Dracula Movie Critique – The French Director’s Passionate Revamp of the Classic Horror Story is Absurd but Engaging

Perhaps there is no great enthusiasm for a new version of Dracula from Luc Besson, the filmmaker known for glossiness and bloat. Still, it has to be said: his opulently crafted romantic vampire tale has ambition and panache – and in all its Hammer-y cheesiness, I might just favor to it to the recent, stately interpretation by Robert Eggers of Nosferatu. A few strange elements appear, such as a scene that seems to depict a geographic divide between France and Romania.

Waltz as a Clever but Weary 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 finds himself in Paris in 1889 for the French Revolution centenary celebrations. So does the sinister Dracula, enacted by the seasoned horror actor Caleb Landry Jones with a mangled central European accent similar to the voice of Gru by Steve Carell in the Despicable Me films. This is a part that he too was born to take on.

The Story: A Chronicle of Longing

The story is this: Dracula has wandered endlessly the world in sorrow over four centuries following his rise as one of the undead, a consequence for his faithless sorrow after the passing of his wife, Elisabeta (a first film part for Zoë Bleu, daughter of Rosanna Arquette). The count has been searching, searching, searching for a female who might be the reincarnation of his departed beloved. Unfortunately, the fortunate female is revealed as Mina (also Bleu, of course), the demure fiancee of the count’s timid estate manager, Jonathan Harker (Ewens Abid), who just traveled to Dracula’s fortress to negotiate his real estate holdings and the tiny painting of the winsome Mina drew the vampire’s attention.

The Filmmaker’s Approach and Comic Flair

Besson structures Dracula’s flashback sequence of worldwide travels in various outrageous costumes skillfully, and he doesn’t shy away from giving us some comedy moments reminiscent of Mel Brooks – like Dracula’s ongoing failed efforts to commit suicide following Elisabeta’s passing, in addition to comical sequences that occur when Dracula douses himself with a specific fragrance in historic Florence, which causes him to be irresistible to women. Absurd yet engaging.

Dracula is available digitally starting December 1st and in disc format starting the twenty-second of December. It screens in Australian cinemas beginning on the fifth of February, 2026.