“I must apologize for the intrusion. But travel is very difficult for me, and I've come a long way.”

By now you should realize that it is impossible to escape the grasp of Dracula. Face the truth, the Count is here to stay. He’s foreclosed on a house on the coast and he’s invited his…friends over to party like its 1945. Can you survive 67 minutes in the House of Dracula?

Plot
In the…country I suppose of Visaria, a certain Dr. Edelman lives in a castle by the sea and has a reputation for treating strange medical cases. One night, Dracula approaches him seeking a cure for his vampiric condition, and the doctor, intrigued by the challenge, begins trying to come up with a cure. Meanwhile, another man comes to the doctor seeking help to cure his lycanthropy, who eventually accepts this challenge as well. Over the course of the movie, things get…weird.

Characters
Dr. Franz Edelman: Onslow Stevens plays the kindly doctor, a man of both science and faith. He lives in a castle, but he’s got a reputation as a good man with a staff of attractive women working for him. One of his major developments is growing a plant/fungus/whatever that releases spores that can soften bone enough that it can be shaped like putty. At first, he seems like a stock skeptic character, but he’s also pretty quick on the uptake to recognize a vampire and werewolf when he sees one jump out at him. He’s more or less the Hero, selflessly trying to help people, until Dracula messes with the blood transfusion thing they’ve got going on and the doc goes into a Jekyll & Hyde kind of thing.

Count Dracula/“Baron Latos”: John Carradine (father of David Carradine & siblings) plays the count as a thin, intense man haunted by his cravings. He’s also upgraded the costume to include a dapper top hat at most times. His Dracula isn’t a bad one, actually, though you never really buy the idea that he wants to get cured since he backslides faster than a directionally challenged junkie on a ski slope. Still, he’s got one really sinister scene where he’s trying to seduce one of Edelman’s aides as she plays the piano and he goes on about the darkness of the music she’s playing. Admittedly, it was also done in Dracula’s Daughter, but here its got that whole creepy sexual predator thing that Drac’s got going on.

Miliza Morrelle: Martha O’Driscoll is the Doctor’s blonde nurse/assistant, and someone who had met “Baron Latos” previously. She’s basically there to be the Count’s mark and a damsel in distress.

Nina: Jane Addams plays Dr. Edelman’s much more interesting nurse/assistant. She’s a hunchback, which I suppose makes her a Shegor (like an Igor but- well, you know). She’s also a charming, sweet, fairly attractive lass who’s also got a fair amount of initiative. She’s really sympathetic and a stark contrast to standard Igor type hunchbacks. Probably my pick for badass of the film for being an interesting variation on a theme.

Lawrence Talbot/The Wolf Man: Lon Chaney Jr. playing the horror character he’s most famous for, just not in the horror movie he’s most famous for. Talbot approaches the good doctor seeking a cure for his werewolf status since his life sucks. At first, the Doc’s not sure, but he sees the transformation right before his eyes, so he agrees to help. However, Talbot’s a bit…impatient about the situation and not sure if he’s got the time to wait for enough spores to be harvested for the surgery.

Frankenstein’s Monster: Glenn Strange plays ol’ bolt neck, but really, he’s barely in the movie and just seems to be in there…just to have the Frankenstein Monster in the movie for a big finish. I mean, they just find the monster’s body in the basement of the castle by chance and drag him upstairs and tease out his reanimation until the end of the movie where he brings the building down on top of himself.

Visuals/Effects
Directed by Erle C. Kenton, the movie’s fairly well shot. Makeup effects, particularly on Dr. Edelman when he goes full crazy are great, as are the Wolfman and Frankenstein’s Monster costumes (for however briefly they’re seen). The movie also uses the animated trick for Dracula going from bat to human forms from Son of Dracula. I’m also pleased to note that rubber bat on a string technology has consistently moved forward in these movies.

Writing
Edward T. Lowe Jr., Dwight V. Babcock and George Bricker threw everything at the wall on this one. Dracula, Wolfman, Frankenstein’s Monster, a hunchback (though not a villain) and a mad scientist (though only for the last half of the movie). Hell, there’s even a torch-bearing mob at the end of the movie. The mid-movie twist is an interesting one, since it basically eliminates Dracula, making you think the heroes have won, then the Doc starts freaking out and becomes the new villain.

Sound
The score by William Lava is quite fine and melodramatic for the action.

