WEBVTT - Weirdhouse Cinema Rewind: Dracula (1931) 0:00:04.360 --> 0:00:07.960 Hey, you welcome to Weird House Cinema. Rewind. My name 0:00:08.000 --> 0:00:09.600 is Rob Lamb. Things are a little bit out of 0:00:09.680 --> 0:00:12.959 order this week, but it'll be back to order next week. 0:00:13.039 --> 0:00:15.600 This is going to be our look at nineteen thirty 0:00:15.640 --> 0:00:20.200 one's Dracula. Yes, be Dracula, Todd Browning, Bela Lagosi. This 0:00:20.280 --> 0:00:24.880 episode originally published one, twenty twenty five. Let's jump right in. 0:00:27.680 --> 0:00:30.680 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:38.440 --> 0:00:41.400 Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob. 0:00:41.280 --> 0:00:45.080 Lamb and this is Joe McCormick. And today on Weird House, 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:48.200 we're tackling a classic. We're going to be talking about 0:00:48.240 --> 0:00:53.920 the nineteen thirty one Universal Pictures adaptation of Dracula, directed 0:00:53.920 --> 0:00:59.160 by Todd Browning, starring Bela Lagosi. Now, Rob, this was 0:00:59.160 --> 0:01:01.959 your pick for this week. I had always assumed if 0:01:01.960 --> 0:01:05.200 we talked about Dracula, it would happen in October. But 0:01:05.319 --> 0:01:08.440 I'm not complaining. Happy to talk about Dracula in January 0:01:08.480 --> 0:01:10.760 or whatever month it still is. Yeah, it's we're still January. 0:01:11.240 --> 0:01:14.160 So what's going on? How'd you get to Dracula? 0:01:15.000 --> 0:01:16.959 Well, this is how it went down. So, yeah, this 0:01:17.000 --> 0:01:20.679 is a film I had actually never seen before. You know, 0:01:20.720 --> 0:01:23.839 sometimes a film I think is so iconic, so genre defining, 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:26.800 so all present in popular culture that it kind of 0:01:26.840 --> 0:01:29.880 fades into a personal obscurity. You know, you haven't seen it, 0:01:29.920 --> 0:01:32.280 but you kind of feel like you've seen it, or 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:34.800 you know you're just overly familiar with its themes. It's 0:01:34.840 --> 0:01:37.280 cast its place in film history, and therefore, when it 0:01:37.280 --> 0:01:39.640 comes time to watch something, you're like, well, I just 0:01:39.640 --> 0:01:41.840 want to watch something fresh, or you want to watch 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:44.960 something you really do know, and films like this can 0:01:45.040 --> 0:01:46.200 kind of fall through the cracks. 0:01:46.920 --> 0:01:49.320 Yeah, that's sort of interesting. I might talk more about 0:01:49.320 --> 0:01:52.720 this later. But something I find interesting about this Dracula 0:01:52.800 --> 0:01:56.360 is I've probably seen it at least five or six times, 0:01:56.680 --> 0:01:59.800 but I still forget things about it. And the reason 0:01:59.880 --> 0:02:03.800 is that there are so many different adaptations of Dracula. 0:02:04.400 --> 0:02:07.560 It becomes hard to keep straight which elements are from 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:09.600 which version true? 0:02:09.720 --> 0:02:15.000 True? Yeah, what deviations are made, what is intensified and 0:02:15.040 --> 0:02:17.200 what is condensed and so forth. 0:02:17.600 --> 0:02:18.400 Yeah. 0:02:18.520 --> 0:02:22.160 So yeah, I had this realization over the weekend. So 0:02:22.880 --> 0:02:25.359 my kid has really gotten into dungeons and dragons and 0:02:25.480 --> 0:02:28.519 has set their sight so not only dming a campaign 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:32.359 for Friends, but dming Curse of strawed. For those of 0:02:32.400 --> 0:02:35.120 you who are unfamiliar, The Dark Lord stra of aon 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:38.919 Zardovich is D and d's take on Dracula, essentially a 0:02:39.080 --> 0:02:42.799 dracula esque vampire lord character, created in the late nineteen 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:46.320 seventies by Tracy and Laura Hickman and based in part 0:02:46.400 --> 0:02:50.080 on Bela Lugosi's iconic portrayal in nineteen thirty one's Dracula. 