i have to start by calling out the use of the author's name for any publicity of this movie. it would have been more appropriate to call it "Coppola's Shitty Dracula". i'll follow that with what i saw as the movie's strengths: sweet costuming for the Vlad preface; decent acting (however wasted on the film as a whole) by Anthony Hopkins, Gary Oldman (guaranteed by the screen actors guild to astound as an over-the-top villian while introducing a faint glimmer of humanity), and [surprise!] Tom Waits; and financially conservative effects (including camera positioning, aesthetically pleasing fades, and interesting editing), which i always appreciate for their resourcefulness and creativity. now for the weaknesses. in my perfect imaginary world, any time that someone tries to turn a piece of innovative and culturally important literature into a porn that is not even a good porn, they should have to apologize to everyone who watches it all the way through. i won't bother waiting for that, since this is not my world and Francis Ford Coppola's iteration of this horror story already achieved blockbuster status. besides the performances mentioned, the rest were either totally bland or (accidentally, i hope, for the sake of any respect i might in the future have for this director) unentertainingly comical. if you feel you must watch this, try to focus on the mystery of dracula's shapeshifting and centuries-long history. the movie got this right while it let all of the other great suspense-building plot-points from the novel fall apart. ff when Winona and Keanu are on screen together to avoid going into a bored coma.
1 comment:
i went into this thinking it would be terrible with kitsch, i came out of it hating keanu reeves more than ever.
Post a Comment