Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)
Film review
by Melissa Kavanaugh

 

Rating:

 

The 1992 film Bram Stokers Dracul a is an adaptation of the 1897 novel Dracula by Bram Stoker. The film begins with a battle in 1462 where a Romanian knight named Vlad the Impaler from the castle Dracula. He returns home from the battle to find his wife Elizabetha had committed suicide at word of his death. He denounces God and thus becomes a vampire.

The film then shifts to four hundred years later where Jonathan Harker is being dispatched to the Count Dracula s castle to help him settle a land deal. He is to replace Renfield who is in an asylum in Carfax England. Jonathan went to the castle and had a picture of Mina, his fianc é, which Dracula sees. Dracula immediately sees she is the reincarnation of his dead wife. Jonathan gets left for the female vampires while Dracula sets off to England with the dual motive of a new food supply and to find his lost love Mina. While in England Dracula courts Mina and snacks on her friend Lucy. Lucy falls ill one of her suitors Dr. Seward, calls for the assistance of his mentor Dr. Van Helsing. Dr. Van Helsing figures it out since he is studying vampire bats and obscure diseases of the blood.

In the meantime Mina has fallen in love with Dracula and having some flashes of memory of her previous life. She s then called away to Jonathan whom she marries. Dracula goes on a rampage when he finds this out. So the group of five go after Dracula. Dracula is tracked down to Carfax Abbey, where he has a love scene with Mina next door in the asylum. He then escapes where he returns to his homeland. Dracula is stabbed by Jonathan in the courtyard of the castle. Dr. Van Helsing stops him from finishing the job. Dracula and Mina go into the castle s abbey where she drives the final knife through Dracula to free her lover s soul after having asked Jonathan to do the same for her when her time comes.

In his film Francis Ford Coppola fails to produce what he set out to do. The film was advertised to be an accurate portrayal of the 1897 novel by Bram Stoker. There are several major differences in the film that deviate so much from the novel that it would be an inaccuracy to call this version anything like the novel. Of course, in all spin off work done on the vampire legend it does carry many of the similarities created by Bram Stoker in the first four chapters of the novel. What is most striking is the blatant inaccuracies that anyone who has read the novel and then seen the movie will see. Accounting for the sophistication of the modern film viewer does not make taking such license in passing this film off as an accurate portrayal of the novel acceptable.

The first indication of deviation from the novel is evident in the subtitle of the film, "Love Never Dies." This 1992 version of the Dracula legend is like so many other late twentieth century films in that a love story is attached. Attaching a love story breaches Bram Stoker's characters in a way that changes the entire fabric of the work resulting in a dramatic change in characterization.

For example, the character of Mina Murray Harker, excellently portrayed by Winona Ryder, is a one dimensional person. In this modern version there is a great focus on the sexuality of the female protagonist that would have never been acceptable in Victorian England. In the novel Mina's character is much more dynamic. She was truly the picture of the perfect Victorian lady in keeping her emotions in check, operating from her intellectual side while offering selfless concern for others. Her desire to be a helpmate to her future husband is totally lost in the film due to its inaccurate portrayal of her as a passionate woman instead of an intellectual woman who actually solves the mystery surrounding Dracula.

This is an irony considering the fact that there was great pain in showing Dracula as not simply evil, but as a multidimensional character who justifies his evilness out of a broken heart. Also the male protagonist, Jonathan Harker, is upstaged by the love affair between Dracula and Mina, which inhibits the development of his character as the principle male protagonist. Instead Dracula is seen as both protagonist and antagonist. This may be Francis Ford Coppola s comment on late twentieth century morals not being so black and white, stating that there is evil in all of us. This could have been effectively done by portraying the internal struggle that Jonathan went through in his submission to the temptress vampires.

What is also lost is the depiction of the differences between Mina and Lucy. This was Bram Stoker's comment on the role of women. Bram Stoker's apparent intention was to show that women were generally thought not to be able to function in the male world because of being overly emotional. The ideal was to operate from an intellectual, detached place of logic for both males and females. It was commonly accepted then that women could not do this in the nineteenth century. He was portraying Mina as an exception to this rule while at the same time accepting the limits of her gender. This is lost in the film because Francis Ford Coppola shows all women as being the same -- sex starved vixens waiting to be released. This focus of all women being the same in the film prevents this dynamic from being seen. The three vampire women go after Jonathan in a similar soft porn way as the scene in the asylum between Dracula and Mina.

Dracula's supernatural powers and the limits of his existence are also changed in the film. According to the novel Dracula is in a trance like state during the day and is obviously not aware of his surroundings. This presents a problem for Francis Ford Coppola's love story so he inserts a monologue into Anthony Hopkins character, Dr. Van Helsing, stating how Dracula can move about during the day but his powers are weaker. What is similar is his ability to be a shape shifter. Dracula appears as an old man, a young man (not in the novel), a wolf, a wolfman, mist, and a devil like creature. (In the novel he also appears as a bat.) His vision onto the train that Jonathan Harker was on, his ability to see what is going on hundreds of miles away, and his ability to control the minds of others appear as the presence of Dracula is as described in the novel. Francis Ford Coppola was true to the description of Dracula s physical appearance taking great detail in his pallor, eyes, palms, and fingernails. The only difference is that Dracula in the novel always wears black clothes. That is really not a bothersome deviation from the novel.

In an attempt to make Dracula's character more believable to modern audiences, Coppola gives a background to him that is not in the text but is from actual history. This is interesting. Along with the maps and description of the travel that Dracula does, it achieves the believability that there is a real legend surrounding vampires that originated with Vlad the Impaler. This is the good film technique that Coppola is known for.

This is a highly erotic film in it's relation to the macabre. The general tone is ominous. The background music is heavy and dramatic with the intent to provoke fear in the viewer. The exception to this is in the love scenes between Dracula and Mina. Then the music is flowing with strings with the intent to sweep the viewer into sympathy for Dracula's plight. Lighting and special effects are effectively used to continue this feeling. Instead of using bright moonlight as the novel did, candles rise up in flame upon the entrance of the vampires. So generally the scenes are much brighter than the novel describes. Gore is presented periodically throughout the film with bestiality being presented by the offering of the infant and the sexuality between Dracula and Lucy. But the film is most bestial in the scene where Lucy's corpse is desecrated and then it shifts to Van Helsing carving roast beef---this is a cheap effect to turn the stomach. Mainly the sexual overtones are the driving force throughout the film. The viewers see this through the almost orgasmic pleasure in the evil of the vampire characters. This is definitely not a film for the squeamish or children.

For entertainment value this movie is great but for accuracy to the novel it just doesn't stand up.