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Bram Stoker's Dracula

Bram Stoker's Dracula

List Price: $14.94
Your Price: $11.21
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Dracula is the best!
Review: I saw this movie many times, and i really loved. This is a great movie, with lot of love and terror, and good actors and actris.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Gary Oldman makes this movie work
Review: Not since Bela Lugosi has there been a Dracula this sexy, handsome, ugly, lovelorn and pure evil at the same time. Whether portraying the young count in the 16th century or playing himself as a late 19th century ogre of a man with a big white bufont hairdo (with a handsome window's peak to boot) and Edward Scissorhands fingernails, Oldman makes this film what it is. His acting is exquistite as the tortured soul who longs after his lost love and lusts after the taste of human blood.

Post-Lagosi vampires in cinema have always seemed to get the best of the good guys, but in this film taken from Stoker's 19th century novel, good does triumph over evil. Copola endeavored to stick with older cinema effects and he did a superb job. There are some scenes that you will never forget ... a marriage between simple effects and creativity gone wild... especially when the elder count's shadow acts on its own accord. More suave than gory, but there is gore... this is the best production of the tale of Dracula since the invention of color film. If Anne Rice's spin on the vampire tale is more your speed, this film will probably not be up your alley. Violence and sexual inuendo make this a film not suitable for kids.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Stylish, Sexy and Modern Version of Stoker's Dracula!
Review: More literal and filled with a lot more coherent dialogue than all the other 'Dracula' films, very stylish with gothic imagery and ghoulish atmosphere. But unfortunately that takes away some of the impact on the novel. The good thing is that this one decided to concentrate more on The Count's love for Mina and less on horror or gore, even though there's plenty of that too. An all star cast bring all these familiar characters to life. Gary Oldman delivers a truly seductive performance, very impressive, his performance is one of the main things that make this one work even though his accent gets a little out of hand. Winona Ryder is also impressive as Mina, Dracula's love interest throughout the ages, and she delivers a great performance even though she fumbles a bit on the more intense scenes. Anthony Hopkins plays it way over the top but I don't consider that to be a mistake, he is the most memorable version of 'Van Helsing' I have yet seen. Keanu Reeves is the biggest flaw in the casting, he was simply miscast and he never could master any accent. It takes the liberty of breaking one of the 'Dracula rules' which is the one that says that 'Dracula cannot walk around by day' and changes it to 'his powers are a lot weaker by day'. I was also amused by the dialogue between Oldman and Reeves when they first meet, they quote the original Lugosi 'Dracula' with lines such as 'I vid you welcome', 'Children of the night, what music they make' and 'I never drink... wine'. While it does have it's dose of scares and plenty of gore and blood it is also romantic with some truly impressive scenes with remarkable acting. Also with eye-catching sets and costumes. Inspired direction by Coppola almost all the way through, the pace lags at times and the final action sequence with the carts is a bit tough to follow. From a scale of 1-10 I give this film a 7!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Brilliant Period Movie
Review: What a show! This version of the (old theme) Dracula, actually comes to live in a weird and extremely entertaining way. You never suspect to be touched in such a way - you actually feel sorry for Prince Dracul and his long lost bride. I wanted them to end up together. And who better to entertain us than the brilliant Sir Anthony Hopkins and the very sensuous Gary Oldman. Great cinematic tricks that enhances the pleasure of this film.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: You Cant Spell Horrible with out the horror
Review: This is one of the worst movies ever to come out. It seems to like to jump around and do weirds stuff. One Minate Dracula is some old dude, the next he is some young stud picking up the ladies and then boom he's a wolf. No Primse or anything to this movie. I give it 0 stars out of 5.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Not Bram Stoker's but still wonderful
Review: Bram Stoker's orginal vision was some what different than what Francis Ford Coppla has brought to the screen, but doesn't all adaptations end up the same. Look at Stanley Kubrick's The Shining, the similarities between the book and the movie were very small, but the film was still a wonderful film. If you have read the original novel by bram stoker, I suggest you forget about it. This film is a wonderfully scary masterpiece of forbidden love and terror. Bram Stoker's Dracula is a passionate love story and a terrifying vision of the undead and their quest for blood. The acting is great and the costumes are lavish, transporting you into the time and place of an 18th century London. Even Keanu Reeves does a decent job as Jonathan Harker, even though his acting skills and talents do not go as far as say Sir Anthony Hopkins, it's still a decent performance. See this film.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Renowned Literature Begets Sappy Theatrics
Review: Yes, this movie is, in its overdrawn ways, as melodramatic as they come. Everyone's character is overplayed to make them that much more interesting, but this is for the purpose that the original story would never have carried its own weight at the box office or with numerous critics. Mina is breathy and doe-eyed, which is not much of a stretch for Winona Ryder, who seems to be more akin to period pieces than any other genre she's attempted. Lucy is flagrantly sexual and mischievious, a spunky job done by a film ingenue named Sadie Frost. Harker is square and stony as they come, not much of a stretch for Keanu Reeves who can't act much anyway. Van Helsing is stark-raving mad, a shameful interpretation by Anthony Hopkins. Thank God the queen of England gave him some dignity back when she chose to knight him five years later. Finally, Dracula is the dark mystique with an ugly past and countless years of self-loathing and damnation, not to mention acting selfish and overly emotional. You can count on Gary Oldman to deliver such silly gag-me-with-a-spoon lines as "oceans of time to find you" with plausibility and gusto. He's also trained in the fine art of European accents, having sported a Romanian one here and a Soviet tongue in "Air Force One". Yes, this recreation of the literary classic is exactly what Bram Stoker himself envisioned...NOT! Francis Ford Coppola has murdered the intrigue and mystery that follows the tale of a disturbed soul who thrives off the blood of the living and is ever in search of redemption for his purloined love.

