#85: DRACULA (1931)

 

THRILL SCALE 1-10

7

HAVE I SEEN IT BEFORE?

No, first time

BEST SEQUENCE

The first official meeting between Dracula and Renfield, on the steps in his castle

BEST LINE

Dracula: "This is very old wine. I hope you will like it."
Renfield: "Aren't you drinking?"
Dracula: "I never drink...wine."

- You can practically hear Dracula's urge to nudge and wink at Renfield in this line.

ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE

94%

ROTTEN TOMATOES CRITICS CONSENSUS

"Bela Lugosi's timeless portrayal of Dracula in this creepy and atmospheric 1931 film has set the standard for major vampiric roles since."

IMDB SYNOPSIS

"Transylvanian vampire Count Dracula bends a naive real estate agent to his will, then takes up residence at a London estate where he sleeps in his coffin by day and searches for potential victims by night."

THOUGHTS

• This movie is, of course, iconic. Bela Lugosi's performance as Dracula is so famous, so influential, that I felt like I had a pretty good idea of what to expect despite this being my first viewing. He was great to watch, with his creepy stare and his commanding voice and presence
• I also thought Dwight Frye as Renfield was a lot of fun, at least after he went insane and started chewing the scenery like his life depended on it. In the beginning, before he was turned by Dracula, he was kind of annoying
• I also really liked the face-to-face confrontations between Dracula and Van Helsing
• My favourite part of the movie was probably the first 20 minutes. The sets and the scenery around Dracula's castle were amazing, and his introduction was great. The movie had some really drawn-out action, a more modern movie probably wouldn't be as patient to just show things like Dracula descending a flight of stairs, but at least in the Transylvania scenes, the visuals were interesting enough that I never felt bored
• Side note, my whole life I thought Transylvania was a fictional, made-up country, but I was wrong! It's actually a very real region in central Romania
• Once we got to England, though, I found myself a little bit less entertained. Dracula was still creepy, and Renfield was crazy, and I liked Van Helsing, but the multiple scenes which took place in proper English drawing rooms were just less interesting than the ones set in a vampire's castle
• A seminal movie like this gets bonus points just for paving the way for everything that would come after it. I said similar things about Night of the Living Dead. I enjoyed watching Dracula, but it is now 90 years old, and it shows. It's a very short movie, at only 74 minutes, and it felt like it ended extremely abruptly. Lugosi did indeed have a hypnotic stare, and there were some effective shots of Dracula staring directly into the camera with just his eyes lit up, but these shots just kept being used again and again, diminishing their effectiveness. The fake bat special effects are pretty silly, but endearingly so. And finally, something that struck me as very jarring, the movie didn't have a score. Philip Glass was commissioned in 1998 to retroactively write one, but at least the version I saw had absolutely no background music except for during the opening credits. This was especially odd to my modern sensibilities when something sudden and surprising happened, like Dracula seeing a crucifix and shielding himself. In scenes like this I could almost hear the dramatic musical sting we'd expect to have in a modern movie
• But all of that being said, Dracula is a classic for a reason, and Lugosi's performance has been the one to beat for 90 years. If you haven't seen it, definitely watch it to see where it all began, and to see the actor who imprinted this character on the public consciousness. Just don't be surprised if it feels just a little old-fashioned

Up next: Poltergeist from 1982