A sometimes stylish but very nasty horror film, stuffed with more modern matinee idols than pints of blood.

Brad Pitt plays the 'vampire with a human soul' who, tired of life after his wife and child have died in 18th-century Louisiana, is vampirised by Lestat (Tom Cruise), a merciless and sardonic bloodsucker who fancies a companion.

Reluctant to drink human blood, Pitt takes to a diet of rats and chickens before Cruise tempts him with an 11-year-old girl (the unsettling Kirsten Dunst), who in turn becomes Pitt's companion through the decades - and spells trouble for Cruise.

Some great and gruesome special effects and an orgy of blood-letting - at times the film seems to be little else - will compensate horror fans for the somewhat stately pace of the piece.

But they will be disappointed by the jokey ending: the filmmakers have a fine climax in modern America, only to throw it away on a silly coda.

Antonio Banderas, Christian Slater and Stephen Rea also flash their fangs.