dracula movies: S and D

Saw the 1920s silent version a few months ago and after the first few minutes of silent overacting, it was genuinely scary. The 1970s (?) remake of Nosferatu is also very good and creepy.

Though the Frank Langella Dracula is just terrible. Avoid it, except to laugh at the costumes.

Although the Lugosi one remains definitive and classic (along with the Christopher Lee Hammer series) - they did play fast and loose with the plot of the book in a way that I found really annoying.

has any movie ever actually stuck close to the book? bram stoker's dracula made sort of a half-assed attempt, but was foiled by the need to turn it into The Ultimate Goth Love Story (haha maybe if they'd cast robert smith and siouxsie as drac and mina?).

That movie *looked* great, it was just so badly miscast with regard to the two leads! Everyone else was fantastic.

I'm trying to remember... I've seen so many different versions of Dracula that they all start to run together after awhile.

Oh, and the only redeeming feature of the Frank Langella version is that it spawned an amazing graphic novel.

I don't really have any interest in the gothic/romantic side of the myth - sure it's an endless metaphor for people to play with but I like my vampires monstrous. Nosferatu is barely human, which is what makes him so scary.

I saw the Herzog Nosferatu as a teenager and thought it was tedious, but I might well think differently now. It's certainly not as creepy as the original, even if Kinski makes a good Max Schreck double.

Anne Rice can eat a bag of dicks as far as I care.

I saw it recently and it was a lot better than I remembered it.

Errm... I like my vampires sexy as well as monstrous. I mean, that's kind of the point. That evil can be very seductive and attractive.

I mean, if we're going to get into the entire vampire canon, well, every Julian Sands film ever to thread, really.

Because I think that's the thing with Evil. It often doesn't look horrible and evil on the surface.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4754027

http://www.blaxploitation.com/images/poster_gifs/poster_scream_blacula.gif

I'm on my second marriage, this holds no terror for me ;)

I've always thougt that, even if all of this wasn't intentional, it's actually a very clever comment - Stoker's original book played with the paranoia of ppl afraid that EVIL immigrants would come and steal their jobs/wimmin; this movie, regardless of what happens in the plot, seems to ridicule that notion, in a way.

The funny thing about "Dracula" is Renfield is a thousand times scarier than the count!

"Nosferatu" is quite a different matter, of course - no pity for the vampire there, he/it looks barely human. Max Shreck was some kind of genius, that really is the creepiest thing I've ever seen - very hard to keep your eyes fixed on him, too.

... Bela and Carol - don't they make a lovely couple?

yeah, and that's when he speaks that wonderful line: "to die, to REALLY be dead, that must be glorious." not a hint of self-pity, very dignified.

e.g. Andy Warhols' Dracula?

Vampire as decrepit aristoracy feeding off the blood of good, pure working class virgins who can only be saved by the sexual exploits of good pure working class Joe Delassandro?

Now that is a funny but also deeply complex film.

That's kind of why Paul Morrissey made it in the first place

(Though the problem was, I actually thought Udo Kier was much, much HOTTer than Delassandro.)

But that's why it's funny! Because he's such a BAD actor!!!

While Udo Kier is just lovely... sigh.

(We used to have that on our ansaphone in NYC)

This man is not Udo Kier.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0061655/

i think Universal did quite a few (ok, 2) Dracula sequels, Dracula's Daughter, House Of Dracula for instance. he also turns up in a few others - Abbot and Costello meet Frankenstein for instance (the only other time Lugosi played him)

Irma Vep is also worth a mention if only because bits of it were filmed with a PixelVision camera.

http://www.unbrokenmetal.de/she/borlmv27.jpg

"Watch out, I know it's only 1935 but there's an unfeasibly cute hippy goth vampire girl behind you"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0067367/

By the early 70s, Brit film studios like Hammer were forced to make films that were virtual softcore, in order to compete with the rise of the real thing. Look at the way the Confessions movies stole a march from the Carry On movies.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0069427/

and of course Taste the Blood of Dracula (Tarts a-go-go)

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065073/

Wairt, is this just Dracula stuff?

http://www.storiamedievale2.net/Vampiria/Film/Vampiri/TZ/velvetvampire01.jpg

Did anyone else see Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary ? They tried to combine dance with silent film elements and I thought it came out very boring. There was no horror left in it at all.
As with many of Guy Maddin's longer works, I had trouble staying in my seat the whole way through but there is lots of great stuff in it. Best Renfield ever.