Conclusion
House of Dracula is a really weird movie. On the one hand, it’s a monster mash that just throws horror characters together, sometimes without rhyme or reason. On the other, the mid-movie twist is pretty fun and spirals the movie into a pretty dark ending with a burning building.


And again the trailer goes and spoils the end of the movie.


And for funsies, here's the piano scene that I mentioned above

“We're here to meet a friend of the Caldwells, a Count Alucard.”

Watch out! The Drac Attack is back for more. 1943’s Son of Dracula put horror vet Lon Chaney, Jr. into the cape and evening wear and moved the Transylvanian to the American Deep South. The end result was, let’s be honest, definitely a case of diminishing returns.

Plot
In a sleepy town in the Deep South, Kay Caldwell, a woman so obsessed with the macabre that she has traveled to Transylvania and brought back a gypsy woman, awaits the arrival of a friend and guest, a certain Count Alucard. Some of her friends look for him at the train station, but only his luggage, several large oblong boxes, arrives. That night, the Caldwells throw a party where old man Caldwell dies under mysterious circumstances (circumstances that are obviously Alucard related). Weirdness abounds and after Alucard makes his official debut to the characters, Kay and he wed, much to the surprise of Kay’s former fiancée Frank. Through all this, one of the Caldwells’ friends, a Dr. Brewster just can’t shake that something is wrong about the count, and brings in a Hungarian professor to help sort things out.

Characters
Katherine “Kay” Caldwell: Louise Allbritton plays the most interesting character of the movie (and arguably the center of it). Kay is…well, Kay’s just not right in the head. She’s way more than a little obsessed with the macabre, and inviting Alucard to the US was her idea. As the movie progresses, it seems that she’s in over her head with her new vampiric beau, but a few twists get tossed in that make you wonder who’s playing who in her new marriage.

Claire Caldwell: Evelyn Ankers is Kay’s kinder, nicer, brighter, more boring sister. She’s pretty much there to serve as a normal member of the family and doesn’t do much else.

Doctor Brewster: Frank Craven plays a character that is more or less the plot’s Hero. He’s a friend of the Caldwells (not sure how exactly) and a doctor (not sure of what) and when he starts investigating he just kind of barges his way through places, bossing people around because I guess that’s what the guy trying to piece together the mystery of why Alucard’s name spelled backwards is Dracula is supposed to do. I don’t know. I didn’t like the character.

Professor Lazlo: J. Edward Bromber plays a portly Hungarian professor and “expert” on Dracula type stuff. Essentially, he provides exposition like Van Helsing does, but brings little else to the movie.

Frank Stanley: Robert Paige plays Kay’s mortal lover. He really doesn’t know what the hell’s going on when Alucard shows up and his confusion only grows when he tries to shoot the count on his (the count’s not Frank’s) wedding night with a revolver. Obviously bullets don’t work, passing right through the vampire, but they apparently work on the person that was hiding behind the neck sucker. Faster than you can say “I done a bad thing, George,” Frank’s wrought with guilt and questionable sanity that actually gets kind of interesting (as far as bad movies go) and by the end of the movie, he ends up being a wild card that wraps things up in a pretty nice twist that more or less makes him the movie’s badass.

Count Alucard: Lon Chaney, Jr. just doesn’t look comfortable in the outfit. Maybe its because the Count’s more or less playing second fiddle here to other characters. Sure, he gets some decent scenes, but the way the movie halfheartedly teases out the “mystery” of Alucard’s nature (Surprise! He’s Dracula!) is pretty obvious. It also negates the title of the movie, because we get Dracula. Not a son, not a descendent, just a grumpy looking Dracula with a pencil thin moustache.

Visuals/Effects
Robert Siodmak, a German director apparently influenced by earlier Expressionist films and later an influence on film noir, seems to be doing the best he can with the movie. The lighting on the sets is absolutely fantastic with the play of shadows on light, and there are some great shots. I particularly love the opening where the title gets revealed. A hand hurriedly clears away some cobwebs to reveal “Son of Dracula!” Its simple, yes, but it’s a great way of telling the audience what you’re getting. The visual pacing of the film is hit and miss, but when it does work, its appropriately atmospheric.

The movie also does some really good special effects for the time. Vampires leaving their caskets don’t open the lid and sit up, they waft out as pale smoke. The rubber bat on a string returns, but sometimes when its supposed to be crawling on a victim, its more of a puppet that has a moving head and arms with belies some sophistication. Moreover, I really liked the animated transition that Dracula does from bat to human forms. For the time, it looked pretty good.

