TO LIVE AND DIE IN L.A. (1985)

Director: William Friedkin

Writers: William Friedkin, Gerald Petievich (adapting his novel)

Producer: Irving H. Levin

Cast: William Petersen, Willem Dafoe, John Pankow, Darlanne Fluegel, Debra Feuer, John Turturro, Dean Stockwell, Michael Greene, Steve James, Robert Downey, Sr., Christopher Allport, Valentin de Vargas, Jack Hoar, Michael Chong, Michael Zand, Jackely Giroux, Jane Leeves, Donnie Williams, Earnest Hart, Jr., Gary Cole (uncredited), Jason Ronard (uncredited) 

U.S. Secret Service agent Jimmy Hart (Michael Greene) is killed two days before his retirement by Los Angeles counterfeiter Eric “Rick” Masters (Willem Dafoe). Hart’s young partner, Richie Chance (William Petersen), vows to avenge Hart by doing anything it takes to arrest Masters. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review 

I have almost no use for action movies anymore. I can still enjoy a vintage Clint Eastwood, Charles Bronson, or Chuck Norris flick. However, these days when almost anything one can imagine can be portrayed on the screen, the main focus for many films is just trying to outdo images of what has gone before. Spending more money on CGI and green screen effects never makes a script better. When all else fails, filmmakers will resort to shaky cam and fast cut editing to try fooling us into thinking something is evermore intense while neglecting good storytelling. All of this excess is a waste, because the action is usually so contrived that it becomes ridiculous. Worst of all is that the characters involved in these feats are usually interchangeable, snarky badasses trying to ape James Bond, Dirty Harry, and Rambo antics in films devoid of wit or grit. 

By the mid-1980s, I was already becoming aware of the action films’ idiotic excesses, as they were becoming a specific and generic genre. That’s why To Live and Die in L.A. was a refreshing kick in the ass. It is a neo-noir film and crime thriller that has style without larger-than-life heroics. Actually, the only character in the film that seems truly heroic is Jimmy Hart, the veteran U.S. Secret Service agent who is killed off early in the film. 

Probably the real reason that To Live and Die in L.A. flirts with the action film label is that it has a long and exciting car chase rivaling director William Friedkin’s other epic achievement of motorized mayhem in 1971’s The French Connection. There are no other action set pieces in the film; only brief foot chases and quick bursts of violence. What we witness are not superhuman feats and physics defying stunts, but rash and ruthless acts that give this film an edge. 

The two main protagonists are, as director Friedkin puts it, two sides of the same coin. Both U.S. Secret Service agent Richie Chance and counterfeiter Rick Masters are involved in risky professions that cross personal and legal boundaries. Chance seems driven not only by his one honorable sentiment of avenging his partner’s death; he gets an adrenalin rush facing danger. Masters affects a hip and avant-garde persona as a frustrated artist while making a living as a counterfeiter who must often resort to cold-blooded acts of violence. These two men are deliberate and unrepentant about how they achieve their objectives. It is probably no accident that both characters have similar first names. Ironically, the actors portraying them, William Petersen and Willem Dafoe, also have nearly identical first names. Dafoe’s actual given first name at birth was William. 

In this very early film role, William Petersen is really fine as our “hero.” His Richie Chance probably approaches his job as a macho challenge that gives him the same sense of satisfaction as his bungee jumping off of a bridge. Initially, we are probably going to think such a gung-ho attitude makes him someone to admire. We can also empathize with his payback agenda against Rick Masters, even if Chance steps over the legal line to try nailing him. However, Chance already has a history of ruthless behavior. He has been using parolee Ruth Lanier (Darlanne Fluegel) sexually and as his informant. If she does not cooperate, he will get her parole revoked. Frankly, U.S. Secret Service agent Richie Chance is an asshole. 

Another standout performer here who was also about to achieve stardom is Willem Dafoe. His hip and cold-blooded counterfeiter, Rick Masters, is one of my favorite villains. When dealing with anyone in his illegal line of business, he is utterly deadpan. Masters doesn’t raise his voice, even in the most violent situations, and he will savor the moment with an irreverent comment before pulling the trigger. His motivations are never explained, yet we see his artistic endeavors that he seems conflicted about. Masters might be trying to purge some inner turmoil though his art, but it is the technical application of his talents making counterfeit money that fulfill his comfortable and unconventional lifestyle. 

