Dracula Movie Critique – Besson’s Love-Struck Reinterpretation of the Gothic Classic is Ridiculous but Watchable
It’s possible interest is limited for an updated adaptation of Dracula from Luc Besson, the French maestro for glossiness and bloat. And yet, it’s worth noting: his lavishly upholstered love story with vampires displays creativity and style – and in all its Hammer-y cheesiness, it could be preferable over Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu. There are some very bizarre touches, including one shot that seems to depict a geographic divide between France and Romania.
Waltz as a Witty Yet Careworn Vampire-Hunting Priest
Christoph Waltz portrays a clever but beleaguered cleric fighting vampires – I can’t believe he hasn’t played this character previously – who arrives in Paris in 1889 during the centennial of the French Revolution. The same goes for the sinister Dracula, played by the body-horror veteran Caleb Landry Jones with a mangled central European accent similar to Steve Carell’s Gru in the Despicable Me films. This character that he too was born to take on.
The Narrative: A Saga of Heartbreak
The plot unfolds as follows: the vampire lord has traveled ceaselessly the globe in sorrow over four centuries following his rise as one of the undead, a consequence due to his blasphemous mourning following the loss of his spouse Elisabeta (an inaugural screen appearance for Zoë Bleu, the offspring of Rosanna Arquette). Dracula has looked tirelessly for a lady who could be the reincarnation of his departed beloved. As ill fortune would have it, the fortunate female is revealed as Mina (again played by Bleu), the reserved future wife of Dracula’s feeble property handler, Jonathan Harker (played by Ewens Abid), who lately visited to Dracula’s fortress to review his real estate holdings and whose miniature portrait of the charming Mina drew the vampire’s attention.
Besson’s Handling and Comic Flair
Besson arranges Dracula’s middle-section history of worldwide travels sporting extravagant attire skillfully, and he is not above providing funny bits with a distinctly Mel Brooks flavour – such as the vampire’s constant unsuccessful tries to commit suicide following Elisabeta’s passing, in addition to absurd moments that follow Dracula applies to himself with a specific fragrance during the 1700s in Florence, that renders him compelling to the opposite sex. Ridiculous and watchable.
Dracula is on digital platforms from 1 December and in disc format from December 22nd. It screens in Australian cinemas from 5 February 2026.