Marc Warren, Sophia Myles, David Suchet
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
Plot Summary:
In this version the plot centers around Lord Arthur Holmwood (Dans Stevens), who after his engagement to the beautiful Lucy Westenra (Sophia Myles), discover that his father immoral, lustful life has given him syphilis (he contacted the illeness in his bieth and so did his mother who as we are informed killed herself). He neither wishes to expose Lucy to the deadly decease nor break up their engangement and so he joines a weird, obscur cult who promises that can give him a cure if he brings Dracula to England.
The latest production of Dracula is or had the potential of being a very interesting take on the very well none story of Count Dracula, but it failes miserably. I mean he had the actors, the costumes, the amazing settings and a good story, but somehow they managed to destroy everything.
I do not care that they have altered the original story. I actually though that concetrating on Arthur and Lucy was a very nice and original idea and the syphilis angle could have been great if they bothered to actually work those ideas. I mean it's like they had an idea and somewhere in the middle decided that they should have better stayed close to Bram Stoker's Dracula but they had filmed half ot the mini series and they didn't want to waste their money, so they changed the script somewhere in the middle. Usually I'd rather prefer that the movies stay close to the books, but I am not against re imagining something if you do it right.
The one good thing about this production was Lucy (Sophia Myles). She is so beautiful and sexy that you understand why Dracula goes for her first. Her sex scene with the Count is quite hot and it has something that reminded me of good, old Hammer Horror films (and I seriously could have lived with seeing Sophia Myles naked boddy) despite the fact that I seriously didn't like Marc Warren as Dracula. Neither he is handsome nor charming and personally I don't think that he contributed anything to the part. As far as his acting is concerned it was rather bad and not at all convincing as Dracula. He was more like a thirty year old guy with anger management issues. Plus, the dirty nales were very disgusting.
Mina, on the other hand, was pretty in a very innocent way as you expect her to be and I believe that she had a lot of potential but her time wasn't enough and her role as it was written was weak. She wasn't able to be the leading lady after Lucy's death, but in my personal opinion this happens because they have diminished her importance for both the movie and Dracula, so his sudden attention to her seems somewhat stranged and unexpected. The same thing happens with Van Helsing he doesn't quite fit this adaptation and he seems to be a stranger to the story.
The plot was weak and a lot of things were unexplained or silly. I mean how is it possible that Arthur couldn't postpone the wedding due to Lucy's persistant, but he was able to resist the amazingly beautiful and hot Lucy, with whom is desperately in love, when she attemps to seduce him? Or how is it possible for dracula to be so fascinated with a single photo of Mina? Francis Ford Copolla's Dracula was reminded of his late wife Elizabetha and that is why he had that reaction, what is this guy's excuse. And what about Jonathan's close? Why did he take those? I mean for goodness shake he good have better ones. Was this all the writers could think for his first meeting with Mina? And what about Van Helsing? They imprisoned him but they let him live. Why? They clearly wanted dead everyone who knew about Dracula's existance and true nature, so why does he lives?
To be fair, this is the first adaptation that portaits Lucy as something more than a frivolous flirt, but a real flesh and blodd woman whith real needs and desires and this is a good thing since I always though that Lucy was a far more interesting character than the holy, uninteresting, innocent Mina , but this is as fas as it goes. You can watch this if you have nothing better to do, but if you want a really good dracula movie you should try something else. If you like Sophia Myles as much as I do maybe you want considered it a total waste of time and if you are a costume lover you will enjoy them a lot since they are quite nice, especially women's dresses.
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
Plot Summary:
In this version the plot centers around Lord Arthur Holmwood (Dans Stevens), who after his engagement to the beautiful Lucy Westenra (Sophia Myles), discover that his father immoral, lustful life has given him syphilis (he contacted the illeness in his bieth and so did his mother who as we are informed killed herself). He neither wishes to expose Lucy to the deadly decease nor break up their engangement and so he joines a weird, obscur cult who promises that can give him a cure if he brings Dracula to England.
The latest production of Dracula is or had the potential of being a very interesting take on the very well none story of Count Dracula, but it failes miserably. I mean he had the actors, the costumes, the amazing settings and a good story, but somehow they managed to destroy everything.
I do not care that they have altered the original story. I actually though that concetrating on Arthur and Lucy was a very nice and original idea and the syphilis angle could have been great if they bothered to actually work those ideas. I mean it's like they had an idea and somewhere in the middle decided that they should have better stayed close to Bram Stoker's Dracula but they had filmed half ot the mini series and they didn't want to waste their money, so they changed the script somewhere in the middle. Usually I'd rather prefer that the movies stay close to the books, but I am not against re imagining something if you do it right.
The one good thing about this production was Lucy (Sophia Myles). She is so beautiful and sexy that you understand why Dracula goes for her first. Her sex scene with the Count is quite hot and it has something that reminded me of good, old Hammer Horror films (and I seriously could have lived with seeing Sophia Myles naked boddy) despite the fact that I seriously didn't like Marc Warren as Dracula. Neither he is handsome nor charming and personally I don't think that he contributed anything to the part. As far as his acting is concerned it was rather bad and not at all convincing as Dracula. He was more like a thirty year old guy with anger management issues. Plus, the dirty nales were very disgusting.
Mina, on the other hand, was pretty in a very innocent way as you expect her to be and I believe that she had a lot of potential but her time wasn't enough and her role as it was written was weak. She wasn't able to be the leading lady after Lucy's death, but in my personal opinion this happens because they have diminished her importance for both the movie and Dracula, so his sudden attention to her seems somewhat stranged and unexpected. The same thing happens with Van Helsing he doesn't quite fit this adaptation and he seems to be a stranger to the story.
The plot was weak and a lot of things were unexplained or silly. I mean how is it possible that Arthur couldn't postpone the wedding due to Lucy's persistant, but he was able to resist the amazingly beautiful and hot Lucy, with whom is desperately in love, when she attemps to seduce him? Or how is it possible for dracula to be so fascinated with a single photo of Mina? Francis Ford Copolla's Dracula was reminded of his late wife Elizabetha and that is why he had that reaction, what is this guy's excuse. And what about Jonathan's close? Why did he take those? I mean for goodness shake he good have better ones. Was this all the writers could think for his first meeting with Mina? And what about Van Helsing? They imprisoned him but they let him live. Why? They clearly wanted dead everyone who knew about Dracula's existance and true nature, so why does he lives?
To be fair, this is the first adaptation that portaits Lucy as something more than a frivolous flirt, but a real flesh and blodd woman whith real needs and desires and this is a good thing since I always though that Lucy was a far more interesting character than the holy, uninteresting, innocent Mina , but this is as fas as it goes. You can watch this if you have nothing better to do, but if you want a really good dracula movie you should try something else. If you like Sophia Myles as much as I do maybe you want considered it a total waste of time and if you are a costume lover you will enjoy them a lot since they are quite nice, especially women's dresses.
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