 

John Pankow, as Chance’s new partner, John Vukovich, gives us the clearest indication of just how extreme and out of control these situations have become. He wants to be a by-the-book agent, while still being loyal to his partner. Like Chance, he feels a need to prove himself, if only because he comes from a family of policemen. In a world full of sociopaths and users, Vukovich is being tested and incredibly stressed. He reminds us of the very real physical and legal dangers involved in his career and his association with his reckless, fellow agent. 

Friedkin made a deliberate choice to depict the seamy side of Los Angeles. We spend our time in taverns, a strip club, prison, warehouses, small apartments, and the streets of East L.A. The poshest accommodations shown are those of counterfeiter Rick Masters and the sleazy lawyers (Dean Stockwell and Christopher Allport) that he associates with. (Who says crime does not pay?) Striking shots of sunrises and the catchy, synthesized soundtrack by Wang Chung (Jack Hues and Nick Feldman) compliment the mood of this environment perfectly. All of this seems bleak and a bit surreal. Such an atmosphere suits the attitudes in a film that Friedkin says is about a counterfeit world; the money and the relationships in this neo-noir tale are fake. 

Despite the stylistic trappings of the film, it always rings true. No one is portrayed as infallible and pure. The main protagonists, Chance and Masters, are polar opposites in temperament. But aside from Agent Chance’s noble goal of bringing his partner’s killer to justice, he can be just as unpleasant as the criminal Masters. Director Friedkin stated that he was depicting the very thin line between law enforcers and lawbreakers. 

This film is distinguished by its authenticity. The co-screenwriter and author of the original novel, Gerald Petievich, was actually an agent of the U.S. Secret Service. In an early scene, we see the creation of Rick Masters’ funny money; courtesy of the ex-con counterfeiter that the film employed to show us all how it is done. Unfortunately, a kid of the film’s prop master tried to pass one of the phony bills at a store, which resulted in the real U.S. Secret Service hassling director Friedkin and his poor prop master. 

To Live and Die in L.A. is an unsentimental reflection of ’80s attitude. Duty and machismo is shown to be as shallow as greed and fashion. The film plays the flip side of the crime thriller by refusing to romanticize the motives or abilities of its protagonists. It does so with a sense of style and ends on a nihilistic and almost mystic note. That makes this movie far more memorable than any of the era’s typical macho fantasies about saving the day with bullets, explosions, and wisecracks.

RE-ANIMATOR (1985), aka H.P. LOVECRAFT'S RE-ANIMATOR

Director: Stuart Gordon

Writers: Dennis Paoli, William J. Norris, Stuart Gordon, based on H.P. Lovecraft’s serialized story “Herbert West—Reanimator”

Producer: Brian Yuzna

Cast: Jeffrey Combs, Bruce Abbott, Barbara Crampton, David Gale, Robert Sampson, Carolyn Purdy-Gordon, Peter Kent, Ian Patrick Williams, Al Berry, Gerry Black, Craig Reed, Bunny Summers, Barbara Pieters, Velvet Bebois, Lawrence Lowe, Robert Holcombe, Mike Filloon, Jack Draheim, Robert Pitzele, Annyce Holzman, Derek Pendleton, Gene Scherer, James Ellis, James Earl Cathay, (and uncredited cast) Kim Deitch, Greg Robbins, John Forker 

In Arkham, Massachusetts, Miskatonic Medical School student Dan Cain (Bruce Abbott) accepts newly transferred student Herbert West (Jeffrey Combs) as a roommate in his rented house. The intense West is obsessed with his own medical research and believes that the dead can be restored to life. West has developed a serum to reanimate dead tissue and involves Dan in his increasingly dangerous experiments. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review 

Chicago, Illinois native Stuart Gordon had a background in theatre. First at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, then back in Chicago with the Organic Theater Company that he founded, Gordon directed and produced controversial and confrontational plays. When he decided to make a film, horror was not only the genre most marketable for beginning filmmakers; it was also the genre that would allow director Gordon to keep pushing boundaries. 

