New, Gothic "Dracula" Airs Sunday Night

[Gerard]

I tried watching it, on and off, and it just did not grab me.  I eventually turned to "American Dad."

Gerard

[Julia99]

I didn't know Toby Stevens was Maggie Smith's son!

His father was Maggie's 1st husband, Sir Robert Stephens.  But they divorced when the two sons were quite young and both her sons have said her 2nd husband, Beverly Cross (to whom she was actually engaged prior to marrying Stephens) was more their "dad".

[Josette]

I thought it was pretty weird - didn't care for it.  I really don't see why they needed to invent the syphillis story.  It didn't make much sense to me and it seems that if they want to incorporate that into a vampire story, they could write their own instead of pretending it's Dracula.  I'd say it's the worst version of the story I've encountered.

[Philippe Cordier]

I agree with MB that the program had a good visual style, and the music helped create tension.  The castle on the hill, though, immediately reminded me of the fake model "Collinwood" used in the opening credits of the 1991 DS revival series.

I'm glad I was forewarned that this wasn't a close adaptation of the novel.  As a new interpretation, it had some good moments and interesting backstory to some of the characters.

Overall, I didn't care much for the way Dracula was portrayed.  He was very creepy at the beginning, something along the lines of "Nosferatu," rather than following Stoker's descriptions.  I thought both the early scenes and the youthful Dracula might have owed something to the Coppola version (in my view, the worst version).  They also seemed to borrow the twisted idea from that movie that staking Lucy was a substitute for having sex with her.

I managed to miss the sex scene between Dracula and Lucy so will have to watch my tape of it sometime.

The part about the occult worshippers owed its inspiration to one of the Christopher Lee/Hammer "Dracula" movies, I forget which one.

The movie really lost me the first time Dracula ripped off someone's head, and I was hoping it wouldn't happen again, but it did.  That seemed more like something a horror movie monster would do, not Stoker's warrior count.

And I actually thought the last scene with the aged Dracula hiding among the street people was kind of lame.

Nevertheless, as a stand-alone movie, I enjoyed it over all, but I wouldn't rate it as a good version of the novel.  I wish they would have given it some other title than "Dracula," which was so misleading.  And the trailer had the best scenes.

[Gothick]

Hi Vlad, Dracula was first associated with the Black Mass in Hammer's 1969 classic "Taste the Blood of Dracula" (now available in a truly gorgeous DVD which *radically* altered my opinion of this film--the photog is simply stunning).  They repeated this theme in subsequent films, notably "Dracula A. D. 1972" and "The Satanic Rites of Dracula."

The sexualization of Lucy's staking is in the original book, in a very sick and twisted way.  Bram Stoker seems to have had some serious issues around his own sexuality.  Granted, in the book they did not stage Lucy's staking in the over-the-top way that it was done in this new movie.  That truly was gratuitous to the point of being laughable.

Although I enjoyed watching it, there were a number of sequences where I had no idea how the actors got through their scenes without falling about in helpless laughter at the idiocy of the proceedings.

I look forward to seeing Marc Warren in future work of a better calibre.  He's in an episode of the new Dr. Who series I haven't had time to watch yet.

G.

[Philippe Cordier]

I really don't see why they needed to invent the syphillis story.  It didn't make much sense to me

I think they brought in the syphilis angle because some biographers have speculated that Stoker might have had it, though there's no evidence.  (Nice how biographers like to speculate.)

I liked Warren simply because he played the part with a different twist.  Since so little of the dialogue or story from the book was used, it made it easier to accept Dracula being very different from how he was described in the book.

Which is not to say that Marc Warren wasn't an interesting casting choice, and I'd be interested in seeing more of his work.  He has quite a list of credits, mostly for British television.

I actually thought certain scenes may have owed a debt to Dark Shadows. Mina and Lucy's meeting with Dracula on the Whitby cliffs, for one.  (I don't think they actually filmed in Whitby.  For my money, Dan Curtis' use of Whitby locations was really quite imaginative in his version of this tale.)

