Even though January is nearing its end, the days have remained gloomy. The night sky still appears to be darker than usual. In this cold, dark month I decided to watch a small collection of gothic features. These films are designed to chill the spines of those who watch them. However, I hope the films I picked, warmed my typing fingers as the cold nights set in. The first film is one I’ve never seen before. One I should have perhaps seen by now. Hammer Horror’s first Dracula entry.
Shockingly, I had seen Gerard Butler’s unremarkable display
as Drac in the regrettable Dracula 2000 (2000) before I’d seen any of
Christopher Lee’s iconic turns in the role. More fool me. The bigger surprise
came when I realised the number of creative liberties the Hammer adaptation
takes with the material. Terrence Fisher’s Dracula is abridged and truncated in
ways that would make modern fanboys lose their mind. Budget limitations and
time constraints ensured that canon was not the main concern. Because of this,
Dracula, or Horror of Dracula as it was retitled in America, becomes a rather
lean revenge thriller. Having a similar affected production situation as a Marc
Forster Bond film, one could call this version of Dracula A Quantum of Coffins.
Not like that makes a lick of sense, but then again did Quantum of Solace?
Bad jokes aside, this Dracula rendition feels streamlined
because it's leaner than turkey. Many of the bones of Stoker's original story
remain. However, the changes implemented in the story alter the fabric of the
narrative substantially. One example occurs right at the beginning of the movie
in which Johnathan Harker travels to see Count Dracula in the guise of a
commercial venture. Unlike Bram Stoker's original story where Harker is rather
innocently heading to Dracula Transylvania for real estate matters, in this
Hammer rendition, Harker is travelling to Klausenburg intending to kill Dracula
already on his mind. Harker’s already-acquired knowledge about vampires is a
startling twist. So also, is his fate in which Harker is dispatched early in
the film. This sets forth an altered arrangement of the sequences and
characters from the original narrative. Here Dracula feels like a strongly
concentrated vendetta upon the Harker and his kin.
Of course, Dracula‘s hunting and stalking have always been
predatory. But there’s a joyless, tragic nature to proceedings here that’s not
always sensed in other renditions of Dracula. In John L Flynn’s Cinematic
Vampires: The Living Dead on Film and Television, Christopher Lee states how he
saw the character: "I've always tried to put an element of sadness, which
I've termed the loneliness of evil, into his character.” Lee’s Dracula seems
hellbent on dragging Harker and those around him down. The loneliness that Lee
considers can be felt after the film when you realise that Dracula only has
sixteen lines in the whole picture. He’s said all of them by the 10-minute
mark. Most if not all of them are shared between himself and Harker, the man
who has set his sights on killing him. Lee also says of his development of the
character “Dracula doesn't want to live, but he's got to! He doesn't want to go
on existing as the undead, but he has no choice." This brings a strange
underlying tension to the narrative. Nothing is shocking about a vampire with a
death wish, fighting to survive. However, in fighting against Harker and
embarking on an aggressive attack on everyone he loves, the “plague” of Dracula
feels concentrated in a way that differs from other versions.
It’s a stark contrast to Francis Ford Coppola’s 90s overblown adaptation of the material which focuses heavily on the idea of Dracula being so deeply bereft of love that his need of Mina is a love that bleeds through the ages. Coppola’s OTT interpretation of the material is extremely on the nose. In one of its more memorable sequences, a literal beast ravishes a young woman during a storm. The '58 Dracula, despite its bold colour palette, honking score and dramatic performances, is more subtle in its design, and more controlled in its metaphors. This can be considered in the aftermath of the first attack on Mina by Dracula. Van Helsing has Mina’s husband Arthur give her a transfusion due to the amount of blood loss. The process is straightforward and clinical in its execution. Drained of cinematic flair or fancy. The procedure also feels unemotional given the relationship between the two patients. This sexlessness in the operation helps distinguish the eroticism given by Lee’s Dracula. Fisher believed that Dracula preyed upon the sexual frustrations of his female victims. And felt that the relationship between Arthur and Mina was a sexually frustrated one. Mina, much like Lucy earlier on in the film, never hides the anticipation of her and Dracula's encounters.
Removing precautions and defences to ensure his presence.
And while Dracula’s encounters are never explicit, we see the profound desire
he creates with his victims in the aftermath.
Mina’s transfusion with Arthur is as mannered and stiff as their
interactions. The irony is that the lifesaving operation involving her husband
holds no allure as opposed to becoming Dracula’s undead bride. Lee places a
stamp on this in an interview with Leonard Wolf:
"He had also to
have an erotic element about him (and not because he sank his teeth into women)
... It's a mysterious matter and has something to do with the physical appeal
of the person who's draining your life. It's like being a sexual blood donor...
Women are attracted to men for any of hundreds of reasons. One of them is a
response to the demand to give oneself, and what greater evidence of giving is
there than your blood flowing literally from your own bloodstream? It's the
complete abandonment of a woman to the power of a man."
Arthur and Dracula might be both doing the same thing. But
when it comes to one of them, things just hit differently.
What makes the 1958 Dracula stand out is the remarkable way
that it is still quite startling. Today’s audiences may perhaps have a more
sophisticated palette and are less scared of repressed sexuality in
technicolour. However, Lee’s Dracula brings a varied distillation to the
vampire templates set by Bela Lugosi in Tod Browning’s Dracula (1931) and Max
Scheck in Nosferatu (1919). His tall, dominating presence is something other
incarnations of Dracula don’t necessarily have. His charming, British manner
early on is in stark contrast to the “foreign” persona of Lugosi and Gary
Oldman in Coppola’s 90s rendition. The othering that inhabits some versions of
the character could now be seen as kitsch. It’s not surprising that Lugosi’s
version is still ripe for parody. But the elaborate politeness from Lee in the
few scenes in which he has lines, disorient the viewer for when Dracula acts.
The most shocking moment is when Dracula reveals himself to Harker early on.
The shot switches unexpectedly from a typical mid shot to an extreme, shocking
close of Dracula’s face. Blood is dripping from his mouth. His eyes are bulging and bloodshot. His smile
is manic and unhinged. It’s difficult to believe it’s the same person
smattering Harker a few scenes ago. Fisher and editor Bill Lenny use a similar
tactic when Lucy tries to lure Tania, daughter of the Holmwood’s maid, to a
graveyard. Both close-ups of Dracula and Lucy emphasise the drastic change
undertaken by the characters and how uncanny and removed they now are from society.
For all the lavish art direction and effects in Coppola’s version of the story,
nothing in it captures the simple sinisterness found here. From the narrative
change involving Harker to the very simple scares that are found in the movie.
This Dracula is the most unsettling of the versions I’ve seen.
There’s a boldness in the film’s presentation which sets
Dracula ’58 apart from its counterparts. Its narrative changes help maintain a
sense of loss and tragedy. Its colour and eroticism set itself apart from what
came before it. The simplicity of the storytelling makes it more memorable than
the films that come after it. Christopher would become Dracula 6 more times for
Hammer and was Dracula ten times in total. It was a role that, while perhaps
his most iconic, one that he never truly relished, despite what he infused into
it. He may not have necessarily enjoyed the work, but he is perhaps the person
who wanted to understand the assignment best. Funny how these things happen.