Gordon had first considered making his Lovecraft adaptation a production for the stage, then as a series of episodes for television, and finally as a feature film. Gordon found the perfect ally in producer Brian Yuzna, who was also a fan of horror and the writings of H.P. Lovecraft. Yuzna convinced Gordon to shoot the film in Hollywood and arranged the distribution deal. The initial scripts for the television series proposal were pared down into a concise feature film screenplay with more outrageous ideas added. 

Lovecraft’s writings were usually concept-driven and concerned with creating an atmosphere of awe and dread. Many of his tales dealt with the terror of man’s insignificance in a universe full of other beings and forces beyond our power to understand or control. Lovecraft’s stories did not dwell on their characters’ relationships. The protagonists of Lovecraft’s stories were usually driven only by an obsessive goal or an unearthly influence. Like the film adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe’s short stories, movies based on Lovecraft’s work usually needed his plots to be elaborated upon with additional characters, if one believes that movie plots should be character driven. 

While Re-Animator is not much more faithful to the prose it is based on than many other Lovecraft adaptations, it seems to have one of the best reputations of all Lovecraft-based films. Lovecraft’s serialized story, “Herbert West—Reanimator”, was written to be published in six parts, each of which needed to have a climax. It was more frantic than some other Lovecraft works, while having a less cosmic and a more grisly spectacle to it. As such, this lesser known Lovecraft yarn lends itself to the excesses of a mid-eighties fright flick. Stuart Gordon’s film takes the basic premise from Lovecraft’s tale and runs wild with it. 

Re-Animator is that exploitation rarity that gives the horror buffs all they are craving while still being surprisingly well received critically. Along with the gore and sex, there is a demented sense of fun to be found in the performances and the escalating madness of situations getting further and further out of control. The horror and humor are perfectly balanced so that the film never lapses into spoof territory. It keeps delivering the shocks while the performances keep us involved and amused. 

The story works so well because there is always a sense of intimacy to the horror. Aside from a few establishing shots, the action all takes place in a handful of interior locations. We have time to settle into this environment and with the small cast of main characters clashing with each other. Yet things never really seem to slow down and relax. Everything further bonds us with the characters or lays out the goals and values they have which cause most of the conflict. There is never a sense of the story marking time. It also seems like there is no limit to how much further the horror and chaos can go. 

Jeffrey Combs became a horror film immortal with his insolent and probably mad medical student, Herbert West. This character’s wit and sociopathy never fail to make me smile. He strikes me as the 1980s American answer to Peter Cushing’s Victor Frankenstein of the British Gothic horror classics from Hammer Films. West’s single-minded devotion to restoring the life of the dead spurs him on ever further into greater risk-taking and mishaps. Combs’ performance is a joy to watch for any horror fan. 

The hapless hero that we identify with is Bruce Abbott’s Dan Cain. He seems like a decent sort just trying to make it through medical school and get on with his life. Dan provides a measuring stick of normalcy against which to gauge the recklessness of his ruthless roommate, Herbert West. Unfortunately, Dan is just a bit too enamored of West’s medical achievement and gets entangled in the complications created by West’s experiments. 

Another important aspect of Abbott’s performance is that his Dan Cain is traumatized by the horrors he encounters in the story. This was deliberate on director Gordon’s part. He stated that his audience would not be frightened if his characters weren’t. This is an important technique that maintains Re-Animator’s delicate balance between humor and horror. Too many films of many genres forget to honestly depict how normal people would behave in dire situations. 

Like Jeffrey Combs, Barbara Crampton also became a legend in the horror genre for her role in Re-Animator. She would join Combs in more Stuart Gordon-directed horror films. As Gordon has stated, Crampton was a real trooper going above and beyond the call of duty providing this film its sex appeal. It doesn’t hurt that she is also a fine actress going through an entire range of extreme emotions while always remaining likable and relatable. 

