Dracula Film Analysis – Besson’s Romantic Reimagining of the Classic Horror Story is Absurd but Engaging

It’s possible there is no great enthusiasm for a new version of Dracula from Luc Besson, the filmmaker known for stylish excess. However, it’s worth noting: his richly designed love story with vampires displays creativity and style – and amid its theatrical camp, I’m not sure I wouldn’t prefer over Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu. Odd details emerge, like a particular moment that appears to show a land border between France and Romania.

Waltz as a Humorously Exhausted Vampire-Hunting Priest

Christoph Waltz plays a humorous yet burdened man of the church pursuing the undead – I can’t believe he hasn’t played this character previously – who finds himself in Paris in 1889 during the centennial of the French Revolution. The same goes for the sinister Dracula, brought to life by the body-horror veteran Caleb Landry Jones using a distorted Eastern European tone evoking the voice of Gru by Steve Carell from the Despicable Me comedies. This character he seemed destined to play.

The Story: A Tale of Love and Loss

The story is this: Dracula has traveled ceaselessly the world in torment for hundreds of years since he became undead, a penalty for his faithless sorrow over the death of his spouse Elisabeta (a movie debut role for Zoë Bleu, Rosanna Arquette’s child). Dracula has been searching, searching, searching for a lady who would be the reincarnation of his deceased partner. As ill fortune would have it, the fortunate female is revealed as Mina (portrayed once more by Bleu), the reserved future wife of Dracula’s wimpish land agent, Jonathan Harker (enacted by Ewens Abid), who just traveled to Dracula’s fortress to discuss his property portfolio and whose miniature portrait of the winsome Mina attracted Dracula’s gaze.

The Filmmaker’s Approach and Humorous Style

Besson organizes Dracula’s second-act backstory of global roaming wearing flamboyant outfits with a sure hand, and he willingly includes providing some comedy moments with a distinctly Mel Brooks flavour – such as Dracula’s ongoing failed efforts to end his own life post-Elisabeta’s demise, as well as comical sequences that result after Dracula sprays himself in a certain perfume in 18th-century Florence, that renders him unavoidably attractive to females. Absurd yet engaging.

Dracula can be streamed online from 1 December and in disc format starting the twenty-second of December. It will be shown in Australian cinemas from 5 February 2026.