Dracula

The 1931 `Dracula' casts an imposing shadow over the horror genre. It is, after all, the movie that launched the classic Universal horror cycle of the 1930s and 1940s. It is also a tremendous influence on the look and atmosphere of horror movies in general (and vampire movies in particular). It gave Dracula a look and a voice, and created a legend. Okay, so we know it was influential. But how does it work as a movie? Well… the first time I watched it, I was underwhelmed. The pace is slow. While Bela Lugosi's Dracula is menacing, the rest of the cast is colorless to the point of transparency. There are some good gliding camera shots here and there (thank you, Karl Freund!), but the majority of the film is locked into stationary medium and long shots. The film is tightly bound to its theatrical origins – director Browning has his characters look at things out of frame and describe them rather than just showing us, which would be much more effective. Fortunately, `Dracula' improves with repeated viewings. The glacial pace and lack of sound in many places gives the movie a nightmarish sense of menace. In fact, `Dracula' is somewhere between a nightmare and a piece of classical music – everything proceeds at its own pace, gliding through the motions, gradually building suspense and momentum until the piece reaches climax. The end result is a flawed but haunting, hypnotic masterpiece, and one of the greatest vampire films ever made.

Younger people who never saw the original here but have seen Dracula movies sometime in the past 30 years will be very disappointed with this original version. I'm not young, and I was disappointed, too, not that it was all bad. The film does have an eerie feel to it in a primitive way, so kudos for that. Bela Lugosi, the first and most famous Dracula of them all, has eyes that penetrate and are unforgettable. Unfortunately, that's about it as the only things unforgettable about this film. I said what I said in the first paragraph because there is no blood, not even one scene of Dracula biting anyone. Come on - this is Dracula!! The ending wasn't very dramatic, either: a most disappointing finish. I did enjoy watching this for the "historical" value, however, because having only known Dracula movies since the '50s I learned a few truths from this film. "Truths," meaning that (1) Dracula had to return to the soil when he went to sleep at night, not particularly in a coffin, and Renfield was institutionalized when he arrived in America and stayed there until Dracula killed him in the end. You don't see these things in latter-day Dracula movies or in Dracula spoofs.

Bela Lugosi forever captures the role of a certain undead Transylvanian count who takes a trip to London in the first legitimate version of the classic Bram Stoker novel. Despite many attempts by many talented film makers, I believe this version, directed by Tod Browning, remains the definitive take on the often-filmed novel. But why? Is it simply nostalgia? Granted, I do fondly remember staying up late as a child watching this film on Ghost Host theater and finding myself suitably frightened. However, if I were the same age today, would I find the film as effective? Would a steady diet of more modern and explicit horror films made me too jaded to enjoy the more subtle charms of this film? I hope not, but I could see how it might. The film is slow, and its slowness is further emphasized by the absence of an under score. It is stagey - being as it was more influenced by the stage play than the novel itself. Also, the story plays itself out too quickly. Van Helsing manages to figure everything out and dispatch the count in about two seconds. There simply isn't much suspense - and even less gore or violence. Yet it remains the champ. Why? The main reason is Lugosi himself. He gives the performance of a lifetime. He truly inhabits the role and is genuinely creepy. The rest of the cast, particularly Edward Van Sloan as Van Helsing and Dwight Frye as Renfield, support him admirably. However, when I watch the old Universal horror films nowadays, I find myself really enjoying the atmospheric sets and lighting. Yes, there is still much to love about Dracula today. (As long as you avoid the optional Philip Glass score on the DVD!)

At first I'd like to say that I have read the book by Stoker. It was one of the worst books I can remember of. It was unbelievably naive, too long and the story was really inconsistent. I hoped that the movie would do better and I was looking forward to its creepy atmosphere. I was really disappointed. The film was a bad abstract from the bad novel. Some very important persons were just left out, another were swapped. The story was told so quickly that the film was even more inconsistent than the book. Some scenes were made useless because they were told so quickly that it was impossible to understand what they were about, unless you didn't read the book. And what I found really rude was, that we didn't see Dracula biting into anybody's neck, we didn't see even those two little holes in the victims' necks, we didn't see him getting out of his coffin, Lucy died just by the way (you don't even realize she dies, actually you don't even realize she was ever there) and so on and so on. This film totally failed in telling the story. Unfortunately, the atmosphere was not worth remembering either. Compared to Frankenstein, which was made in the same year, Dracula is a good amateur video.