They've forgotten The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires.

Watch that one drunk. It helps.

Peter Cushing at his very best

ihttp://aintitcoolnews.com/images/belajc.jpg

i actually kinda loveds this movie

incidentally lugosi still rules. and i'm not wild about that philip glass thing... it's not a silent movie dude!!

is nadja any good?

only thing i can really remember about it is the ballroom scene.

> is nadja any good?

not really, probably worth setting the video for. the pixelvision thing and, i think, the 4ad music connection (or am i thinking about something else again?) was interesting, actual film less so.

i can't believe the thread got this old with out anyone mentioning Vampyros Lesbos:
http://imdb.com/title/tt0066380/

Or Daughters of Darkness also 1971 (a watershed year for lesbian vampire movies, apparently).

or long hair at all

if you think about it enough the name "count dracula" almost sounds like it could be some semi-obscure jump blues singer from the '40s!

I'd like to see a lavish Japanese Anime version of dracula - the two Vampire Hunter D movies are absolute classics.

oh god i saw an episode of this when i was a kid (watching TV when i shouldn;t have been) and it haunted my nightmares and sleepless nights for years. i still vividly remember a scene where Drak is scaling the vertical walls of the castle. horrifying.

Saw "Bram Stoker's Dracula" for the first time last night. Damn that movie is intoxicating. Want to watch it again soon!

Also watched a BBC 2000's version immediately afterwards, which was pretty different (super low budget). It was decent but that's about it. Both were on youtube. I'd love to see BSD on a big screen!

Oh yeah, early this year I saw "Dracula AD 1972", which was quite good. Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, and Caroline Munro. So yeah right off the bat (pun intended) I was sold. The plot was silly 70s Cultsploitation and there was some nice cinematography and I remember it being fun!

Prince Vlad's scream after he drives his sword into the cross is not the voice of Gary Oldman. Lux Interior, lead singer of punk band The Cramps, recorded the scream and it was dubbed in.

From BSD's IMDb trivia

no way

that's awesome. I need to rewatch it, it's been years

Bela Lugosi playing Jesus Christ in a Hungarian stage play, 1916 pic.twitter.com/g9s0oq98Zy

— Diane Doniol-Valcroze (@ddoniolvalcroze) July 6, 2020

you drink his blood, he drinks yours

I've seen a lot of Dracula films (and a couple of TV series), the only one I came away from satisfied that it had truly lived up to its potential was Love At First Bite.

I decided to revisit the old vampire movies, so a few weeks ago, watched both Nosferatu (Murnau version of course), and Dracula (Browning). Nosferatu I've seen in recent years, Dracula not since I was 7 years old and watched it w/ my dad.

Nosferatu I loved about as much as normal, but was surprisingly disappointed in Browning's Dracula, was completely underwhelmed. it had its moments, naturally, but every so often I'd get sucked back out of it, and the ending just stunk.

decided to read the Stoker novel, and just finished. and now I think I've figured it out.

obv the Browning Dracula is essentially the stage adaptation, and not really the novel itself, and I feel like it gets the essence of Dracula completely wrong. I think Lugosi gives a masterful performance for what he was asked to do, but I think the interpretation of the character was off.

Lugosi plays him as a bit of a charmer, a villain who hides in plain sight, who can hide his misdeeds by creating a deceptive public persona. he actually shows up at an opera, introduces himself to Seward, Mina, and Lucy, and flat out announces his new abbey is right next to the asylum. He bites someone on a crowded street, leaving their body on the street with tons of witnesses seeing the body lying in the street moments after it happens.

