The Addiction

Infobox Film
name =


caption = Promotional poster for "The Addiction"
director = Abel Ferrara
producer = Preston L. Holmes,
Russell Simmons,
Denis Hann,
Fernando Sulichin
writer = Nicholas St. John
starring = Lili Taylor,
Christopher Walken,
Annabella Sciorra,
Edie Falco,
Paul Calderon,
Fredro Starr,
Kathryn Erbe,
Michael Imperioli,
Jamal Simmons
music = Joe Delia
cinematography = Ken Kelsch
editing = Mayin Lo
distributor = October Films
released = 1995
runtime = 82 min
country = flagicon|USA USA
language = English
budget =
preceded_by =
followed_by =
website =
amg_id = 1:133607
imdb_id = 0112288

"The Addiction" is an unconventional 1995 vampire film by Abel Ferrara, starring Lili Taylor, Edie Falco, Paul Calderon and Christopher Walken. It was written by Ferrara's regular screenwriter, Nicholas St John, filmed in black and white and released simultaneously with Ferrara's period gangster film, "The Funeral".

The film is widely considered an allegory about drug addiction.

Plot

Kathleen Conklin (Taylor), a young philosophy student at New York University, is attacked by a woman (Annabella Sciorra), who tells her "order me to go away" and, when the frightened Kathleen is unable to do so, bites her neck and drinks her blood. Kathleen develops several of the traditional symptoms of vampirism, including aversion to daylight, but the film's main focus is on her moral degradation. The film opens with a narrative of the My Lai massacre, and the vampires repeatedly resort to the strategy of blaming their victims for not being strong enough to resist them. As one of Kathleen's victims weeps incredulously over the damage, Kathleen coldly informs her: "It's not my actions but your incredulity that needs examination here." At her graduation party, she says "I'd like to share a little bit of what I've learned" and savages the neck of the nearest person, precipitating a bloody, chaotic vampire orgy. Eventually Kathleen meets Peina (Walken), who claims to have conquered his addiction and recommends that she read William S. Burroughs' "Naked Lunch". In an ambiguous finale, Kathleen is again confronted with the woman who first bit her, who stops her suicide attempt and quotes R. C. Sproul to her. But Conklin resists, receives absolution from a Catholic priest, and is shown walking away from a grave with her own name on it, in broad daylight.

Awards

* Nominated "Best Film", Berlin International Film Festival, 1995 [ [http://www.berlinale.de/en/archiv/jahresarchive/1995/01_jahresblatt_1995/01_Jahresblatt_1995.html Berlinale archives, Feb. 1995] ]

References

External links

*
*
* [http://artsandfaith.com/t100/2005/entry.php?film=1 "The Addiction"] at the [http://artsandfaith.com/top100/ Arts & Faith Top 100 Spiritually Significant Films] list