It may sound like I'm ripping on the whole movie, but really I'm only ripping on the acting. As far as art direction and overall adaptation goes, our eccentric and somewhat tepid Irish author would've been proud. A lot of dialogue and diary entries are pulled directly from the novel and the costumes, set design, and camera work are excellent and well in tune to the film's pace. Coppola does the artistic macabre with taste, but I question his direction towards the actor's performances. I can give him no credit there, for I think the film was miserably casted except for Oldman. There's no question about it that no one else could've played him the same way. I applaud this performance and the enchanting environment, but I can't give credit for anything else. I wouldn't recommend this film either except if all other deliciously scary rentals on Halloween night mysteriously disappeared from the shelves. If you want a really good vampire flick with excellent actors and a smooth adaptation that even the author was skeptical about, watch "Interview With The Vampire". You'll appreciate everything it has to offer, including its pretty faces...

Rating: 2 stars
Summary: Bram Stoker's Dracula? not really...
Review: Not as faithful to the novel as it claims to be, although it does depict Dracula as an old man in the early scenes, as per Stoker's description. Unfortunately, Gary Oldman's 'eccentric' accent during this section is somewhat distracting. The main problem here is the characterisation. In the novel, there was a clear distinction between good and evil, which this film blurs. Dracula is shown as being not so bad, more a tragic/romantic figure. The 'good' guys come across as being obsessed. Professor Van Helsing verges on the edge of madness, and Dr. Seward (Richard E Grant) is addicted to the drugs he gives his patients. As for the 'pure and innocent' Lucy (Sadie Frost)... well, you could have fooled me.

The performances range from one extreme to another. Anthony Hopkins (normally an excellent actor) is wildly over the top as Van Helsing, whereas Gary Oldman lacks presence as Dracula and fails to make much of an impression. Keanu Reeves is wooden as Jonathan Harker, but then he is miscast. He's done better things since this. In the midst of it all, Winona Ryder gives the most believable performance as Mina. It makes a refreshing contrast to the differing acting styles going on around her.

This is certainly a sumptuosly mounted version of the story, and the makeup is good, but the flashy camera shots are overdone. After a while they come across as rather obvious and contrived. To sum up, this film is not so much a case of 'all style and no substance', more like 'all style and wrong substance'.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Bram Stokers Dracula
Review: I went to see Bram Stokers Dracula when it first came out in the cinema. It is the best film I have ever seen, everyone says its just another Dracula movie but they are wrong, Francis Ford Coppola did a fantastic job in re-creating this story as this film is about the real dracula and the story of what really happened. It is very indepth and that what makes it so different to other dracula movies. I would recommend this film to everyone who loves Dracula movies. I have just bought it on DVD and I would not be without my DVD player now I have one because the difference between video and DVD is incredible, everyone should have one.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Wondering
Review: Love the movie, have it in Widescreen VHS, but on a recent travel to Spain I saw the LaserDisc version of it and it had an Insert of F.F. Copola narrating the StoryBoard for the Moive. Does the DVD version has it? If so Im willing to buy it =)


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