Dracula

I may not be the biggest fan of famed Italian horror director Dario Argento, but I definitely have nothing but the utmost respect for he and his contributions to the world of cinema. He's done some incredibly work and his style is the sort-of thing that movie-goers dream of and film students salivate over. So I loaded up his recent 3D adaptation of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" with a certain sense of intrigue. I saw an early concept trailer some time ago that looked woefully bad, but it was clearly unfinished, so I opted not to judge the film by its quality. I needed to see the entire completed film start-to-finish to be fair and balanced in my assessment.

...I should have just stuck with the trailer. It had all the camp and unintentional hilarity of the finished film, but none of the prolonged and shockingly boring padding.

"Dracula 3D" might just be one of the worst adaptations of the character I've ever seen thanks to the nonsensically and bizarrely awful production. While lead Thomas Kretschmann salvages what he can in a surprisingly decent performance, the film just implodes around him. Forget what you've heard about the incompetent craftsmanship, laughable visual effects and amateurish direction, because despite what you might suspect... it's far worse than what you might have imagined. Nothing will quite prepare you for just how poor this work is in virtually every conceivable sense.

The film predominately follows Mina Harker (Marta Gastini), as she travels to the village of Passo Borgo at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains sometime after her husband Jonathan (Unax Ugalde) was sent to meet Count Dracula for business. Soon enough, she encounters the vampire count (Thomas Kretschmann), who is entranced by her resemblance to his beloved Dolinger- who had died some centuries ago. And it soon becomes clear that he desires Mina for a dark and devious purpose. And so, Mina must team with famed vampire hunter Van Helsing (Rutger Haur) to try and stop the vile vampire lord...

The film is an absolute trainwreck. The quality of filmmaking is shocking, with very little effort put into basic facets of production like frame composition and flow, and a complete lack of post- production tweaking like color- timing or pacing. Most sequences are constructed with only the most basic of set-ups; poorly framed with one or two cameras simply set- down somewhere vaguely near the action on tripods with a complete lack of cinematic lighting or eye towards capturing the scene dynamically. It feels completely thrown together without interest. Completely apathetic. And outside of maybe mildly tinting scenes vaguely a dark blueish- green during the night or lazily brightening the image with a mild yellow "tinge" for daytime scenes, it seems no effort was put into trying to manipulate the cinematography. The editing is also inorganic and lacks any sense of real flow, lending to the film feeling bloated and boring despite being less than two hours long. There's plenty that could have been done to improve the speed at which scenes play out, but the lack of effort prevents this.

The effects? My god, the effects! This was a 2012 film, but it boasts digital trickery about on par with a 1992 TV-movie. I know not to expect "Avatar" quality digital trickery, but when an early green- screen sequence at a train-station actually boasts some of the same stock background elements I got for free online over five years ago, lazily patched together with no treatment to blend them realistically, you know the effects are gonna be something else... in all the wrong ways. Digital creatures all move with hilariously inorganic motion and shine like plastic. Green-screen sequences look cartoonish and completely unreal. And then there's the Mantis. If you've seen the trailer, you know what I'm talking about. It might be the worst digital effects sequence I've ever seen. It comes out of nowhere, lacks any set-up or pay-off and looks like something out of a children's cartoon. It might be the single most unintentionally hilarious thing ever committed to the screen.

Add to that flat performances from the bulk of the cast, forgettable music that fails to thrill or enthrall, atrocious cinematography and some of the most bland screen writing I've ever had the misfortune of witnessing, and you got yourself one of the most perplexing failures in recent cinematic memory. If it weren't for one or two decent roles performed by actors far too talented to be here, the unintentional humorous moments of camp that crop up here and there and gorgeous co-star Miriam Giovanelli's penchant to be nude for much of the run- time, it'd be unwatchable. Argento... you're a talented man. And you've made some phenomenal films. But crap like this won't do.

"Dracula 3D" barely scoots by with a 2 out of 10. If you want some laughs, maybe pop it on. But even then, they're few and far in- between, and the bulk of the film is just an incoherent, incompetent, boring mess.