With beautiful Barbara Crampton as Dan Cain’s co-ed girlfriend, Megan Halsey, some could envy Dan too much to have sympathy for him. However, we really learn to like both of these simply drawn characters during the few intimate moments we get to spend with them. That means that the rest of the morbid and madcap time, we care about them, which really sets up a touching, ironic, and unsettling payoff. 

I remembered Robert Sampson best for his appearance in “The Mutant,” an episode of the great, sci-fi, television series The Outer Limits (1963-65). Sampson was an experienced actor guest-starring in a multitude of television programs for three decades by the time he was cast as the dean of Miskatonic Medical School, Alan Halsey. Although Sampson had a supporting role in Italian director Lucio Fulci’s typically very moist horror film City of the Living Dead (1980), here he becomes a key player in the gruesome goings-on. At first, his character of Megan’s conservative and dignified father seems like the establishment type just meant to complicate things for our young couple. He really ends up in the wrong place at the wrong time and unwittingly helps the cause of mad science. 

If anyone in this cast seemed custom-made for the horror genre, it was David Gale. With his angular features, deep voice, and piercing gaze, he projects authority, intelligence, and evil effortlessly. His ambitious and underhanded Miskatonic professor, neurosurgeon Dr. Carl Hill, is yet another unprincipled proponent of mad science. Hill’s supercilious pupil, Herbert West, almost has us empathizing with him, but it does not take long before the not-so-good doctor reveals his loathsome nature. Dr. Hill’s shenanigans with Megan Halsey are Re-Animator’s most notorious highlight. 

There you have it: the five characters that push around this gory gurney called Re-Animator. Aside from some bit parts in this film, everyone else is dead, which could mean that they have a lot more to do, courtesy of Herbert West and his hypos of reagent serum. 

Re-Animator was a surprise hit at the Cannes Film festival, winning a Special Prize. When presenting the film for theatrical release in the US, director Gordon thought that getting the R rating was possible, but the MPAA had become less permissive in recent years and would have gutted the barely feature length film. Producer Brian Yuzna and Gordon made the gutsy decision to release the film unrated. This earned Re-Animator a bit of notoriety, while the critics still noticed the craft and wit of a film pushing its genre limits. Cuts were made to the film to get an R rating for another theatrical release the following year. That R-rated version included some previously deleted footage to add to the less gory cut’s runtime. Re-Animator found its greatest success on home videotape releases that usually used the unrated version. Fortunately, producer Yuzna was able to secure the rights again to get Re-Animator restored in all of its unrated, gory glory for 21st-century DVD releases. 

Due to this success of what Stuart Gordon considered a blessed production, he continued to direct and write more films. While he would dabble in other subject matter, Gordon would often return to the genre he is most associated with. If Gordon had never made another film after his first, he would still be a revered horror filmmaker. His Re-Animator is a cult film that has become a classic.

DRACULA (1931 - SPANISH VERSION)

Director: George Melford

Writers: Garrett Fort adapting the stage play by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston based on Bram Stoker’s novel, Spanish-language adaptation by Baltasar Fernández Cué

Producer: Carl Laemmle, Jr.

Cast: Carlos Villarías, Pablo Alvarez Rubio, Eduardo Arozamena, Lupita Tovar, Barry Norton, José Soriano Viosca, Carmen Guerrero, Manuel Arbó, Amelia Senisterra, Julia Bejarano (uncredited), John George (uncredited), (and uncredited players in snippets of English version footage) Bela Lugosi, Dwight Frye, Geraldine Dvorak, Cornelia Thaw, Dorothy Tree 

Renfield (Pablo Alvarez Rubio) is a solicitor traveling in Transylvania to meet Count Dracula (Carlos Villarías). In the count’s remote castle, Renfield presents the lease to Carfax Abbey, the property outside London, England that Dracula intends to rent. Dracula is a vampire who enslaves Renfield. After they sail to England, Dracula moves into Carfax Abbey and preys on the locals around his new home. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review 

Universal Pictures’ 1931 classic Dracula made Hungarian actor Bela Lugosi a household name and established his Dracula role as an icon of horror. Its success also proved that supernatural menace was a viable American film subject in the sound era. 