0:02:51.320 --> 0:02:54.040 I have no familiarity at all. Basically, all I know 0:02:54.120 --> 0:02:58.160 is that vampires are a big deal in D and D. 0:02:58.280 --> 0:03:00.959 You can confirm this that they're not like your standard 0:03:00.960 --> 0:03:03.200 you know, you're just staking them left and right kind 0:03:03.200 --> 0:03:05.560 of enemies that you might expect from some like horror 0:03:05.680 --> 0:03:08.720 video games or whatever. Like if you meet a vampire 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:10.760 in D and D, this is like one of the 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:15.320 most devastating and dangerous enemies you could possibly face. 0:03:15.240 --> 0:03:18.079 Absolutely, especially like a true vampire as opposed to just 0:03:18.120 --> 0:03:21.880 a vampire spawn. But ah, okay, yeah, any rate, I 0:03:21.919 --> 0:03:24.640 told you know, I'm supportive. I'm a supportive dad, So 0:03:24.680 --> 0:03:28.280 I'm like, okay, that sounds good. But one doesn't simply 0:03:28.480 --> 0:03:32.120 run Curse of straw without seeing at least one Dracula movie, 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:34.840 and I think the most they'd seen was Bart Simpson's 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:36.440 Dracula on Treehouse of Horror. 0:03:36.720 --> 0:03:39.800 Oh yeah, which is a take on a lot of 0:03:39.800 --> 0:03:42.560 the jokes on that are tied into the Francis Ford 0:03:42.560 --> 0:03:44.240 Coppola adaptation from the nineties. 0:03:44.400 --> 0:03:47.600 Absolutely, yes, yeah, And so you know, I was looking 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:49.720 at my options, and I was considering the Copola one 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:52.520 as well, because I'm like, all right, my wife's going 0:03:52.560 --> 0:03:53.760 to be out of town. It's just the two of us. 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:56.600 We've got to watch a Dracula film. And then I 0:03:56.640 --> 0:03:58.440 started really thinking about It's like, you know, I haven't 0:03:58.480 --> 0:04:01.800 actually seen the nineteen thirty one Assic in full. You know, 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:04.200 I've seen so many Dracula films over the years, and 0:04:04.240 --> 0:04:08.800 this one has just fallen through the cracks. So given 0:04:07.960 --> 0:04:12.560 that they enjoyed Son of Frankenstein back in October, I 0:04:12.640 --> 0:04:15.840 was like, well, it makes sense to watch another black 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:19.440 and white horror classic. It's maybe not too scary. I mean, 0:04:19.480 --> 0:04:21.920 they can handle stranger things and aliens at this point, 0:04:21.920 --> 0:04:23.919 so I'm not too worried about that. But you know, 0:04:24.800 --> 0:04:29.159 some of these Dracula movies hit pretty hard. So yeah, 0:04:29.200 --> 0:04:31.599 we watched Dracula. For my own part, I feel like 0:04:31.720 --> 0:04:37.279 absolutely holds up stunning, atmospherically, creepy, absolutely rooted in Lugosi's 0:04:37.480 --> 0:04:41.080 mesmerizing performance, and it's pretty weird in its own right too. 0:04:41.360 --> 0:04:43.680 I'm also happy to report that my kid also really 0:04:43.800 --> 0:04:47.320 enjoyed the film, resulting in many a oh my whenever 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:52.000 Dracula or Renfield made crazy or intense eyes. They told 0:04:52.040 --> 0:04:54.680 me after we were viewing that they half expected Dracula 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:56.560 to creep out of the shadows in the house. 0:04:56.920 --> 0:05:00.840 Well, I think that's what you want. I okay, let's see. 0:05:00.839 --> 0:05:04.279 I'm trying to search my feelings and know and find 0:05:04.320 --> 0:05:06.400 what I know to be true. Have I ever really 0:05:06.440 --> 0:05:09.880 been scared by the Universal Dracula. 0:05:10.279 --> 0:05:10.479 No. 0:05:10.680 --> 0:05:14.080 I think maybe I'm just too hardened by horror movies 0:05:14.080 --> 0:05:16.600 that would come later. But I do love it, and 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:19.920 I appreciate the craft of the horror in it, and 0:05:20.240 --> 0:05:22.400 I feel like I can see how it would be 0:05:22.520 --> 0:05:25.360 scary if I hadn't been so desensitized by all of 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:28.480 the edgier horror movies that would come later. 0:05:29.000 --> 0:05:32.080 Yeah, to be clear, they're fine, they're almost thirteen. They 0:05:32.160 --> 0:05:35.560 were able to handle it, but I was. It did 0:05:35.560 --> 0:05:37.520 bring me much joy that they enjoyed it as much 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:40.080 as they did, and they weren't bored with it or anything. 0:05:40.680 --> 0:05:43.000 And yeah, I don't think there's really a boring moment 0:05:43.000 --> 0:05:46.240 in this one. It flies right along, sometimes literally on 0:05:46.279 --> 0:05:48.919 the wings of a bat. So I don't really have 0:05:48.920 --> 0:05:51.520 an elevator picture this one, Joe, other than it's Dracula. 