Dracula Untold: A Story That Should Have Remained Untold

F or the uninitiated, "Dracula," for many is a vampire who wears a black tuxedo and sometimes turns into a bat after he seduces women with his hypnotic stare. He speaks with a Romanian accent and says silly things like, "I want to drink your blood," He is a monster that preys on women, and in a venereal sense, is a creature of lust. However, "Dracula Untold" attempts to tell the story behind the legend and bring to light the historical figure that Bram Stoker hinted at in his 1897 Gothic Horror novel. Luke Evans ("The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug," "Immortals") plays the semi-historical Prince Vlad of Transylvania. Sarah Gadon ("The Amazing Spider-Man 2") plays his wife Mirena, and Art Parkinson, little Rickon Stark from the HBO series "Game of Thrones" is Ingeras his son. Although freshmen director Gary Shore and writers Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless attempt to fill in the details behind the mystery of who Dracula is, they fall short in the history department while trying to make up for it in effort, special effects and action. 

This is the second origins blockbuster film for 2014. The first, "Hercules" staring Dwayne Johnson did a decent job bringing a version of the demigod to the big screen that is a more human and perhaps a more honest view at how we see ancient legends. Bram Stoker gave only a few hints in his novel of who he was basing his dark count on. For instance during one of Jonathon Harker's conversations with the Count, Dracula mentions that his family comes from the proud Székelys, and Boyars who fought Ottoman Turks in defense of his people and their lands. This narrows the field down to Prince Vlad III of Walachia, situated next to the region of Transylvania. Although Stoker displaces Vlad III to the Transylvanian Carpathian Mountains, there was no person other than the reviled Vlad Țepeș, the Impaler. Even more specific is the name Dracula, as Vlad III was a Christian Knight in the Order of the Dragon, or Dracul, or Dragkwlya. As the reputation as the bloodthirsty Prince spread, 400 years later, Irish playwright and theater manager, Bram Stoker, created a vampire story around that legend. Others say that Stoker had his story pretty much outlined when he was looking for a name for his vampire and came upon the bloody prince.

"Dracula Untold" attempts to bring back Stoker's Count by providing the audience with a few morsels of truth about the infamous man behind the legend, as well as plenty of Hollywood myth making tossed in for good measure. In this version, a narrator recounts how Vlad and his brother Radu “The Handsome” were given as political hostages as a children and were educated by the Turks. He learned the Quran, Turkish, literature, logic, and the Art of War. Instead, Sharpless and Sazama turn the atrocious Vlad into a sympathetic anti-hero. Yes, Vlad the Impaler was a Christian Crusader who took up the cross during Pope Pius II's Crusade against the Ottomans, but he did so with such gusto that both friend and foe alike reviled him.  "Untold" presents us with a man born into a cruel world and tries to soften the edges and humanize him. As the narrator tells us, after leaving the captivity of the Turks, and returning to his own lands to reign, he renounces violence, and like Rock’s character in “Hercules,” intends to settle down and become a stay at home prince to his wife and a good and loving father to his son. 

After encountering evidence that the Ottoman Turks are on his lands, he and a small band of his men track the Turks to a bat infested mountain cave. Within the cave, they find the bones of humans who have lain there for centuries, along with the recently dispatched Turkish scouts. So many so, that Vlad realizes that something darker abides there. In a decent scene of horror (for a PG-13 movie), Vlad finds a creature who is so strong, but also so monstrous that he files that information for later. Returning to his home, we find that he has a beautiful wife (Gadon) and a well-bred, and unspoiled son (Parkinson) waiting for him to return. Shore allows us to see for ourselves perhaps the reason why Vlad hates the Turks so much as he removes his shirt to reveal horrible scars on his back from the whippings he endured when he was their prisoner.