While it was initially considered a risky venture by cost-conscious Universal, they stretched their Dracula dollars by making a duplicate version for Spanish-speaking markets. Using the same sets and script, Universal shot a simultaneous, Spanish-language production of Dracula with a different director, cast, and crew. After director Tod Browning’s English-language production finished each day’s work, the Spanish version was shot at night under the direction of George Melford. 

The Spanish version’s story is virtually identical. It also shares a few establishing shots with the English version. Yet it has become almost conventional wisdom for the past half century to laud this version as being superior to the English-language version. 

Here is where this flashback fanatic needs to start picking nits or I will start eating flies. As tedious a chore as it may seem to some, I am obsessive enough to have watched both versions of 1931’s Dracula within a few days of each other to accurately discern the small, but crucial, differences between these two productions. Those differences are mainly what I am ranting about here. Although they may seem trivial, those differences justify this horror junkie continuing to waste away in the blissful glow of the boob tube. It’s not just an addiction; it’s dedication, dammit! 

It has to be stated right up front that Carlos Villarías is no Bela Lugosi. The bug-eyed glares, toothy grins, and pouts he uses to display his range of emotions deprive his Dracula of all the morbid power and dignity in Lugosi’s portrayal. Villarías also has the habit of repeatedly bowing with his head or from the waist during dialogue scenes. Lugosi did this a few times to convey some regal manners, but Villarías doing it so often makes him seem much too ingratiating. His Dracula is much more likely to transform into a lapdog instead of a wolf. 

In Villarías’ defense, his Dracula is menacing and effective in one shot as he rises out of the hold aboard the doomed schooner Vesta at sea while his slave, Renfield, is shrieking with insane laughter. That is one rare sequence that may be an improvement over the English version. 

As Renfield, Pablo Alvarez Rubio is memorably mad. While he won’t make anyone forget Dwight Frye’s incandescent insanity in the English-language role, Rubio gives an intense performance that helps enliven the proceedings. Unfortunately, as in the English version, Renfield is not given any reason to be needed by Dracula in England or ever shown to have any reason to be so concerned about the safety of Dr. Seward’s (José Soriano Viosca) daughter, Eva. Renfield just becomes a dramatic prop vacillating between madness and sorrow. 

While the rest of the performers are adequate, Lupita Tovar manages to make an impression. Her Eva Seward is the Spanish version’s counterpart of Helen Chandler’s Mina. The chief difference between the two roles is that Tovar is vivacious and sports a more revealing nightgown. Her vampire-influenced lunge at her fiancé (Barry Norton) is a tad more physical, yet the long, lingering close-up of Chandler’s trancelike stare as she moves in on David Manners’ John Harker is still more unsettling. 

The differences that so many applaud in the Melford-directed version really amount to just a few more moving camera shots, the aforementioned short scene aboard the Vesta, and a nicely done effect of mist rising out of an opening coffin to materialize as Dracula. The bit of Dracula walking through the giant spider web is also shot and edited a bit more effectively in the Meford film. That’s it, folks. I do not find anything else in this Spanish version to be more accomplished than the English version. However, I do find plenty of ways it does not measure up to the much-maligned, Tod Browning-directed film. 

Browning has always been bashed for not being comfortable transitioning from the silent films he made his name with to the sound era. He has been accused of having his camera be too stationary, as if he is shooting from a fixed position watching a stage play. That is precisely how many of the shots in Dr. Seward’s residence are framed in Melford’s version. We often have characters shown at such a distance during dialogue exchanges that we almost expect to see stage footlights at the bottom of the screen. Browning was not particularly dynamic in staging similar scenes, but he framed his shots much better than this. I suppose Browning’s cinematographer, Karl Freund, had a hand in those decisions. Nevertheless, such scenes often play better in Browning’s film. 

