of Loew that she gets her brother to give her bullets for her gun. But he only gives her blanks. Not only is it a shame to see her family not taking her concerns seriously, but I’m sure this type of abuse is a sad reality for some people in the workplace.

Let’s focus on Loew for a second. He is like a Patrick Bateman prototype. A young executive who is wealthy and charming but also struggles to hide his dark side. Around the time his client requests the contract, is when he believes a beautiful vampire lady bites him. It symbolizes the ignition point for his latest stress, which is finding the contract. 

From here, we see him descend further into the delusion that he is turning into a vampire. It culminates in him chasing Alva down and sexually assaulting her. She is unable to defend herself, because her gun only fires blanks. Loew goes on to murder a woman in a club, then he walks around town mumbling to himself like a lunatic. 

It is in his final monologue that we find out what is causing Loew to act this way.  He is having a hallucination, where he is visiting his therapist for the final time. He confesses that he never found the right woman. It’s the big reveal. You see, from the outside, who wouldn’t want Loew’s life? Money, power, women. However, the one thing he lacks, that rots him from the inside out, is basic human connection. While Loew is irredeemable at this point, this is something a lot of people can relate to. 

As I was writing this I also thought, how alone did Alva have to feel in all this? No one at her job stands up for her when Loew is berating her in front of the entire office. Her family simply brushes her off. She was asking for help, for someone to care. And no one listened until it was too late. 

Honey’s Final Thought

Is “Vampire’s Kiss” some masterpiece of social commentary, mixed with psychological horror? Not really. When it was over, I just thought it was an odd movie. Did it give me some stuff to think about? Absolutely.

At its core, the film focuses on lonely people. I was born around the time this movie came out in the late 1980s. Loneliness wasn’t even a concern, let alone an epidemic at that time. Looking back, I believe every house in my neighborhood had a family living there. If someone lived alone, they were usually an outcast who thought they were a vampire or something. Now, when I drive through my complex, I see the number of single households far outnumber those with couples or families. 

We’re supposed to have technology that keeps us all connected. But over the past 15 years I’ve watched the gym go from a place where you could easily make friends with a shared interest in fitness, to a place where everyone has headphones in and stares at their phones between sets. Much like how Loew lived in a packed city, filled with people, we can be surrounded by online friends, but be alone in real life. 

What’s my advice? Well, if the World Health Organization can’t figure it out, what’s a guy who writes scary stories in his bedroom have to offer? You know, maybe I’ve overthought all this. Just watch it for Nicolas Cage hamming it up for nearly two hours, while wearing a pair of cheap plastic vampire teeth.