While he and his family are in the midst of celebrating Easter in his grand hall with both servants and people of his court, Shore  depicts Vlad as a noble and generous prince. The Turks march in and interrupt the feast demanding their tax and levies for their Janissary corps. Janissarys are male children between the ages of 8 and 15 that serve in an elite corps of the Turkish Army. This sets the stage for rest of the film. Vlad is a good person only trying to save his family and his people. He has almost no army, and as he begs Mehmed II to leave his son out this deal, his hate returns with the memories of abuse at Mehmed's father's hands. Dominic Cooper ("Need for Speed," "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter") plays the Sultan Mehmed II who serves not only as the villain, but also as the catalyst that forces Vlad's hand in deciding to turn to the dark side. Returning to the bat cave mentioned earlier, he encounters a very old and ancient evil that may supply him with an answer to his dark prayers. "Game of Thrones" Charles Dance plays the very old Master Vampire. A dark Yoda of sorts, he cautions the young prince on the pitfalls of immortality and the need to feed. Yes, he will become a hero, but many will hate him. Unlike Louis and Lestat in "An Interview with a Vampire," Prince Vlad is given time to decide if he has buyer's remorse. He has three days to defeat the Sultan, however, the need to feed on human blood will become unbearable, but he cannot drink blood in that time. If he does, his change will become permanent. 

What would you do? Would you accept the dark side in order to save your loved ones? Or, would you stay the course and give in to the Sultan and wait until you have built your army? What the film does mention that is more or less historically accurate is that Radu, Vlad's brother, sided with Mehmed during the upcoming battles. From here on out, the "Dracula Untold" becomes a formula action film with somewhat melodramatic bitter sweet doomed romance, and plenty of CGI shenanigans which include Vlad morphing into not just one bat, but into an entire colony of them. The blood and gore is kept to a 21-century minimum, and the horror and thrill are more at an action level rather than going for the paranormal suspense and fear. 

The battle scenes are shot close up in the "Jason Bourne" style of dizzy and frenetic camera work, more of a blur if you will. Luke Evans' acting is stiff at times but conveys the charm of a prince and the brooding weight of responsibility for others. Dominic Cooper's Mehmet isn't around enough to like or dislike the character nor is Cooper's acting is of anything to note. Charles Dance as the creepy and demonic Master Vampire is probably the only real scary part in the whole film. Vlad's son Igneras is just another kid whom the audience are supposed to feel concern over his fate. Unfortunately I didn't. If anything i felt the film was lacking in passion (except for Luke Evans) for the whole film seems to me to be on the same level as Johnathon Harker played by Keanu Reeves, in Francis Ford Coppola’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula.” The special effects in “Untold,” in some ways overshadow the story, and not in a good way. Watch if you are looking for an average action film  with just a tad bit of history, stay away if you are looking for that special film that you will remember as an important part of the Dracula cannon. If anything I give the director and writer some points for effort. 

"Dracula Untold" opened in theaters on October 10, 2014 and on DVD and Blu-ray on February 3, 2015.

Related

The Literary and Cinematic Origins of Dracula

Movie Data

Genre: Action, Drama, Fantasy, Horror, War 
Year: 2014
Staring: Luke Evans, Sarah Gadon, Dominic Cooper, Art Parkinson, Charles Dance
Director: Gary Shore
Producer(s) Michael De Luca
Writer: Matt Sazama, Burk Sharpless, Bram Stoker (characters)
Rating: PG-13

Running Time: 92 minutes

Release Date: 10/10/2012

The Literary and Cinematic Origins of Dracula

Vampire books and movie surround us today in our society, Books, and films as recent as "The Vampires Assistant," "Twilight," and many others all who owe Irish author and playwright Bram Stoker, for writing the horror masterpiece "Dracula." Although I have seen the Bela Lugosi as the dark Count, Frank Langella as the romantic Dracula, and Christopher Lee's version of the character, but it wasn't until High School that I got around to read Bram Stoker's "Dracula." My personal copy of the Bram Stoker classic is the "Leonard Wolf Annotated Dracula," version where Mr. Wolf provides the introduction, notes, and bibliography. The artist Sätty provides the artwork that adorns the pages of this book. Gothic lithographs and beautiful maps of England and Romania help create the illusion of reality that Stoker brought to the pages in 1897. Released on May 26, Stoker wrote a novel, that I found absolutely creepy and nightmarish when I first read it. Unlike most novels written in second or third person narrative form, Stoker creates a world of utter believability by writing "Dracula" in the form of letters, diary entries, or newspaper clippings. As if he, Stoker, was the editor, piecing together an event in history and providing us with evidence of the account, creating in a fashion, a found footage narrative. The story of an English solicitor traveling to the dark woods of Transylvania to conduct a real estate contract between a Eastern European noble, Count Dracula, and his firm. The solicitor, Jonathon Harker becomes drawn into a world that, in Stoker's time, confined to tales told at night beside the fireplace.  

