Dracula Review – Luc Besson’s Romantic Reimagining of the Gothic Classic is Ridiculous but Entertaining

Perhaps audiences aren’t clamoring for a new version of Dracula from Luc Besson, the celebrated French director for polished extravagance. Still, it has to be said: his richly designed love story with vampires has ambition and panache – and with its B-movie charm, I might just favor to it to Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu. A few strange elements appear, including one shot that looks like it presents a land border between France and Romania.

Christoph Waltz as a Witty Yet Careworn Vampire-Hunting Priest

Christoph Waltz embodies a clever but beleaguered cleric fighting vampires – it feels natural for him to tackle such a part earlier – who finds himself in Paris in 1889 for the French Revolution centenary celebrations. The same goes for the evil Count Dracula, played by the expert in grotesque roles Caleb Landry Jones speaking in a twisted regional dialect similar to Steve Carell’s Gru from the Despicable Me comedies. This character that he too was born to take on.

The Narrative: A Chronicle of Longing

Here’s the premise: the count has traveled ceaselessly the world in sorrow for hundreds of years after his transformation into a vampire, a consequence for his irreligious grief after the passing of his spouse Elisabeta (an inaugural screen appearance for Zoë Bleu, daughter of Rosanna Arquette). Dracula has been searching, searching, searching for some woman who might be the rebirth of his deceased partner. As ill fortune would have it, the fortunate female is revealed as Mina (again played by Bleu), the modest betrothed of Dracula’s feeble property handler, Jonathan Harker (played by Ewens Abid), who lately visited to Dracula’s fortress to discuss his property portfolio and the small picture of the charming Mina caught the count’s hooded eye.

The Filmmaker’s Approach and Comic Flair

Besson structures Dracula’s middle-section history of international journeys in various outrageous costumes skillfully, and he is not above giving us funny bits with a distinctly Mel Brooks flavour – like the vampire’s constant unsuccessful tries to commit suicide after Elisabeta’s death, along with absurd moments that occur when Dracula applies to himself using a particular scent in historic Florence, which causes him to be irresistible to women. Outlandish but entertaining.

Dracula is available digitally beginning on the first of December and for physical purchase from 22 December. It will be shown in Australian cinemas beginning on the fifth of February, 2026.