🔗 Share this article Dracula Review – Besson’s Romantic Reimagining of the Timeless Gothic Tale is Ridiculous but Entertaining It’s possible there is no great enthusiasm for an updated adaptation of Dracula from Luc Besson, the filmmaker known for stylish excess. However, it has to be said: his lavishly upholstered vampire romance has ambition and panache – and in all its Hammer-y cheesiness, it could be preferable compared with Eggers’s dignified recent take of Nosferatu. There are some very bizarre touches, including one shot that appears to show a geographic divide between France and Romania. Christoph Waltz as a Witty Yet Careworn Vampire-Hunting Priest Christoph Waltz plays a humorous yet burdened man of the church pursuing the undead – I can’t believe he hasn’t played such a part earlier – who ends up in Paris in 1889 to mark the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. So does the malevolent vampire count, played by the expert in grotesque roles Caleb Landry Jones speaking in a twisted regional dialect evoking the voice of Gru by Steve Carell in the Despicable Me films. It’s a role suits him perfectly. The Narrative: A Tale of Love and Loss The story is this: the count has been restlessly roaming the world in torment for 400 years since he became undead, a punishment for his irreligious grief after the passing of his beloved Elisabeta (a movie debut role for Zoë Bleu, daughter of Rosanna Arquette). Dracula has sought relentlessly for some woman who might be the reincarnation of his lost love. As ill fortune would have it, the chosen woman turns out to be Mina (also Bleu, of course), the demure fiancee of Dracula’s feeble property handler, Jonathan Harker (Ewens Abid), who has recently been to the vampire’s estate to review his real estate holdings and the small picture of the charming Mina attracted Dracula’s gaze. Besson’s Direction and Comic Flair Besson structures Dracula’s second-act backstory of global roaming wearing flamboyant outfits confidently, and he willingly includes offering some comedy moments with a distinctly Mel Brooks flavour – like the count’s repeated and futile attempts to end his own life following Elisabeta’s passing, as well as farcical scenes that result after Dracula douses himself in a certain perfume during the 1700s in Florence, which causes him to be compelling to the opposite sex. Ridiculous and watchable. Dracula is available digitally starting December 1st and in disc format from December 22nd. It screens in Australian cinemas starting February 5, 2026.