Dracula Review – Luc Besson’s Love-Struck Reinterpretation of the Gothic Classic is Outlandish but Engaging

Perhaps audiences aren’t clamoring for an updated adaptation of Dracula from Luc Besson, the French maestro for polished extravagance. However, it’s worth noting: his richly designed love story with vampires boasts bold vision and flair – and with its B-movie charm, it could be preferable compared with the recent, stately interpretation by Robert Eggers of Nosferatu. A few strange elements appear, like a particular moment that appears to show a geographic divide between France and Romania.

Waltz as a Humorously Exhausted Priest Tracking the Undead

Christoph Waltz plays a clever but beleaguered vampire-hunting priest – it feels natural for him to tackle this role before – who finds himself in Paris in 1889 during the centennial of the French Revolution. So does 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 in the Despicable Me films. This character he seemed destined to play.

The Story: A Chronicle of Longing

Here’s the premise: Dracula has traveled ceaselessly the earth in anguish for 400 years after his transformation into a vampire, a penalty for his irreligious grief after the passing of his beloved Elisabeta (a movie debut role for Zoë Bleu, daughter of Rosanna Arquette). The count has been searching, searching, searching for a female who would be the return of his deceased partner. As ill fortune would have it, the lucky lady is revealed as Mina (again played by Bleu), the reserved future wife of Dracula’s feeble property handler, Jonathan Harker (Ewens Abid), who just traveled to Dracula’s fortress to negotiate his real estate holdings and whose miniature portrait of the winsome Mina drew the vampire’s attention.

The Filmmaker’s Approach and Comic Flair

Besson arranges Dracula’s middle-section history of global roaming wearing flamboyant outfits confidently, and he doesn’t shy away from giving us some comedy moments in the style of Mel Brooks – like the count’s repeated and futile attempts to kill himself following Elisabeta’s passing, in addition to absurd moments that occur when Dracula sprays himself using a particular scent in 18th-century Florence, which makes him unavoidably attractive to females. Absurd yet engaging.

Dracula is available digitally from 1 December and for physical purchase from December 22nd. It will be shown in Australian cinemas starting February 5, 2026.