Tod Browning telling of "Dracula" in 1931, for a long time was the version that many remember to this day. Taking liberties with the story, and turning Renfield into the solicitor that travels to Castle Dracula, and then captured by the Count, changed the story in a way that simplified its telling for the audience. The star, Bela Lugosi, embodied the character of Dracula throughout his career and into the grave. For audiences of the time, at a time as the United States was entering the Great Depression, Dracula was an escape into the dark eerie world of the supernatural. By 1958, the story had changed a bit more turning Harker, not as a solicitor, but into a librarian. Peter Cushing ("Star Wars") starred as Doctor Van Helsing, and Christopher Lee ("The Fellowship of the Ring," "Star Wars: Episode II - The Attack of the Clones") as Dracula, together they made unforgettable adversaries. By the time I was in High School, Frank Langella ("Lolita, "The Ninth Gate") starred in director John Badham's romantic version of the count. "Dracula" is now less a monster and more of a romantic figure seducing the women and inciting them into a venereal lust.  

Not until Francis Ford Coppola's 1992 version, captures not only the spirit of the novel, but to some degree more or less the literalism of the book as well. For me, the appeal to Coppola's version is that he creates a backstory for Dracula that seems quasi-plausible in light of history of Vlad the Impaler. In this version, screenwriter James V. Hart tells us at the beginning of the film, that when the Eastern Roman Empire capital of Constantinople fell in 1453, the Ottoman Empire, led by Sultan Mehmed II swept throughout Eastern Europe. On June 17, 1462, Vlad III, of the sacred order of the Dracul (Dragon), a Prince of Wallachia in Transylvania, made the daring "Atacul de noapte de la Târgoviste" or Night Attack, engaged Mehmed on the battlefield. While Vlad III is victorious on the battlefield, Coppola turns to folklore to take the story a step further. A defeated Turkish soldier shoots an arrow into Vlad III's chamber with a note attached to it saying that Vlad Dracul is dead. His wife Elisabeta flings herself into the river below, committing suicide. Vlad Dracul is shown as a Christian Knight who upon realizing that the Orthodox Priests refuse his wife burial on holy ground, blasphemies against the Church and God, causing a cross to bleed. Upon drinking the blood that flows from the religious symbol, he takes on immortal life and the curse of the need to feast on the blood of the living. With an all-star cast with Gary Oldman as the infamous Count, he leads Winona Ryder as Mina Harker, away from her true love Jonathon, played by Keanu Reeves. 

"Dracula 2000" tells another origin story. The main characters are thinly veiled versions of the well-known characters of Mina, Johnathon, and Lucy, the characters of Dracula and Van Helsing are solid. In this version, Dracula is none other than Judas Iscariot, the betrayer of Christ. For two thousand years, he suffers the curse of immortality. Gerard Butler ("300," "Phantom of the Opera") is Dracula, while Christopher Plummer ("The Sound of Music” "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country") is Abraham Van Helsing. All of these versions of the Dracula character have something for fans of the vampire genre. However, they are merely plot points in the larger story arc of good against evil.

In "Dracula Untold" director Gary Shore gives a fleshed out account of Dracula's attempt to hold back the Ottoman Turks. In doing so, he needs to call on a higher power, a darker power, for help in his fight against the invading Muslims. Luke Evans ("Immortals") plays the Romanian Voivode (warlord) and Sarah Gadon ("The Amazing Spider-Man 2 ") plays his wife Mirena. Dominic Cooper ("Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter") is the Sultan Mehmed. Drawing from Slavic folklore, screenwriters Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless introduce us to a Baba Yaga, an ugly witch disguised as a beautiful woman. In this version of Dracula, he has a son played by Art Parkinson and his name is Ingeras. Vlad had three children by two women. His first wife's name isn't documented anywhere other than folklore. His child with his unnamed wife was Mihnea cel Rău. He lived to be about 50 and spent much of his time trying to regain his father's throne. He was assassinated while attending Mass in Sibiu in the historical region of Transylvania in Romania.


