My Review of Dracula (2025)

 

Written And Directed by Luc Benson

Vlad: "Do you think God will forgive us for loving each other so much?"

Elisabeta: "God is love. He understands. And if he doesn't - he can go to hell."

Did anyone want a French remake of Bram Stoker's Dracula? Well, even if you didn't, that's exactly what this movie more or less amounted to. 

It might sound like I'm complaining but I'm actually not. Well, not really. First of all, point to Caleb Landry Jones because he's one of the actors that I never would've considered for the role of Dracula but he's a very good choice here.

The movie started off with Vlad the Impaler. He's besotted with his lady love, Elisabeta (Zoë Bleu). He's off to fight the Ottoman Army and while that happened, Elisabeta tragically died and Vlad denounced his own religion and became Dracula.

Cut to the next four hundred years where Dracula was working over time to find a reincarnated version of his beloved. Of course that would happen upon eventually coming into contact with Mina Murray (Zoë Bleu). However, it's his interactions with Jonathan Harker (Ewens Abid).

I love that Jonathan managed to avoid death by getting Dracula to talk about his love life. It certainly bought Jonathan enough time to escape as Dracula made the moves on Mina. Again, there's solid enough chemistry between the two of them.

Throw in some familiar characters but renamed - Dumont (Guillaume de Tonquédec), Maria (Matilda De Angelis), The Priest (Christoph Waltz) and Henry Spencer (David Shields) and you've got the usuals aiding or trying to stop Dracula. The conclusion isn't new but it's executed well.

- Those CGI gargoyles that were assisting Dracula looked rubbish but funny. 

- They really styled the aged up Dracula exactly like Gary Oldman's version.

- Standout music: Frederic Chopin's Nocturne No15 in F minor Op55 No1 DG.

- Chronology: 1480 AD Eastern Europe and 1889 Paris, France.

Dracula (2025) isn't the most innovative of takes of the infamous Count but it's engaging enough with a strong performance from Caleb Landry Jones and solid direction from Luc Besson.

Rating: 7 out of 10