Belief in vampires and other evil spirits is the more popular, the deeper the crisis of faith in society in general

Belief in vampires and other evil spirits is the more popular, the deeper the crisis of faith in society in general. Not only faith in religious traditions, but also faith in social institutions, faith, oddly enough, in science. Over the past three centuries, we have seen a kind of pendulum swing in Western culture. Approximately at the end of the first quarter of the 18th century, an interest in science awakened in society, as that force that would help solve almost all the difficult questions of mankind. The enlightenment of the eighteenth century flows into the technical revolution of the nineteenth, and then the breakthrough of the scientific and technological progress of the twentieth century. But by the end of the next century, disappointment in the old ideals accumulates, and a rollback occurs. And here, at the change of eras, the time comes for fans of romanticism and the Gothic novel (the turn of the XVIII-XIX centuries), decadence (XIX-XX) and black fantasy (XX-XXI). And each time, among other things, there is a surge in the popularity of stories about vampires.
Thus, this topic has existed in Western literature for a long time, although, perhaps, the first truly serious attention was paid to it by Bram Stoker in the novel Dracula (1897), in which he forever defined the stereotype of the classic vampire. In the 20th century, the vampire theme in the so-called "enlightened" countries began to be actively developed by means of not only literature, but also cinema, and due to the mass nature of this direction, it is not surprising that the search for new images and meanings that the authors lead, trying to introduce something new and attract to attention to yourself. As a result, there is a gradual change in the canonical image of the vampire, and often the change is so radical that only the name remains of the image.
Here we should say a few words about our tradition. After all, the term "vampire" came to Russia from the West, replacing a similar folklore character of the Eastern Slavs - "ghoul" (you can also find a synonym for "ghoul"). However, unlike the ghoul, whose image has always been exclusively negative, and which , in principle, could not have anything to do with "romance" , the vampire has been actively positioned by Western cinema in recent years as an improved model of a person with only virtues (eternal youth, beauty, wisdom of generations, strength, speed, superpowers , etc.), with the exception of a small well-known shortcoming, which is justified every now and then.
The evolutionary trend of the image of the vampire broadcast from abroad lies in its gradual integration into modern society. The vampire has merged into the culture of modern civilization, and many have already forgotten that he once belonged to one very specific mythological tradition and was filled with an unambiguously negative content. This is one of the reasons why vampires in modern works often stop responding to elements associated with certain traditional folklore or religious ideas: they do not die from garlic, are reflected in mirrors, and are not allergic to holy symbols.
So what are they, "modern vampires"? And what features are inherent in modern vampire cinema? In this article, we will try to uncover these questions using the example of the 1994 cult film Interview with the Vampire, based on the novel by Anne Rice, which began another explosion in the popularity of the vampire genre. The author also considers it necessary to give some examples from the widely publicized saga "Twilight", the plot of which, I think, is known to many, and does not need to be introduced.