Writing
Curt Siodmak (the director’s brother) and Eric Taylor worked on the story and script. The dialog is forgettable, the characters mostly uninteresting and continuity seems to be an issue. Often characters will mention events having happened sometime in between one scene and the next, like when Frank is telling someone that a tree fell on his car several times and the audience is left going “Wait, I don’t remember that. Do you?”

Still, in its own B movie way, the story does try to bring some new ideas to the table. First, the change of scenery is kind of nice and the reason for it, while not very inspired, does make at least some kind of sense. Second, the plot does throw some interesting twists into the mix in a very noir-esque style (which would be spoilers). Also, the idea of destroying a vampire’s coffin/resting place before he can reach it at sunrise is a pretty interesting way of screwing over the bloodsucker.

Sound
Hans J. Salter wrote the original music and it’s the usual old school Hollywood industry style that does the job nicely but you can’t remember a damn thing of later. Not bad.

Conclusion
Son of Dracula is a forgettable, ultimately anemic (see what I did there?) effort that has flashes of interesting bites-- I mean, bits. It’s the kind of movie that MST3K would poke fun at, and really, that’s probably the best way to watch it; sitting on your couch with your buddies and making jokes about buying war bonds, how “white folks crazy,” and singing the beginning of “Amos Moses” when characters are running around in the swamp. Outside of that context, not really recommended, but if you’ve got it in the boxed set, you might as well watch it.


Gee, the, uh, trailer kinda spoils everything.

“You know, this is the first woman's flat I've been in that didn't have at least 20 mirrors in it.”

If you thought 1931 saw the end of the Universal Studios Dracula films, you would be horribly and totally wrong. It was a hit, so the idea of more Dracula related films was enticing, so much so that in 1936, Dracula’s Daughter, a direct sequel that featured exactly what it said it would: the daughter of Count Dracula.

Plot
The story picks up immediately (and I mean immediately) after the events of Dracula. Some London cops barge into Carfax Abbey and find Renfield’s body barely cool and Van Helsing comes out, trying to explain why there’s a dead man at the bottom of the stairs and a dead man in a coffin with a stake in his chest. Naturally, they arrest him, since they think he’s a loony and take him to jail. However, at the prison, a mysterious woman arrives and makes off with Dracula’s corpse and burns it in the woods. She is the Dracula’s Daughter (dun dun DUN!), and wishes to be free of her vampiric condition. When she finds out that disposing of her father’s body didn’t do the trick, she tries to enlist the aid of a psychologist who studied under Prof. Van Helsing in his younger days who is also called in to help the good Prof. clear his name.

Characters
Professor Abraham Van Helsing: Edward Van Sloan is the only character to carry over into this movie and he’s immediately arrested and suspected of being either a nutcase or a murderer (or both). Fully confident in his own innocence and in science’s inability to have an answer for everything, he’s really more of a subplot character here, but it was a pleasant surprise to see Van Helsing back and in a slightly different position from his leadership role in the last movie.

Countess Marya Zaleska: Gloria Holden plays Dracula’s DAUGHTER! (dun dun DUN!) and she’s not bad, actually, despite being called a Hungarian Countess when Drac’s from Transylvania (which is in Romania). The two regions are close, but they aren’t THAT close. She’s got the hypnotic eyes and plays the role as somewhat of a junkie. She may think she wants to be free of her vampiric condition, but when burning dad’s body in a pyre didn’t work, well, she backslides pretty quickly. Still, despite being the Villain, she adds some depth and pathos to the character. Her point of no return comes when she has her henchman bring back a young woman to model for her paintings in the middle of the night (yeah, nothing suspicious there) and attacks the poor girl, achieving two things. 1) Inability to escape her cravings, and 2) providing some pretty obvious lesbian/bisexual sub context, which is pretty ballsy (ironically enough) of the filmmakers to do at that time.

Sandor: Irving Pichel (who looks an awful lot like Flight of the Conchords’ Jemaine Clement) is the Countess’ glowering henchman. Apparently he’s hanging around because he himself wants to become a vampire.

