By Keri O’Shea
Bram Stoker’s Dracula was the direct antecedent of what is arguably the first horror film ever made, and in the best part of a century which has followed, it has remained a particularly fertile source for horror movie makers. By their very nature, the films which have followed have been variable; never, however, did I expect Dracula to manifest as a giant, cuddly CGI owl and make me laugh my gin through my nose. Dario Argento, sir – are you trolling us?
As the years roll on, I find it ever more difficult to accept any version of auteur theory where Dario Argento is concerned; sure, films like Suspiria and Tenebrae are savagely beautiful, innovative pieces of film, and nothing can take them away from us, but in later years – where Argento is ostensibly still in charge of proceedings only with more cash and more freedom – the quality of his output has generally declined. That said, I liked The Stendhal Syndrome a lot more than I expected, so hope sprang eternal that, however unfortunate the teaser trailer for Dracula seemed to be, it would be worth a watch. And I tried to enter into the spirit of things, I really did. It’s not that I simply want Argento to keep making films exactly like Suspiria; I don’t, and nor do I mind when a filmmaker changes their modus operandi – as long as what they go on to do actually works as a film, be it a scary film, or a charming film, or even a ‘so bad it’s good’ film. Sadly, Dario Argento’s Dracula is part Noah’s fucking Ark and part AA meeting, a huddle of slurring or disengaged actors wending their way through a random selection of vampiric beasties, bad fangs and sudden tits.
Sigh. Anyway, here’s the plot. We are, true to the novel, somewhere in the Carpathians; village girl Tania (Miriam Giovanelli) ignores her mother’s advice about locking up for the night and sneaks out for some hot Walpurgisnacht barn action with a married man (tsk!) before suffering an ignominious death by unbelievable owl/Dracula. Cue arrival of one Jonathan Harker (Unax Ugalde) to the village, a man from foreign parts who seems unlikely to understand the quaint local customs they have here, such as a group of men digging up the recently deceased Tania preparatory to staking her, allowing her to escape because they’re crap, and then brawling with one another. Still, Mr. Harker is in town for the happy occasion of starting a new job: he hopes to settle into his role as a librarian at Castle Dracula before wife Mina arrives, and he stops off to see their mutual friend Lucy (Asia Argento) before heading off for his first day.
It is literally minutes before Harker notices that Count Dracula – played by Liam Neeson Look-a-like Competition Winner Thomas Kretschmann – has no reflection. Oh, and Dracula’s ‘niece’ Tania, now a fixture at the castle since outwitting the witless village men, is a bit effing keen. Things go from bad to worse however when he gets ‘the bite’ and by the time Mina arrives in town, Jonathan is missing altogether. Will Mina recover him? Will Mina be safe? AND WHY THE FUCK IS THERE A SIX FOOT PRAYING MANTIS IN THIS?
It’s difficult to know what Argento must have been thinking of here, but possibly this is his attempt to render something akin to a Hammer Dracula film – the location, the costumes – only adding some characteristic profondo rosso into the mix because gore is cool and it always went down well in the Seventies, and then of course adding CGI, which, ahem, brings the film smack bang up to date. In fact, let’s have everything CGI. Want a wall in your film? Sure, you could film a boring fucking actual wall, even a few houses, or you could get them done up on one of them new-fangled computers! It’s the future. I’m not some rabid anti-CGI fangirl, by the way: I think that CGI when it is well-used is fine, but it works best when it conjures up the improbable, not the everyday, or if it must depict the everyday, you should hardly know it’s there. From the opening credits of this film, with the fake village fly-over putting me in mind of Atari ST adventure games from the late Eighties, I was dubious. When I saw that Argento had used real wolves but employed CGI for said village, I began to fear the worst, and I was right to do so. Every instance of CGI used in this film was jarring, pointless and stupid. It didn’t just take me out of the film, it made me want to take the film out of the player.
The CGI was a major player in the film’s laugh-out-loud moments throughout – the spider on its web which makes the Fulci tarantulas in The Beyond look positively believable, the werewolfpire attack, the owl, the mantis…but there are other things which made me laugh just as much, like the ‘You both look so happy!’ comment regarding Jonathan and Mina’s wedding portrait, as they’re there with faces like stone, and – sad to say – nearly all of the performances. Marta Gastini as Mina is one rare flash of competence here, whereas all of the other chief players seem embarrassed or stoned, even the great Rutger Hauer as a late-entrant Van Helsing. The appearance and aesthetic of Dracula is interesting at least, but not fully-developed thanks to unequal screen time and a poor script.
However, the absolute baffler here is what the hell has happened to Asia Argento in recent years. Perhaps her father has simply demanded too much of her during her acting career – he certainly seems to have a predilection for filming his own daughter’s tits which would get him on at least one special register here in the UK, let alone what he put her through in Stendhal – but it’s as if she is slowly atrophying. Her delivery has become…somehow stymied, occasionally even slurring. When she makes efforts to break out of that to enact Serious Things, it’s impossible to believe. It’s a bit of a worry.
Whilst it at least moves at a decent pace and doesn’t add insult to injury by lasting for much more than ninety minutes, it’s seriously difficult to say kind things about this film. Whilst you could get some mileage out of it during a group-viewing (i.e. take a shot every time it looks as if Asia has) it doesn’t go quite far enough to be utterly ludicrous. It has silly creatures but you know they’re not even there, it has a cast which should have been good but they look like they wish they weren’t there, and its cut ‘n’ shut Dracula plot is somewhere in the hinterland between earnestness and aimlessness. Let us hope against hope that this is the lowest ebb; if so, and provided someone hides all the computers from the director, then the only way from here, surely, is up.
Dracula di Dario Argento is available, if you must, from international sellers on Amazon.