Dracula Review – The French Director’s Love-Struck Reinterpretation of the Timeless Gothic Tale is Outlandish but Entertaining

Maybe interest is limited for a fresh take of Dracula from Luc Besson, the French maestro for stylish excess. And yet, one must admit: his lavishly upholstered romantic vampire tale has ambition and panache – and in all its Hammer-y cheesiness, it could be preferable compared with Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu. There are some very bizarre touches, like a particular moment that appears to show a land border between France and Romania.

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

Christoph Waltz portrays a clever but beleaguered man of the church pursuing the undead – it’s surprising he never took on such a part earlier – who ends up in Paris in 1889 for the French Revolution centenary celebrations. So does the evil Count Dracula, enacted by the seasoned horror actor Caleb Landry Jones using a distorted Eastern European tone evoking Steve Carell’s Gru from the Despicable Me comedies. This character he seemed destined to play.

The Plot: A Saga of Heartbreak

The plot unfolds as follows: the count has been restlessly roaming the world in anguish over four centuries following his rise as one of the undead, a penalty due to his blasphemous mourning over the death of his beloved Elisabeta (an inaugural screen appearance for Zoë Bleu, Rosanna Arquette’s child). Dracula has been searching, searching, searching for a lady who might be the reincarnation of his lost love. By cruel fate, the fortunate female turns out to be Mina (also Bleu, of course), the reserved future wife of Dracula’s wimpish land agent, Jonathan Harker (enacted by Ewens Abid), who lately visited to the vampire’s estate to review his real estate holdings and whose miniature portrait of the winsome Mina caught the count’s hooded eye.

Besson’s Handling and Comic Flair

Besson arranges Dracula’s middle-section history of global roaming sporting extravagant attire with a sure hand, and he is not above offering funny bits reminiscent of Mel Brooks – such as Dracula’s ongoing failed efforts to kill himself post-Elisabeta’s demise, along with absurd moments that occur when Dracula applies to himself with a specific fragrance in 18th-century Florence, which makes him compelling to the opposite sex. Outlandish but entertaining.

Dracula is on digital platforms starting December 1st and in disc format starting the twenty-second of December. It will be shown in Australian cinemas from 5 February 2026.