Dr. Jeffrey Garth: Otto Kruger is our official Hero, a psychologist who’s an old student of Van Helsing’s. When the old guy’s arrested for murder, he comes to London to try and help him out, but there he catches the eye of the Countess and the plot REALLY converges. He’s very much a skeptic, but at least he’s not THAT stupid when the clues start putting themselves together.

Sir Basil Humphrey: Gilbert Emery plays the cranky, crotchety chief of Scotland Yard who doesn’t believe in vampires and is really annoyed (in a very British way) by Van Helsing and later Garth for dragging him along on this adventure. He was fun.

Janet: Marguerite Churchill plays Garth’s sassy, incredibly competent secretary, and you know what? She’s awesome. Smart, sharp-witted and beautiful, Janet trades rapid fire barbs with Garth pretty much during her entire screen time, but she also becomes the damsel in distress, but thanks to her characterization in the lead up, you actually care about her and are pulling for her to make it the whole way. She’s fantastic, my favorite character in the film, and a badass.

Visuals/Effects
Lambert Hillyer brings a competent eye to the movie, and a lot of shots are really well done, but the atmosphere of the movie is not at all horrific. Aside from a few moments of visual brooding and darkness, most of the movie features actors giving comically over the top facial reactions. Its odd that a direct sequel to Bela Lugosi’s classic is so light and fun in tone.

Writing
Okay, Bram Stoker gets credit for coming up with Dracula, then Garret Fort, John L. Balderston, Kurt Neumann, Charles Belden, Finley Peter Dunne & R.C. Sherriff all contributed to the script (with Fort getting the full credit as in Dracula). Interestingly, “Oliver Jeffries” (David O. Selznick according to IMDB) gets the credit for “suggestion.” I have the image of a guy in a Hollywood studio going “Hey, for the next movie, how about you have a lady vampire who’s Dracula’s Daughter (dun dun DUN!)”

Anyway, the plot itself is a bit silly (no real explanation as to the exact nature of Dracula’s Daughter (dun dun DUN!) and if she became a vampire after she was born or…never mind, but the pacing is fantastic for the runtime. The rest of the plot is fairly self-contained and things get wrapped up nicely at the end. Dialog is frequently hilarious, and it seems intentionally so. Everything Janet says is awesome and/or funny, and its intentional. The movie also throws in some really interesting ideas, like when the movie goes back to Transylvania and we see a bright and cheerful wedding ceremony attended by jubilant peasants (a stark contrast to the first movie). Then a light flicks on in Castle Dracula and the peasants all crap themselves and flee indoors, bolting the doors. It’s a hilarious “when the cat’s away” moment, and I loved it.

Sound
By ‘36, Hollywood was much more comfortable with sound, so this movie has a full blown score from composer Heinz Roemheld. Its not bad, though a bit too much on the bombastic side for the more down to earth nature of the movie.

Conclusion
Dracula’s Daughter was a pleasant surprise as a part of the Dracula: Legacy Collection put out by Universal (a nice series of boxed sets containing a well known Universal Monster movie and several lesser known spinoffs/sequels). In no way is it a success as a scary movie, it makes up for it with some genuinely interesting ideas (like Van Helsing having to deal with the legal ramifications of jamming a stake into a man, vampire or not) and a cast that’s full of wit and charm. It may not be a classic film, but its enormously fun.

“Soy…Drácula.”

1931 was a frightful year indeed, for it not only brought the world Bela Lugosi’s Dracula but Universal released Drácula, a Spanish-language version with a completely different cast but using the exact same sets as the English version. The English cast would film during the day and the Spanish cast would film at night. The result was an interesting alternate take on the story, while still following the same plot.

Plot
An unwitting solicitor travels to Transylvania to finalize Count Dracula’s leasing of a ruined abbey in England. The solicitor becomes the vampire’s mad servant, the two travel to England where the Count prowls the night before being confronted by Professor Van Helsing, a man experienced in the paranormal. The basic plot is identical to the English version of the movie.

Characters
Conde Drácula: Carlos Villarías plays the vampire of the film, and facially he has similarities to both Bela Lugosi and Christopher Lee. He does a fine job menacing the screen with his presence, especially when the movie zooms in close on his eyes when he hypnotizes people, but he just doesn’t quite match up to Lugosi’s incredible screen charisma. Still, he’s pretty badass.

Renfield: Pablo Álvarez Rubio makes a much more likable sane Renfield than Dwight Frye. When he loses his mind, he rants and raves with the best of them, but he’s just not nearly as disturbingly memorable as Frye.