Many of those same scenes are played at a slower pace and last longer in Melford’s film. Browning’s English-language version has always been accused of being slow and stagey, yet that more relaxed quality of performance in the Spanish version usually slows things down while lacking vitality. I suspect that both versions, using the same script, had scenes written and filmed to last the same length, yet the English version probably had more snippets cut out of it to pick up the pace. But it also seems to me that many scenes in Browning’s version are performed at a brisker pace or with more urgency. 

The confrontation between Dracula and Professor Van Helsing, as the vampire tries to bring his nemesis under his hypnotic control, is probably my favorite scene in Browning’s Dracula. In a series of medium shots, Browning allows it to play out from start to finish with Bela Lugosi’s Dracula bringing all of his dark power against the mental resistance subtly conveyed by Edward Van Sloan’s Professor Van Helsing. 

That scene falls flat in the Melford version. It cuts back and forth between that confrontation and one of Eva about to make her bloodthirsty move on her fiancé, Juan Harker. This may have been a way to create a distraction from the fact that Carlos Villarías can’t match the power of Lugosi in that scene, but one can easily tell that it just does not build to a satisfying climax. Melford also shot the sequence with more angles, but that does not compensate for the performances. Browning may have kept it simple, but he allowed his actors Lugosi and Van Sloan to carry the scene. 

Another disappointment in Melford’s film is the exposure of Dracula as a vampire when he casts no reflection. Again, when Browning shot it, he framed his performers at the right distance in the camera and then let the confrontation play out. Lugosi’s Dracula suspects nothing, is surprised, and then lashes out in anger breaking the mirror. To appreciate how good Lugosi is, just watch the same scene shot by Melford. Villarías either chooses or is directed to play it wrong here. His Dracula shows so much apprehension (without cause) as he slowly looks into the mirror, that it makes no sense for him to seem surprised by Van Helsing’s ruse. People probably think that Villarías’ Dracula winding up with his cane and smashing the mirror Van Helsing (Eduardo Arozamena) is holding makes the scene more dynamic, but Lugosi just impulsively swatting away the mirror with his hand and then regaining his composure and arrogance in a single sustained take is far more effective. Of course that also requires the Lugosi presence to make it work. 

Speaking of the Lugosi presence, the eerie, silent stillness of Dracula in some shots of the Browning film eclipse just about everything in the Spanish version. There are numerous wonderfully lit shots of Lugosi’s malevolent features that are never really attempted in the Melford film. The best we get are repetitive close-ups of Carlos Villarías’ glaring eyeballs. 

Director Tod Browning’s Dracula is probably most appreciated for the performances of Bela Lugosi and Dwight Frye. While hardly as great as it could have been, it still has many virtues that become more apparent when compared to director George Melford’s Spanish version. Melford’s film has a longer running time while not fleshing out any characters further or providing much additional narrative. It is only remarkable as being a parallel version of a classic horror film with a few interesting variations. The English version is still superior.

DRACULA (1931)

Director: Tod Browning

Writers: Garrett Fort adapting the stage play by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston based on Bram Stoker’s original novel

Producers: Tod Browning, Carl Laemmle, Jr.

Cast: Bela Lugosi, Dwight Frye, Edward Van Sloane, David Manners, Helen Chandler, Herbert Bunston, Frances Dade, Charles K. Gerrard, Joan Standing, Halliwell Hobbes, (and uncredited cast) Carla Laemmle, Geraldine Dvorak, Cornelia Thaw, Dorothy Tree, Michael Visaroff, Bunny Beatty, Moon Carroll, Tod Browning, Nicholas Bela, Daisy Belmore, Barbara Bozoky, John George, Wyndham Standing, Josefina Velez, Anna Bakacs, William A. Boardway, Anita Harder, Florence Wix

A solicitor named Renfield (Dwight Frye) travels to the remote castle of Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) in Transylvania. Renfield presents Dracula with the lease to Carfax Abbey, a property just outside of London, England. Dracula is a vampire who soon dominates the will of Renfield. The pair sail to England where the vampire takes up residence in his newly acquired property. Dracula soon begins feeding on the English citizens. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review 

During the silent film era, Universal Pictures had made a name for themselves with macabre thrillers like The Phantom of the Opera (1925) and The Cat and the Canary (1927). Oddly, they seemed a bit skittish about producing a sound film based on Bram Stoker’s popular 1897 horror novel, Dracula, which had recently been the subject of successful stage plays in both England and the United States. Purely supernatural threats in American movies were considered either too distasteful or too far-fetched. Fortunately, Universal Pictures founder’s son, producer Carl Laemmle, Jr., was a horror fan and convinced his father that Dracula would work. It became Universal’s most profitable film in 1931 and established horror as a viable film genre in the new talkies era. 

