"These days, vampires are a massively important part of the pop culture landscape. Not only are they a staple in horror and fantasy fiction, but they are, perhaps unarguably, the sexiest of all monsters. Even if you're a furry and are super, aggressively onboard with werewolves, you can't sit there and tell me that you wouldn't prefer a profoundly hirsute vampire."
-AUBREY SITTERSON
You know the only thing scarier than a blood sucking vampire to a bunch of old Victorian dudes?
FEMALE SEXUALITY!
DEAR GOD SAVE US ALL!!!
The dashing, mysterious Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi), after hypnotizing a British soldier, Renfield (Dwight Frye!, into his mindless slave, travels to London and takes up residence in an old castle. Soon Dracula begins to wreak havoc, sucking the blood of young women and turning them into vampires. When he sets his sights on Mina, the daughter of a prominent doctor, vampire-hunter Van Helsing is enlisted to put a stop to the count's never-ending bloodlust.
Bram Stoker's novel had already been filmed without permission as Nosferatu in 1922 by German Expressionist filmmaker F. W. Murnau. Stoker's widow sued for plagiarism and copyright infringement, and the courts decided in her favor, essentially ordering that all prints of Nosferatu be destroyed. Carl Laemmle Jr. also saw the box office potential in Stoker's gothic chiller, and he legally acquired the novel's film rights. So this isn't really the first movie based on Dracula, but this movie is a thousand times more watchable than Nosferateau.
Damn near every possible stereotype about Dracula in film comes from this movie. The way he talks, the flowing red robes, sleeping in coffins, turning into a bat, his hypnotic gaze, everything. When you think of Dracula, what you are really thinking of is Lugosi's incredible performance as the creepy count. But one good character isn't enough to make a good movie, and i was somewhat surprised to find how awesome the whole movie is. Initially Browning wanted Dracula to be a spectacle on a scale with the lavish silent films The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923) and The Phantom of the Opera (1925), and although this movie isn't quite as lavish as Phantom its still packed with interesting settings and incredible directing. A small Transylvania town, a MASSIVE castle, a big ship in an even bigger storm, an opera house, an operating theater, an insane asylum, and so many more crazy locations all in beautiful black and white.
not only does this movie look beautiful, its has a lovely bomb under the table suspense to it to the point where i found it easy to get invested in these characters. Dwight Fry is one of my favorite actors ever, and watching him go from a normal dude to raving lunatic is possibly my favorite thing about this movie.
i could ramble on and on about all the small details that make this movie so damn good, or i could just say this whole movie is awesome if your really eager for a deep dive into this movies motifs and themes, check SparkNotes.
10/10
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