Doctor Seward: José Soriano Viosca is the head of a sanitarium, and more likable than his English speaking counterpart.

Juan Harker: Barry Norton is not nearly as useless as the English language Harker. He’s still not particularly bright or useful, but he’s not useless.

Profesor Van Helsing: Eduardo Arozamena plays the vampire hunter, and he’s not bad. He lacks the intensity of the English version, but his tense standoff with Dracula shows that he’s quite resourceful himself.

Lucía Weston: Carmen Guerrero plays the doomed friend of the heroine, but she’s better than the English version. She’s much more of a wistful, romantic sort and her fantasizing about Dracula’s castle and whatever come across as less morbid and more romantic and ultimately tragic.

Eva Seward: Lupita Tovar is great as the Mina analog. At first, she’s simply there, but as her life becomes increasingly endangered, she gets more and more into the movie. By the end of the movie, when it seems like she’s been corrupted by Dracula, she really plays things up, becoming an aggressive, sensual character.

Visuals/Effects
The director, George Melford, was able to take advantage of the less prudish Spanish market as well as taking up the challenge of trying to best the English language team. The result was a film that is, on a technical level, often better than the English version. Camera angles are more atmospheric, some of the camera tricks are better and so on. Both films do also share some of the same “stock footage” that doesn’t involve human characters. This version is actually longer than the English one, though that can also be a negative factor, since some scenes do tend to drag on a bit longer than they need to. But overall, its a much more ambitious take on the visuals than the English version.

Writing
The Spanish script was handled by Baltasar Fernández Cué, and while the story really doesn’t veer off from the other version much at all, the ending is much, much, much more coherent. It actually makes sense and it also wraps up the loose end of Lucy/Lucia becoming a vampire. The ending of this movie is far superior to the English version. Though I will admit, it is quite amusing listening to characters moving about a London setting all speaking in Spanish.

Sound
This also uses “Swan Lake” for its beginning and ending, though there is nothing at all in terms of music during the film itself. Aside from dialog and foley work, its deathly quiet at times.

Conclusion
There is a lot to like in Drácula. The movie has moments of camera brilliance, the story is more coherent (and better) at the end and the supporting cast of good guys and victims are all much stronger than their English language counterparts. However, I can’t say that it’s a unilaterally better film. Dracula and Renfield are arguably better in the English version, and Van Helsing seems to be a toss up. Both are interesting pieces of cinema history and Drácula is probably best viewed as a fascinating companion piece/alternate take to Dracula that is in many ways superior.

So, not a lot of clips of the Spanish Dracula are to be found easily online that aren't somebody else's review of it. So no trailer today.

“Listen to them. Children of the night. What music they make.”

I bid you…welcome, to a very special evening here at Castle RMWC, for tonight, we celebrate the movie that ushered in a… golden age of thrillers onto the silver screen. 1931 brought Dracula to the screen. Dracula, based on the play of the novel and completely legal (meaning they did not have to rename him “Orlock” or anything this time), became one of the first horror movies to make use of sound, and was the first of Universal Studios’ classic horror monsters to come on the scene. When people hear “Dracula,” its Bela Lugosi and his character in this film that they’re thinking of, even if they’ve never seen it.

Plot
A solicitor arrives in Transylvania on business. Despite the warnings of the local villagers, he travels to Castle Dracula where he meets a mysterious nobleman intent on buying property in England. The deed is signed and the solicitor is transformed into a raving madman in service to Dracula thanks to the Vampire’s influence, and the two sail to England on a ship, the Vesta. When the ship arrives, the entire crew is found dead and the solicitor, Renfield, is taken to an asylum because he is clearly off his rocker. In England, Dracula begins roaming the streets at night, seducing and assaulting women, and one man with experience in the paranormal begins to investigate the nature of the strange newcomer.

Characters
Renfield: Dwight Frye is the hapless solicitor sent to Transylvania. He starts off as a hopeless idiot, oblivious to most of the danger he’s walking into, which is part of the point, but its also a little annoying. Then he goes crazy. Crazy AWESOME. Seriously, insane Renfield is easily the creepiest, most unpredictable character in the movie. He becomes Dracula’s sidekick, but also sort of, kind of tries to warn the heroes about the danger of the vampire, all while trying to eat spiders and flies, because, well, the blood is life. He’s not the badass of the film, but by my troth he comes close. And that laugh. That laugh where he’s giving a toothy grin from ear to ear and going “hehhhhhh hehhhhhhh hehhhhhh” through his teeth is just nightmarish.