Dracula was originally planned as a much more lavish project, but Universal Pictures was having a tough time turning a profit during the Great Depression. It was probably considered too big of a gamble to risk a massive investment on a supernatural thriller, so the original concept was reworked to be more derivative of the Dracula stage production. That resulted in a lot of drawing room drama that would be more economical from a set design and filming standpoint. 

Nevertheless, the opening scenes in Transylvania can’t be beat for Gothic spectacle. They are so iconic and satisfying, raising our anticipation to such heights, that we are bound to be let down by the more mundane settings once the story moves to England. This has long been the most common criticism of this film. 

However, the main fault is not so much with the change of scenery as with the minimal character and plot developments. There seems to have been quite a bit of editing done just to pick up the pace, yet a bit more time to flesh out some of the characters would be appreciated. We never really get a chance to know Lucy Weston (Frances Dade) before she becomes Dracula’s victim. Hence, her death and the loss her friend Mina Seward should feel is barely touched upon. Lucy’s resurrection is also given short shrift in this film’s need to economize or to keep things moving. Most perplexing is the treatment of Renfield. He becomes Dracula’s slave, yet he really serves no story purpose in England except to act crazy and tormented. Why does Dracula maintain contact with Renfield? Once Renfield has been confined to Dr. Seward’s (Herbert Bunston) sanitarium, all he seems capable of is annoying the staff and bungling Dracula’s plans. Renfield also keeps lapsing into despair pleading for Mina Seward’s safety when he never shares a single scene with her. Just how does this lunatic inmate of Dr. Seward’s sanitarium develop any compassion for his daughter? Another likely casualty of this reportedly chaotic production’s economy was the story’s climax. It seems rather abrupt and all too convenient for our heroes. 

Rumor has it that Universal hoped the silent film star who specialized in grotesque characters, Lon Chaney, would play Dracula. Since Chaney had also worked with director Tod Browning many times before, he should have been well suited to working with Dracula’s eventual director. Unfortunately, Chaney died prematurely of bronchial cancer before production began. 

Selecting Tod Browning to direct Dracula seemed like a good fit. Browning had a long and successful career in silent films with grotesque characters and bizarre plots. He had even directed the vampire-themed London After Midnight (1927) starring the Man of a Thousand Faces, Lon Chaney. 

Yet many say that Browning had trouble adapting to directing sound films. He was often criticized for a static shooting style. I think that Browning relied on his strange plots and the actors’ performances to maintain our interest. In the case of his most famous film, Dracula, the visuals greatly benefitted from Karl Freund’s cinematography. In fact, some cast members said that Freund actually directed them more than Browning. 

While many bemoan the heavy reliance on the stage play script for this film adaptation, we must credit the play as the source for two of this film’s stars. Bela Lugosi played Dracula and Edward Van Sloan was Professor Van Helsing in the 1927 Broadway production. 

Universal approached other seasoned film actors before hiring Bela Lugosi to play Dracula. Apparently, despite Lugosi’s fine notices playing the famous vampire on the stage, he wasn’t considered enough of a name to sell the film. However, Lugosi persistently sought the part and eventually won the role. 

If ever there was a case of familiarity breeds contempt, it is exemplified by many film buffs for at least the last fifty years regarding this film and Bela Lugosi’s starring role. The Lugosi-Dracula character and film have been around for so many generations that it is considered as traditional as Santa Claus. Now people take the film and its star for granted. They can’t appreciate the merits of 1931’s Dracula, since its success established what has become cliché after countless imitations. 

