Critic Reviews

The story of Bram Stoker’s Dracula is so well-known that it’s hard to find a new angle. That is, unless you’re Luc Besson and you go back to the book’s inspiration, and present Dracula as a lost soul in need of forgiveness and redemption. And, refreshingly, that’s exactly what you get in this film.

Besson’s film is a magnificent achievement. More romance than terror and more faith than devilry, this film is sure to pull the heartstrings.

Unlike Robert Eggers’ 2024 “Nosferatu,” which was beautiful but bleak to look at and featured an ugly, fearsome vampire, Besson imbues his main character with a swashbuckling sexiness that suits his star’s craggy appeal.

Luc Besson's Dracula is weird. Really weird, borderline nonsensical at certain points. That being said, its great take on its title character is enough to call this one of the Leon: The Professional and The Fifth Element filmmaker's strongest in recent years. It takes a lot of swings, and while not all of them hit, it nails the stake in the heart of what makes this story so timeless and special.

Perhaps there is no great enthusiasm out there for a new version of Dracula from Luc Besson, the French maestro of glossiness and bloat. And yet it has to be said: his lavishly upholstered vampire romance has ambition and panache – and in all its Hammer-y cheesiness, I’m not sure I wouldn’t prefer to it to Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu.

On the heels of several other Dracula-based films in very recent memory, Luc Besson’s take on the story doesn't do enough to set itself apart, despite its fair share of weird comedic moments.

Cheese and kitsch, with smatterings of blood and decapitated heads, are all on the menu in Dracula, which is a watchable if totally ludicrous version of the Stoker story. At best, the movie is another showcase for the always-interesting-to-watch Caleb Landry Jones.

The movie’s intermittent flippancy is its lifeblood, with Christoph Waltz’s cheeky vampire hunter delighting even when he seems to be off doing his own thing.

If the legend of Dracula has become tired through overuse, there is certainly nothing in this iteration to grant the old Count a new lease on life.

Besson doesn’t build up the romantic emotion he apparently aspires to with his efforts, but “Dracula” gets by on the power of his (and Landry’s) conviction.