Not so bad as expected this Dracula 3d. For sure the acting was rather wooden, the effects (specially the digital ones) looked cheap sometimes and the story was not mind blowing, but I very much liked the retro-look of this film. I had the opportunity to see this film on big screen, in 3D and I was kind of touched by its Hammerish-look. The photography, the use of colors, the set designs... it all reminded me of films that were made decades ago. Sweet memories. Might be a bit out of time for modern viewers, but if you can look through the bad acting and some cheesy effects, you actually find a film with a charming, nostalgically look.

The Italian master of horror, Dario Argento, delivers his cheesiest movie...in 3D.

Looking at the trailers, i already knew that Dracula 3D would have been a fun and trashy cheesefest (and i gotta be honest, i have seen better CGI effects in movies made by The Asylum).

Sure, the film is a fun and trashy cheesefest, but it manages to get pretty boring in many moments, plus, Rutger Hauer only appears after a big chunk of the first half of the feature.

The CGI effects are cringe-worthy, they remind me of old computer games, i wouldn't be surprised if the (already) hilarious mantis scene will become an internet meme.

If it wasn't for the gore scenes (which they are good enough to keep the gorehounds entertained), the sexy Miriam Giovanelli, Rutger Hauer and the soundtrack (provided by Claudio Simonetti), the film would be just forgettable, but Dracula 3D is actually a forgettable cheesefest, if it was made in the 70's or 80's, it would have been considered as a cult classic.

I actually like Argento's most modern films (such as: Sleepless, Il Cartaio and Mother of tears), but if you thought that his last three films were bad, then you should take a look at Dracula 3D.

The Italian master of Giallo and horror is back, but how, in a ridiculous and cheesy Dracula flick. The story is loosely based on the actual Dracula story, all names involved are in this flick and the famous sentence, listen to them..., is also here but for the rest this hasn't anything to do with Dracula. In fact, Dario should have given this flick another name and people wouldn't had so many difficulties with this flick.

It's not really the story that makes it a bit stupid sometimes but it's the way Dracula is being shown. In the beginning he's an owl and further he transforms into flies and then in a mantis and I can go on and on.

But not only that, even as Sergio Stivaletti as special effects man is involved, who worked on Dario's classics by the way, it's there were things go wrong. A lot is CGI, even here and there some blood. That gave this flick a bitter feeling. There's only one gory moment involved and that's when Dracula is taking revenge. Here heads are flying around and throats are slashed in the old fashion way. If they had done all the bloodletting with the in-camera effects in stead of CGI this would have been much better.

Still, clocking in at almost 2 hours it delivers some good moments but most is boring and it is still worth watching wasn't it for the real 3D only. And I/ must say that it was the first time that I saw Asia Argento's (Lucy) juggs in 3D and it's worth seeing, of course there's more nudity to catch which is normal for an Italian horror.

A pointless return to the story of Dracula done by a master going totally wrong with his latest flicks (those anyone remembers Giallo (2009)). But if you like cheesy effects and a bit of gore and nudity then this is a must see, be sure to see it in 3D if you know what I mean.

Gore 1/5 Nudity 1,5/5 Effects 2/5 Story 2/5 Comedy 0/5

I love about 3/4 of argentos films, they are surreal classics of the horror and gore genre, but when he messes a film up he really messes it up. This version of the Dracula story follows all the basics, Jon harper comes to draculas castle, he gets seduced by the resident sexy vampire then van helsing turns up and cleans up the vampire problem. alas its told with such flatness and lack of originality that its boring as hell. the cgi is woefully bad, the acting is even worse (except for rutger). and a giant preying mantis scene is full on laugh out loud funny. its lacking in style, pace and, other than 1 very gory scene, violence. the only thing argento has done that is worse than this is giallo. which should tell you all you need to know . your best bet is to hunt down the one gory scene and give the rest of the film a miss. sorry dario but i think its time to retire.