This is a problem because IT MAKES IT WAY TOO EASY TO DEFEAT HIM. which kills all of the suspense. Dracula in the novel goes to great lengths to conceal his presence, starting by sealing Harker up in Castle Dracula (from which Harker is extremely lucky to escape). also disguising himself as a wolf when his boat docks, so that nobody knows he's there. buys several properties under fake names, and though he's been seen in public, nobody really knows who he is - he's just a physical description. mostly he just reveals himself to his victims. he is much more ruthless and when discovered usually just threatens people until they shit themselves.

so whereas Van Helsing has to slowly piece together who the 'king vampire' is, most of which comes from Jonathan Harker's unexpected resurfacing and his journal, in the movie he figures it out in about 5 minutes, because Dracula loudly and obnoxiously showed up in town right as the weird shit started happening, he exhibits odd behavior, says weird things like "to die, to REALLY be dead, that must be glorious". Dracula keeps showing up everywhere! the asylum, the Harker household, it's like he took out a sign that says "YO MOTHERFUCKER INVESTIGATE ME".

in the book, he spreads his boxes of earth across several properties so that even if anybody know who he was, they wouldn't know where he was sleeping. eventually going back home to Transylvania to escape (unsuccessfully). in the movie, dude literally puts all of his boxes of earth at Carfax Abbey, which is right next door to the asylum, so at the end as sun is coming up he goes on a game of hide 'n seek, running to the place everybody knows he lives, and gets into his coffin, and is whacked moments later (with a fairly pathetic series of groans).

just kinda sucks cos some of the moments, like Lugosi's trance-inducing stare, the boat trip to London, his appearances in Mina's room are all great, but then the life gets sucked out of it moments later.

going to watch the Jourdan BBC version next.

Looking forward to ye thoughts on the Jourdan. It’s my favorite after Murnau.

Speaking of Jo(u)rdan and vampires I rewatched “ Byzantium” last night after many years and … wow! What an excellent though misshapen vampire film. It stays with you.

What I like best about the original "Dracula" is that Bela plays him as not so much scary and more just pitiable and awkward.

Have you seen the 1931 Spanish-language version? Some people rave about it, but Carlos Villarias in the title role makes Lon Chaney in Son of Dracula look suave.

I've owned it for decades but could never muster up the enthusiasm.

Not sure if you were motivated to watch Nosferatu because it was on the film club thread last week, probably a happy coincidence.

I would agree that it's one of the strongest versions, but would add that I think the book is a bit of a curate's egg too. the first half is wonderful, but the second half seems to be largely made up of lifeless characters writing long letters about how they had a meeting and how wonderful another boring character is. Aside from possibly Van Helsing, the characters are so thinly drawn it’s sometimes breathtaking. Quincy, for example, has the defining feature of being American, and that’s pretty much it. Lucy is the worst though, surely the most insipid personality ever put on a page (and praised to the heavens for being braindead in such a delicate, ladylike way) - she only gains any character when she is killed and brought back as a vampire, only for the others to be physically repulsed by her passion to the point of driving a stake through her heart. I’m sure there has been a great deal written about what this says about Stoker’s view of female sexuality, none of it very positive.

So I think there's a definite correlation between the amount of time spent on this second half and the success of the film. Nosferatu does the second half in less than 30 mins and cuts the meetings and letters entirely, which is perfect. The Browning version goes the other way and spends an hour on boring country house gentlemen bullshit, spoiling a fine first section. Fisher is truer to the book, but at least tries to make the second half fun. And of course there are a load of other versions.

I agree the Browning Dracula tends towards the creaky.

I've never seen the Spanish version, apparently there's more different than just the language?

It'll suck, but I like the idea of the upcoming latest big budget Dracula comeback wannabe that focuses entirely on the boat voyage.

I think one brilliant part of Nosferatu is how nobody knows what Orlok is doing because they attribute all of the deaths to plague.

I think this was also the vehicle that introduced the idea of sunlight killing a vampire.

great revive. i rewatched Browning's Dracula 3 or 4 years ago close to Halloween alongside other classic Universal monster movies. in that context, it was a clear standout but my memory of it is a little vague. now i wanna see all the Dracula movies.

i just started the Christopher Lee "Horror of Dracula" last night (got too sleepy to finish). already seems bonkers.

admittedly I'm mostly watching it so I can see it's sequel because of Dracula having no dialogue other than hissing (backstory is Christopher Lee claims he had dialogue and said "if you think I'm saying that dreck you're insane")

*its

Channel 4 had a vampire films season sometime in the late 90s and I taped most of them, so have seen especially most of the Hammer films multiple times.

but the one I've rewatched most is Love At First Bite. & am not ashamed of myself.