Dracula Movie Critique – The French Director’s Romantic Revamp of the Timeless Gothic Tale is Absurd but Watchable

Perhaps interest is limited for a new version of Dracula from Luc Besson, the filmmaker known for glossiness and bloat. However, it has to be said: his richly designed romantic vampire tale has ambition and panache – and with its B-movie charm, I’m not sure I wouldn’t prefer to it to Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu. There are some very bizarre touches, such as a scene that looks like it presents a land border between France and Romania.

The Veteran Actor as a Clever but Weary Priest Tracking the Undead

Christoph Waltz portrays a witty yet careworn cleric fighting vampires – it feels natural for him to tackle such a part earlier – who ends up in Paris in 1889 during the centennial of the French Revolution. So does the evil Count Dracula, brought to life by the expert in grotesque roles Caleb Landry Jones with a mangled central European accent reminiscent of Steve Carell’s Gru of the Despicable Me series. It’s a role that he too was born to take on.

The Plot: A Tale of Love and Loss

The story is this: Dracula has been restlessly roaming the earth in sorrow for hundreds of years following his rise as one of the undead, a penalty for his irreligious grief over the death of his beloved Elisabeta (a first film part for Zoë Bleu, daughter of Rosanna Arquette). Dracula has been searching, searching, searching for a lady who could be the rebirth of his deceased partner. By cruel fate, the lucky lady turns out to be Mina (again played by Bleu), the modest betrothed of the count’s timid estate manager, Jonathan Harker (played by Ewens Abid), who has recently been to the vampire’s estate to review his property portfolio and the tiny painting of the charming Mina drew the vampire’s attention.

Besson’s Handling and Comic Flair

Besson organizes Dracula’s middle-section history of global roaming sporting extravagant attire confidently, and he willingly includes offering some comedy moments in the style of Mel Brooks – for example the count’s repeated and futile attempts to commit suicide following Elisabeta’s passing, as well as comical sequences that occur when Dracula applies to himself in a certain perfume in historic Florence, that renders him unavoidably attractive to females. Ridiculous and watchable.

Dracula is available digitally from 1 December and on DVD and Blu-ray starting the twenty-second of December. It plays in Australian cinemas starting February 5, 2026.