Dracula Movie Critique – Besson’s Passionate Reinterpretation of the Timeless Gothic Tale is Outlandish but Watchable
Maybe audiences aren’t clamoring for an updated adaptation of Dracula from Luc Besson, the celebrated French director for polished extravagance. And yet, one must admit: his richly designed romantic vampire tale has ambition and panache – and with its B-movie charm, it could be preferable to it to Eggers’s dignified recent take of Nosferatu. There are some very bizarre touches, including one shot that looks like it presents a geographic divide between France and Romania.
Christoph Waltz as a Clever but Weary Priest Tracking the Undead
Christoph Waltz plays a witty yet careworn cleric fighting vampires – it feels natural for him to tackle this role before – who arrives in Paris in 1889 during the centennial of the French Revolution. Likewise present is the sinister Dracula, brought to life by the expert in grotesque roles Caleb Landry Jones using a distorted Eastern European tone reminiscent of Steve Carell’s Gru of the Despicable Me series. This is a part suits him perfectly.
The Story: A Chronicle of Longing
The plot unfolds as follows: the vampire lord has been restlessly roaming the globe in sorrow for 400 years after his transformation into a vampire, a consequence for his faithless sorrow over the death of his beloved Elisabeta (a first film part for Zoë Bleu, daughter of Rosanna Arquette). Dracula has been searching, searching, searching for some woman who might be the rebirth of his deceased partner. As ill fortune would have it, the chosen woman turns out to be Mina (again played by Bleu), the demure fiancee of Dracula’s feeble property handler, Jonathan Harker (played by Ewens Abid), who lately visited to the count’s castle to review his land assets and whose miniature portrait of the winsome Mina caught the count’s hooded eye.
Besson’s Direction and Humorous Style
Besson organizes Dracula’s flashback sequence of worldwide travels sporting extravagant attire with a sure hand, and he doesn’t shy away from giving us funny bits in the style of Mel Brooks – for example the count’s repeated and futile attempts to commit suicide following Elisabeta’s passing, as well as comical sequences that follow Dracula sprays himself with a specific fragrance in 18th-century Florence, which causes him to be irresistible to women. Outlandish but entertaining.
Dracula is on digital platforms beginning on the first of December and in disc format starting the twenty-second of December. It screens in Australian cinemas from 5 February 2026.