Count Dracula: Bela Lugosi in the role that both made him world famous and typecast in the eyes of millions. His Dracula is a classy, ancient, urbane fellow who’s got it together. The movie is actually pretty subtle about his inhuman qualities. For example, he’s able to walk through cobwebs while Renfield has to use his walking stick to make a hole. Of course, Drac wouldn’t be half as badass as he is if not for Lugosi’s thick Hungarian accent and slow, deliberate delivery (and no, the old myth about him not knowing English when he filmed this isn’t true) are fantastic. Lugosi played the role on stage before the film, and his comfort in the role is evident. There’s a reason why he’s the gold standard of screen vampires.

Dr. Jack Seward: Herbert Bunston is the man who runs the asylum that Renfield gets sent to (and is also Dracula’s neighbor). Aside from that, he’s pretty useless, as a man of SCIENCE is powerless before the supernatural danger of Dracula.

Lucy Weston: Frances Dade is apparently a ward of Dr. Seward’s that is fascinated (down there) when she meets Dracula the first time. She then becomes his victim, dying of blood loss soon after, then rising from the grave to terrorize children in a park, which is fairly creepy, but it becomes a plot hole and never resolved.

John Harker: David Manners is a weak spot as the standard issue hero guy. He’s bland, oblivious to the danger (even when people are explaining to him exactly why his fiancee is in such mortal danger), and he’s ultimately useless in the cause of the good guys.

Mina: Helen Chandler is Harker’s fiancée, and much more likable. She’s vulnerable, but its understandable since she doesn’t really know what’s attacking her, and isn’t strong willed enough to resist Dracula’s hypnotic gaze. She actually gets more interesting when she becomes a thrall of the vampire, and her crazy eyes when she starts going after the useless Harker are creepy.

Professor Abraham Van Helsing: Edward Van Sloan (the only other veteran from the stage version to return) is an interesting foil for Dracula. He’s a professor that shows up to investigate things after Lucy’s death, he’s a man of science, but also has a history with the paranormal. He knows the tricks and signs of a vampire, and is also prepared to encounter one, carrying wolfsbane and a crucifix with him. Most impressively, he’s able to stare down Dracula in a battle of wills that gives him a respectable third place in the movie’s badass standings. Not bad for an old guy with glasses.

Visuals/Effects
Directed by Tod Browning, who was a prolific filmmaker during the silent era (and also the director of the infamous Freaks “One of us! One of us!”). The movie itself, being one of the earliest “talkies” has a lot of visual similarities to silent movies; the exaggerated acting styles, the deliberate staging, the long silent parts. It all does work in the movie’s favor though, since the atmosphere is grim, moody and has a cloying inevitability to Dracula’s nocturnal, err, missions. Pacing is an issue, and whenever Van Helsing, Renfield or Dracula aren’t on screen, the movie suffers.

Most of the effects rely on camera tricks, but a fake bat on a string gets used quite a bit. Its obviously a fake bat on a string, but I can’t fault it for that, not really.

Writing
Well, Bram Stoker wrote the original late Victorian horror novel (it’s an interesting read, by the way). Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston wrote the stage version and Garrett Fort, Dudley Murphy, Louis Bromfield, Tod Browning, Max Cohen and Louis Stevens all contributed to the Screenplay with Fort getting the billing. It follows along with the general Dracula narrative, but there are a few flaws. The Lucy as Vampire subplot is completely dropped after introducing it (that’s a pretty big narrative sin) and then the whole ending is rather underwhelming.

Sound
The original version of the film used elements from Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake for the beginning, but most of the movie is completely devoid of a music track, a result of talkies being new to audiences and many theaters probably wouldn’t even have the equipment to play the audio. In 1999, composer Philip Glass was hired by Universal to score the film, and he did a very good job, collaborating with the Kronos Quartet to create an all-strings soundtrack that works brilliantly with the visuals to create a disturbing and creepy atmosphere. Either version of the “score” works, so your mileage may vary.

Conclusion
There’s a reason why Dracula is a fondly remembered classic, and that reason is Bela Lugosi. The film itself helped established the visual tropes of the entire horror genre for decades to come. It’s a fantastic vampire film, but not the only one released in 1931...