That often leads to disdain for the work Lugosi does here and he gets dismissed as hammy or inept. Lugosi is certainly giving a stylized performance that is trying to embody an extraordinary being of the supernatural. I would also stress that, in a picture directed in Tod Browning’s mostly prosaic fashion, Lugosi’s undead intensity is very welcome. I do agree with the criticism that some of Lugosi’s lines during his first meeting with Renfield are spoken with excruciating slowness for no good reason. Certainly the highlight of the film, once the story moves to the mundane London setting, is Lugosi’s performance. 

Of course this led to Lugosi becoming a horror film icon starring in many more films for Universal Pictures and other studios. Despite the frustration Lugosi always felt being typecast for horror roles by his Dracula success, that part has given him lasting fame beyond most of his contemporaries.

Lugosi’s fellow Dracula stage play performer, Edward Van Sloan, plays the rather one-note role of scientist and the count’s chief nemesis, Professor Van Helsing. He imparts his arcane knowledge about vampires to the other characters (and the film audience) as he tries to expose and defeat Dracula. Like the rest of the cast, Van Sloane is playing an underwritten character, but he shares the best scene in the whole film with Lugosi. When Dracula employs his hypnotic power to try dominating the professor, we are seeing a situation play out that seems ideal for the stage. Yet Van Sloan employs very subtle body language and facial expressions to show the struggle of his will to resist his vampire foe. 

After the huge success of Dracula, Van Sloan would appear in the Universal horror classics Frankenstein (1931), The Mummy (1932), and the Dracula sequel, Dracula’s Daughter (1936). 

The character every bit as attention-getting as Dracula is everyone’s favorite fly-eating maniac, Renfield, the solicitor that the vampire count has enslaved and driven mad. One of the film’s best moments is Renfield being discovered in the hold of the doomed schooner that brought him and Dracula back to England. We hear that creepy Renfield laugh before we stare down into the hold to see his eyes blazing with madness. Dwight Frye is always fun to watch, even if most of his antics as the insane Renfield are inexplicable or unjustified. 

Frye made an indelible impression with his performance in Dracula. Like his co-star Lugosi, Frye was worried that he would be typecast, for he would continue to play demented and despicable underlings and simpletons in the horror films Frankenstein (1931), The Vampire Bat (1933), Bride of Frankenstein (1935), and Dead Men Walk (1943). 

Helen Chandler plays Dracula’s main course, Mina Seward. Like just about every one else in the film, she is written as more of a type than a well-rounded character; in her case, it is the damsel in distress. Chandler never gets any respect for her work here, but I think she does as well as could be expected with what little she is given to do. Even the damsel in distress can be interesting if we are given enough time to get to know her. For all of the complaints about Dracula being a slow film, there is no time spent getting to really know anyone. Chandler’s best moment is when we see her succumbing to Dracula’s influence. She is treated to an eerie, prolonged close-up with her unblinking gaze focused on the throat of her fiancé as she slowly leans in closer and closer… 

As Mina’s fiancé, John Harker, David Manners makes his hapless-and-helpless-horror-movie-hero debut. Harker is probably the most derided character in this film. Aside from trying to comfort the distraught Mina, he accomplishes nothing and only creates a bit of conflict arguing with Professor Van Helsing and sulking. I actually think such behavior would be pretty reasonable up to a point. Most of us would be unlikely to accept our loved one being upset by supernatural claptrap from a stranger. Ultimately, he is also just another movie type: the handsome love interest. I guess that means Harker and Mina were made for each other. 

David Manners would continue playing similar, if more likable, characters in two more Universal horror classics: The Mummy (1932) and The Black Cat (1934), the latter also starring Bela Lugosi. 

Regardless of a lot of modern-day griping, 1931’s Dracula is still deserving of classic status. The sound era’s first American, supernatural thriller still boasts some great moments and established an immortal horror icon with Bela Lugosi’s role. The success of this film led to Universal Pictures’ fear-factory reputation as they continued producing more horror features throughout the ’30s and ’40s that endure as popular culture folklore. The importance of 1931’s Dracula as the foundation of cinematic horror ever since can’t be underestimated.