Today people laugh at that Dracula. Bela Lugosi is a joke of a vampire and every close-up on his stiff-glared face echoes ridiculous. The movie itself is a harsh end-to-end editing of key scenes from the novel. That's why there's no inner breath hampering boredom. Eventually it's the worst Dracula I have ever seen. And I definitely rank Murnau's Nosferatu far above with masterpieces of horror movies. I could not imagine something that bad: I was making these comments in my head during the screening!

This is yet another of those dreary classic films which people desperately WANT to love for purely sentimental reasons. Certainly, it cannot be denied its place in Hollywood history. But it needs to be evaluated for what it is - a fairly unprepossessing example of the genre. It's a sad comment on any sound movie to say that it compares unfavorably to an earlier silent version but that's the undeniable truth in this case. In 1922 director F.W. Marnau filmed the first screen adaption of Bram Stoker's "Dracula" in Bavaria under the title of "Nosferatu". With this landmark production Marnau created an extremely chilling piece of cinema which contained some genuinely spooky images. Nine years later Hollywood sanitized the whole concept and came out with Lugosi's painfully slow and almost comical remake. Today, this sleepy clunker is, in all honesty, only of interest as an historical curiosity. It moves along with all the pace of a funeral procession (appropriately enough). The dialogue regularly stops for long periods and with nothing much happening on the screen to fill the void you'll find yourself glancing over at the video shelf to consider other options. The almost total lack of incidental music throughout the picture also doesn't help the situation. Bela pulls his usual collection of rather idiotic facial expressions most of which will lead you to believe that he's just spotted something nasty on the carpet. As far as being a viable source of entertainment is concerned, it's unlikely that this movie will hold much appeal for anyone other than the most perservering of old time horror fans .

While Tod Browning's Dracula is not the definitive take on the most famous vampire of all time, it is possibly the most memorable one. This is not due to Browning's technical achievements or directorial wizardry, by ANY means. It is due to Bela Lugosi's career-defining portrayal of the title character. Born in what is now Lugoj, Romania, Lugosi brings to the part the flavor of his homeland, making him more believable as Dracula. This other-worldly aesthetic helped to make his performance what many consider the ultimate incarnation of Stoker's Dracula. Having played the Count in Hamilton Deane's Broadway version of Dracula, which started in 1927, Bela Lugosi was more than prepared for the role when it was time to commit it to film. Still struggling with the English language, however, he had to learn his lines phonetically. European accent in tact, he was able to deliver such memorable lines as, "I bid you welcome," "Listen to them. Children of the night. What music they make," and, of course, "I am Dracula." His performance alone is reason enough to watch this monster movie classic. If only the rest of the film was as spectacular as Lugosi. Dwight Frye's Renfield, while perhaps a little too over-the-top, is still another highlight to the film, and even Edward Van Sloan's Van Helsing is enough to challenge the might of Count Dracula. The rest of the film is rather flat to me. Now, I know it was made in 1931, and that, at the time, it horrified audiences, but I still stand by my opinion that the overall movie pales in comparison to Bela Lugosi's performance. Everyone else just seemed to be going through the motions, and it seems especially evident while Helen Chandler and David Manners are on screen. They just aren't convincing. I'm not saying that their performances ruin the film. It is still a classic, and certainly worth a viewing, but if you are in the mood for a vampire movie that is worthy of Bram Stoker's name, look no further than F. W. Murnau's Nosferatu. It is much more convincing and even scarier than Tod Browning's Dracula, despite being nine years older and silent. All in all, though, one cannot overlook the stellar performance of Bela Lugosi in the role he was born to play!

source: Dracula

Trailer—Dracula

Dracula