Dracula Review – The French Director’s Passionate Revamp of the Timeless Gothic Tale is Outlandish but Entertaining

It’s possible there is no great enthusiasm for an updated adaptation of Dracula from Luc Besson, the French maestro for polished extravagance. Still, one must admit: his lavishly upholstered vampire romance has ambition and panache – and with its B-movie charm, I’m not sure I wouldn’t prefer to it to Eggers’s dignified recent take of Nosferatu. A few strange elements appear, like a particular moment that seems to depict a geographic divide between France and Romania.

Waltz as a Witty Yet Careworn Priest Tracking the Undead

Christoph Waltz embodies a humorous yet burdened cleric fighting vampires – it feels natural for him to tackle this role before – who arrives in Paris in 1889 to mark the 100th anniversary of the French Revolution. The same goes for the evil Count Dracula, enacted by the body-horror veteran Caleb Landry Jones with a mangled central European accent reminiscent of Steve Carell’s Gru from the Despicable Me comedies. This character that he too was born to take on.

The Plot: A Saga of Heartbreak

The story is this: the vampire lord has wandered endlessly the earth in sorrow for hundreds of years since he became undead, a penalty due to his blasphemous mourning after the passing of his spouse Elisabeta (an inaugural screen appearance for Zoë Bleu, Rosanna Arquette’s child). The count has sought relentlessly for a lady who could be the return of his lost love. By cruel fate, the lucky lady proves to be Mina (again played by Bleu), the modest betrothed of Dracula’s wimpish land agent, Jonathan Harker (enacted by Ewens Abid), who lately visited to the vampire’s estate to negotiate his property portfolio and the tiny painting of the lovely Mina drew the vampire’s attention.

Besson’s Direction and Comic Flair

Besson organizes Dracula’s flashback sequence of worldwide travels wearing flamboyant outfits with a sure hand, and he is not above giving us some comedy moments with a distinctly Mel Brooks flavour – like the vampire’s constant unsuccessful tries to kill himself after Elisabeta’s death, along with comical sequences that follow Dracula douses himself using a particular scent in 18th-century Florence, which makes him unavoidably attractive to females. Outlandish but entertaining.

Dracula is available digitally starting December 1st and on DVD and Blu-ray from 22 December. It screens in Australian cinemas beginning on the fifth of February, 2026.