I don't remember Dan Curtis using Whitby locations.  Are you sure you're not thinking of the earlier BBC version with Louis Jourdan?  They did use location filming in Whitby for that one.

[Julia99]

I thought it was pretty weird - didn't care for it.  I really don't see why they needed to invent the syphillis story.  It didn't make much sense to me and it seems that if they want to incorporate that into a vampire story, they could write their own instead of pretending it's Dracula.  I'd say it's the worst version of the story I've encountered.

I've understood that scholarly types think the whole story is about syphillis really---not due to Stoker per say but hypersensitivity (or paranoia) in Victorian society at the time--

[MsCriseyde]

I've understood that scholarly types think the whole story is about syphillis really---not due to Stoker per say but hypersensitivity (or paranoia) in Victorian society at the time--

Same here. I'm not a Victorianist, but I have friends who are. (I'm not a doctor, but I play one on tv.  ) I've heard the story discussed in this context before.

[arashi]

Mina seemed to have been inspired by the portrayal of Mina in the comic book series, The League of extraordinary gentlemen (not to be confused with the disastrous film of the same title).

I see I am not the only one who weeps at Mina's character depiction in TLOEG movie vs. the comic. I did enjoy the movie as a seperate entity, I thought Nemo was the shit, but it couldn't hold a candle to the original.

I was intrigued by the comic's [spoiler]depiction of Dracula's bite as appearing that he had tried to gnaw her neck off as an animal would, compared to the standard two bite puncture wound effect.[/spoiler]

[Gothick]

Well honestly Arashi, I haven't even seen the movie of the League--everything I have read about it makes me want to vomit, so why lacerate myself with the actual experience.  I asked my roommate whether Stuart Townsend removed his clothing because, if he had (particularly if he had displayed full frontal nudity), there might have been SOME incentive to see it, but, no dice.  I gather the movie was geared towards thirteen year old mall rats with videogame fetishes.

I also found it fascinating how in the comic books

[spoiler]Mina's neck wounds had not healed after the vampire's destruction.  It made me wonder whether Alan Moore had considered doing a Dracula story somewhere down the line.  It WAS one of the great moments of sheer shock when Mina's unveiling occurred--in circumstances that were already shocking to the max!  Of course, if one recalls the description of Dracula's TUSKS in the original novel, it isn't surprising that the marks he would leave would be hideous, mauling scars, rather than the discreet little holes of the classic films... In the novel, did one of the characters describe the throat marks as being "two little wounds, white with red centers"--this line is given to van Helsing in the original Lugosi film.[/spoiler]

I do go on, don't I?

G.

[Mysterious Benefactor]

geared towards thirteen year old mall rats with videogame fetishes.

Isn't almost everything mainstream geared to that demographic? Thoughtful films that actually challenge their audience almost have to be seeked out in secret back alley theaters/video stores like the porn films of yore.    Though it's not really a laughing matter. But I digress...

[arashi]

I also found it fascinating how in the comic books
[spoiler]Mina's neck wounds had not healed after the vampire's destruction.  It made me wonder whether Alan Moore had considered doing a Dracula story somewhere down the line.  It WAS one of the great moments of sheer shock when Mina's unveiling occurred--in circumstances that were already shocking to the max!  Of course, if one recalls the description of Dracula's TUSKS in the original novel, it isn't surprising that the marks he would leave would be hideous, mauling scars, rather than the discreet little holes of the classic films... In the novel, did one of the characters describe the throat marks as being "two little wounds, white with red centers"--this line is given to van Helsing in the original Lugosi film.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]I took it that at the end of the second series that Allan Quartermain had hunted Dracula down and destroyed him as Mina's neck wounds suddenly disappeared. But perhaps there was some other reason? There's a 3rd league series in the works, apparently due for release this October.[/spoiler]