Dracula

I am a huge fan of vampire movies ever since I have seen Bram Stokers Dracula (directed by Francis Ford Coppola). And this has been around 12 years ago. There are very few vampire movies that come close to the masterpiece of Francis Ford Coppola. And this movie sadly stays far away. It started quite promising, but this movie has a countless amount of flaws.

The story: The variation of the original story isn't so bad, if it would just be a bit more „spectacular". The story simplifies the main-theme and adds some new interesting ideas. Some of those ideas are great, others seem too modern or simply don't fit.

The action: Probably the worst I have seen in a long time. Every time action actually happened, there was a cut in less than a second. - Probably to hide how cheap it was done? The directing was very bad throughout the whole movie. You have been able to see that the best during the action scenes.

Actors and characters: Mostly I found them awful. Characters have been boring, and actors plain bad. There have only been two exceptions. Holmwood (Dan Stevens) and Lucy (Sophia Myles).. those two seemed the only ones that have actually been given a character at all.

Atmosphere: Music was decent, but nothing special. The camera showed very "warm" colors. Similar to cheesy women-dramas in the 18th century. I didn't really like it. Everything looked artificial. Overall the atmosphere was decent, but could have been much better.

4 points because I had fun watching the movie. (I am not actually sure why.)

My partner and I are avid fans of the vampire genre and had eagerly anticipated the airing of this production. We sat down to watch it hoping for the best and that Auntie Beeb would not let us down and we found ourselves sadly disappointed.

It wasn't so much the deviation from the plot of the book that did it - pretty much every Dracula production does that to a certain degree and that is half of what makes these things fun to watch. It was more perhaps the casting, weak characterisation and the fact that most of the action seemed to be crammed into the final 15 minutes that did it. Mina Murray was almost offensively miscast in my opinion and Marc Warren, of whom I am normally a fan, didn't have the charisma or presence to pull off the strong character that is Dracula.

On a plus side, the costumes and sets were excellent, as they tend to be in most BBC period productions and there were some interesting themes, such as the blackening of Dracula's fingernails which perhaps hinted at the corruption that lies in the cursed character. Other than that the rewrite was a weak and disappointing production and doesn't even hold a candle to past efforts by Hammer or indeed Francis Ford Coppola.

First, as others have noted, this has nearly nothing to do with the Bram Stoker novel other than the names of principal characters and the larger plot arc (Dracula moving to London). But I am not bothered by that if they think it in deeper ways.

There are quite a number of VERY clever plot additions that could have been very helpful. One is the religion that Mr. Singleton leads. The book was written at a time when such "spiritualist" groups were popping up all over Europe, which is why the book was so popular. So that part makes sense. But then they turned it into a cartoon-like cross between the Mob and Dungeons and Dragons. Had it been more like the Theosophical Society, they would have had a brilliant turn.

There were strong allusions to the British Empire's global reach, but it was dropped quickly. This could have been at the heart of an ongoing TV series, where Dracula sends out the Undead across the Empire. But no, it was just a throw-away line in the rush to finish within 90 minutes.

I also felt that the sexuality was WAY overdone. Sure, it's there in all vampire tales, and abundantly so in the original. But this made it the prime motive of all actors. Too much.

And finally, the SLAM BAM ending made me ashamed of being an American. Why must our pop culture do so much damage to film-making around the world?

This a professionally and stylish looking BBC made-for-TV adaptation of the famous Dracula story by Bram Stoker, that however differs too much from the original story and adds very little new and interesting in exchange. On top of the that the movie has an extremely poor flow, which makes the movie confusing and dull to watch, with too many- and poorly developed characters.

The movie makes too many leaps in time and the overall flow itself also isn't really perfect. It also makes the movie confusing to follow at times, especially if you don't know the Dracula story in advance. It also makes some of the sequences weak and causes to leave an unsatisfying impression such as the introduction of the Dracula character. Boom! He suddenly is there without any build-up. Its entire build-up and flow, or better said the lack of it all, is the reason why the movie just never becomes scary of even tense to watch. It's an extremely poorly told movie, without any introductions or development. It makes this a very disjointed and hard movie to watch.

The movie leaves lots of room to put in multiple romantic plot-lines, which makes the movie also drag in points, especially the beginning.

The movie was surprisingly good looking. I liked its style. It was a fine combination between the British upper-class kind of atmosphere and the more dark and moody horror atmosphere. The sets and cinematography were simply good.

Even though the cast has some good British TV-actors in it, the acting is still one of the weaker spots and irritating part of the movie. It's painfully bad at times and unintentionally funny to watch. Most actors aren't really to be blamed for this but rather the poor script that makes some bad choices and has some poor and formulaic dialogs in it. It also doesn't help that none of the characters are introduced and developed properly. Seriously, who is who in this movie and what is their purpose exactly?

Dracula really isn't right looking in this movie. I mean, even in his human form he's looking ugly and like a mad monster. He's supposed to be seductive, charismatic and sophisticated. He's none of those things in the movie and besides the actor portraying him looks too young.

A version that you're better off not watching.

2/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Being a huge fan of the book and countless other screen adaptations, especially Hammer's fine back catalogue, I looked forward to this with eager anticipation.

Although I found the twists in the plot to be really exciting and a breath of fresh air, I personally found that the hammy acting spoiled it and thought that Mina and Lucy were just plain awful. Not convincing whatsoever.

The creepy Warren gave me some hope as Dracula, although he didn't have presence of character enough to pull it off. I guess not too many actors do! I can only think of Christopher Lee, Bela Lugosi and Gary Oldman who have pulled it off.

David Suchet played a fantastic van Helsing, however and for me, was the star of an otherwise disappointing adaptation.