[This is the first of *many* reviews of BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA. In general, I try to keep the number of reviews per movie low, but it proved impossible to decide which reviews to eliminate--so they're all here. -Moderator]
BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA
A film review by Mark R. Leeper
Copyright 1992 Mark R. Leeper
Capsule review: Fairly faithful retelling with some
very impressive surreal images. When it works, it works
well; when it fails, it is at least interesting. Perhaps
this works better as an art film than as a genuine piece of
horror. Rating: +2 (-4 to +4).
In 1922 F. W. Murnau made the first film version of DRACULA: NOSFERATU. While the film really was a thinly veiled plagiarism of Bram Stoker's novel, originally calling the vampire Count Orlock, the source of the material was obvious. What was unusual about Murnau's version was the expressionist, almost surreal, world that Dracula/Orlock lives in. Using the crude special effects of the day, Murnau drops the viewer into a sinister world of strange visual images. Subsequent versions, with the possible exception of Werner Herzog's 1979 NOSFERATU, tended to show the story in a more natural world. There were good reasons for that, mainly dealing with budget, but also with audience acceptance. Bela Lugosi, John Carradine, up through Christopher Lee, all play Dracula as a human-like creature with a few special powers, while there was little question that Max Schreck's Count Orlock had transformed into something really quite different from a human. Francis Ford Coppola has directed a new DRACULA for a new generation and has intentionally way out-done Murnau and Stoker. Coppola has claimed this would be the dramatic version closest to Stoker's novel and nearly succeeded, at least for accuracy of plot. (The three-hour BBC COUNT DRACULA and the one-hour premiere of Orson Welles's "Mercury Theater" radio program were both versions more faithful than Coppola's.) Stylistically, Coppola has turned up the horror elements in a way to make the novel prosaic by contrast.
Presumably most people reading this review will already have a good idea what the story is about. The historic Dracula (literally "Son of the Dragon") was also known as Vlad Tepes ("Vlad the Impaler"). He got his first nickname because his father was Vlad Drakul ("Vlad the Dragon"). Don't believe the film's introduction that said he got the name for being in the Order of the Dragon; he was not. It was Vlad Drakul, Dracula's father, who was in the Order of the Dragon. Two more things not to believe: the Vlads were Hungarian, not Romanian as they say in the introduction (borders were different then from what they are now) and the impalements were depicted wrong. People were not impaled the short way, through the trunk. Instead they were set on the stake using holes nature had already provided, which is a slower and much more agonizing death. This alone would have made Vlad Dracula feared.
Here is where fiction separates from reality. Stoker's novel claims the feared Dracula became a vampire who still terrorized Transylvania four centuries later. For reasons that have been left by Stoker to speculation, the vampire Dracula has decided to migrate to England and to spread his infectious vampirism to a new country. The symptoms of an outbreak of vampirism eventually come to the attention of a Professor Van Helsing who recognizes what is happening and, with a small group of friends, checkmates and eventually destroys the vampire.
In spite of his professed fidelity to the novel, Coppola's version, with a screenplay by James V. Hart, makes some basic revisions to the story. Borrowing an idea that goes back at least to the 1933 Boris Karloff film THE MUMMY. Dracula, it seems, became undead because of his love for a woman back when he was truly alive. Centuries later Dracula is still around and finds a reincarnation of this lost love. Now he wants her for his lover again. Dracula becomes a tragic hero trying to regain lost love.
Other revisions to the story include a complete transformation of the character of Van Helsing. In the book it seems to me he was cautious and reserved, holding his tongue as long as possible. The film makes him a sort of mad professor who does not care about the impact of his statement and likely to misbehave in strange and unpredictable ways. Actually, much of the conversation we hear is probably a good deal franker and more sexual than would be likely in Victorian drawing rooms. The same goes for the public cinematograph showing nude women. I have no doubt the pictures dated from then, but probably would have been reserved for a less public venue. Two more places where a bit more research might have been done: Mina mentions Madame Curie as if her name was a household word in 1897. It was not until several years later that Curie would become famous. Also Van Helsing said that the "story of syphilis is the story of civilization" as if it had been around as long as civilization. Actually the first known case was in 1493. It is suspected of having originated in the New World mostly due to the chronology. No other European is even suspected of having originated with native Americans, incidentally. And even in this case, it is known only that it came with Spanish mariners from some other port.
As for the acting, it is fairly spotty. Keanu Reeves seems out of place and uncomfortable as Jonathan Harker. Anthony Hopkins is a bit too weird as Van Helsing. Normally, I would call that the fault of the script, but various interviews have indicated that it was Hopkins's idea. Winona Ryder really was not too bad as Mina. Her British accent seemed acceptable to me, though likely a Briton might have a different idea. Of course, she did squint her eyes in a scene in which she was supposedly dead. Then there is Gary Oldman as Dracula. Lon Chaney, Jr., was a very plain-looking man who, contrary to expectation, was the best character actor of his generation. That same description applies to the man who played Joe Orton, Sid Vicious, Lee Harvey Oswald, and Dracula. This understated actor's range is incredible.
But what sets this version apart from all other versions is the look. One image after another is startling. Time and again the camera plays with us. You find yourself wanting to view scenes a second time. Your eye will catch something funny in a scene. Dracula's shadow may be just an instant in timing slower than Dracula himself. Transylvania is painted in bright primary colors. Out of a red sky you will make out two huge Draculine eyes watching a character. It could be a touch of German Expressionism. The battle scenes in the historic sequence borrow from Akira Kurosawa. Throughout the entire film there is a dram-like quality, perhaps a surrealism. Coppola seems to have chosen to avoid computer effects such as morphing. While these effects might be effective for a science fiction film, there is something about them that does not work in a pure horror film. It did not occur to me at the time, but that might be one reason that FRIGHT NIGHT was not as effective for me as it could have been.
The one problem with this version is the lack of actor empathy. BRAM STOKER'S DRACULA is for me more an artistic success than a good horror film. It tells the story often with images more vital than Stoker used in his novel. As with Murnau's seminal version, scenes are very good, but the net effect perhaps is less than the sum of the parts. My rating is a +2 on the -4 to +4 scale.
Mark R. Leeper
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