Dracula is a folk hero to the Romanian people, but to the West, he is known as Vlad Țepeș the Impaler. As a young man, Vlad and his younger brother Radu (the handsome) were Turkish political prisoners. The Turks trained the young noblemen in horsemanship and in war. While Radu embraced his Turkish overlords, Vlad despised them. As Prince of Wallachia, he terrorized the Turks and impaled thousands of them at one time, that the locals considered him bloodthirsty. In "Dracula Untold," Vlad makes a deal with the Master Vampire, Caligula played by "Game of Thrones" Charles Dance. In this version, Dracula is a hero, rather than the monster that Bram Stoker made him to be. 

Related

Dracula Untold: A Story That Should Have Remained Untold

After Life: Review

Taylor, "Where am I?"  Elliot, "You are Dead."

What would it take to convince you that you were dead? A death certificate? Your ashen body staring back at you in a mirror? The memory of a tragic accident. That is the question the director of the film After.Life asks. Christina Ricci ("Monster," "Cursed," "Black Snake Moan ") and Justin Long ("Jeepers Creepers," "Drag Me to Hell," "Galaxy Quest") try to answer this question in this 103 minute dive down the rabbit hole of the dark world of the Mad Hatter of a mortician played by Liam Neeson ("Taken," "Kingdom of Heaven," "The Haunting"). In many ways this is a film that as director Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo, takes a philosophical stance, like "Saw" - what is the measure of a man's life. Or in this case, What is the measure or meaning of Ann Taylor's life.  Also please meet Anna's student Jack (Chandler Canterbury), don't mind him, he is a little creepy, like Renfield in "Dracula," he likes to start small.

Ann Taylor (Ricci) is an elementary school teacher who wakes up every day to her boyfriend trying to hump her frigid body, she showers, goes to work, meets her boyfriend for dinner, and agree not to argue for everything like her mom.  The director gives us slight hints that Ann is not a happy camper and this sets the mood for the rest of the film.  Meeting her boyfriend and live-in lover, Paul (Long), for dinner at a nice restaurant -- Paul before popping the question, prefaces's his marriage proposal to Ann with the news of having to move to Chicago - stupid.  The high strung Anna immediately accuses Paul of breaking up with her (pull out the ring idiot Paul) tells him to Fuck off and she leaves, making a scene. This film is a cautionary tale to all of us who like to speed in the rain recklessly, while dialing on our cell phones chasing big trucks with heavy loads. Within moments Taylor's life is over and she is on the mortician's slab. Waking up, groggily, she asks Elliot (Neeson) where am I? He replies you are dead. Then he shows her the death certificate. Momentarily convinced, she relaxes as she lays nude on the table, a wound on her head and chest.  Nesson asks, "Don't you remember the car crash?"  Taylor thinks back, and says "I don't feel dead."  "Why must you people always have to argue with me, It's not my fault you are dead." Like a Vietnam torture tactic, Liam Neeson tells her that she has three days to prepare herself for the journey to the other side. Also claiming that he has a gift to see between those in between worlds, it is his gift/curse/duty to help people journey out of this life. 

Thus sets the story and the tone for the rest of this psychological, philosophical mind-provoking thriller on the meaning of life and its worth.  We learn through an ongoing dialog between Neeson and Ricci that she is not happy and would probably be better off dead. The philosophical term for this mindset is called antinatalism. Playing cat and mouse with Ricci's wits and her will to live, Neeson breaks down her sad life, little by little, with lies and half truths he ultimately moves Ann Taylor's psyche closer to accepting her death.  Not like the TV show "The Ghost Whisperer," Elliot's mission is a bit different but perhaps just as important. I liked "After.Life" for the different take on getting a person to examine one's life, rather than the torture methods utilized in the "Saw" films. Ultimately my issue with this well made, well acted, well produced film is, that although director Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo gives us plenty of clues as to the true nature of Taylor's existence on this plane. However, she denies us the satisfaction of celebrating that our ultimate conclusions are correct. For the most part this is an excellent film, but I did walk away feeling less than satisfied with the ending.


Movie Data

Genre: Drama, Horror, Mystery, Thriller

Year: 2010

Staring: Christina Ricci, Liam Neeson, Justin Long, Chandler Canterbury 

Director: Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo

Producer(s): Celine Rattray, Brad M. Gilbert

Writer: Agnieszka Wojtowicz-Vosloo, Paul Vosloo, Jakub Korolczuk

Rating:R

Running Time: 104 minutes

Release Date: 8/26/2010

Originally published by Robert Barbere on Associated Content on 8/10/2010