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:54.800 This is the big one. This is a titan of 0:05:55.000 --> 0:06:00.000 not only cinema enlarge, but also horror cinema specifically. 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:03.200 Dracula comes to the talkies fully licensed. 0:06:03.400 --> 0:06:06.520 That's right, that's right. Let's see if we're able to. 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:08.400 Let's go ahead and listen to just a little bit 0:06:08.440 --> 0:06:09.680 of the trailer audio here. 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:19.159 I am Dracula. 0:06:24.080 --> 0:06:27.440 Dracula. The very mention of the name brings to mind 0:06:27.520 --> 0:06:32.640 things so evil, so fantastic, so degrading. You wonder if 0:06:32.640 --> 0:06:47.599 it isn't all a dream, a nightmare millions the original 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:51.360 terrifying story of a maniac and a man who lived 0:06:51.520 --> 0:06:55.640 after death, lived on human blood, took the form of 0:06:55.680 --> 0:06:59.240 a vampire bat, and lured innocent girls to a fate 0:06:59.600 --> 0:07:01.480 truly worse than death. 0:07:05.040 --> 0:07:25.960 You done, he made me drink all right? Well, you 0:07:26.000 --> 0:07:28.000 might be wondering, well, Where can I watch nineteen thirty 0:07:28.000 --> 0:07:31.600 one's Dracula. Well, I watched it on the Universal Dracula 0:07:31.680 --> 0:07:35.640 Complete Legacy Collection Blu ray set. I rented this from Videodrome. 0:07:36.440 --> 0:07:38.240 I think you have the same addition, right, Joe. 0:07:38.720 --> 0:07:41.520 Uh No, I've got a slightly different thing. I've got 0:07:41.560 --> 0:07:46.160 the Universal Classic Monsters Essential Collection Blu ray set, which 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:49.280 I highly recommend. It's got a lot of great extra 0:07:49.320 --> 0:07:52.040 I mean, all the films look beautiful. It's got a 0:07:52.040 --> 0:07:55.120 ton of great extras, documentaries and commentary tracks and all 0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:57.760 that comes with a nice little booklet. So yeah, I've 0:07:57.840 --> 0:07:59.360 enjoyed this set for years. 0:07:59.360 --> 0:08:00.760 All right, Right, I think we have some of the 0:08:00.760 --> 0:08:04.920 same extras and special features that shared, so definitely, you know, 0:08:05.080 --> 0:08:07.040 Universal Horror release. 0:08:06.720 --> 0:08:09.320 Here might just be a partial repackaging kind of thing. 0:08:09.560 --> 0:08:11.320 Yeah, yeah, because the extras on this day and there's 0:08:11.360 --> 0:08:15.520 some great extras. They're a little bit older, but charming 0:08:16.640 --> 0:08:19.840 in ways that sometimes things from nineteen ninety nine are not. 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:22.880 But there's a really good document short documentary called The 0:08:22.920 --> 0:08:26.760 Road to Dracula, and it's hosted by Carla Limley who 0:08:26.800 --> 0:08:29.360 lived nineteen oh nine through twenty fourteen. She was the 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:33.920 niece of Universal founder Carl Limley and cousin of producer 0:08:34.080 --> 0:08:35.200 Carl Limley Junior. 0:08:35.480 --> 0:08:36.480 And she's in the movie. 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:39.120 She is she has the first line of dialogue. 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:42.480 Yeah, she's just riding in the carriage in the Borgo pass. 0:08:42.800 --> 0:08:46.280 Yes. Yeah. So it's really fun, and you know, you 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:49.319 got some of the usual suspects of various film historians. 0:08:49.360 --> 0:08:51.800 Some will refer to Joe Dante of course, shows up 0:08:51.840 --> 0:08:54.840 to talk a little about horror films, and it's a 0:08:54.840 --> 0:08:57.560 lot of fun. So these Blu rays are great. But 0:08:57.960 --> 0:09:01.080 this is of course a very famous film. It's generally 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:05.080 available for digital purchase in rental, and it's one one 0:09:05.120 --> 0:09:07.240 of those classics that you will also periodically get to 0:09:07.240 --> 0:09:09.839 see on the big screen, which is a treat. 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:13.640 While we're on the subject of disc extras, I just 0:09:13.679 --> 0:09:15.680 wanted to say a couple of times I've watched this 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:19.400 movie with a commentary track that's on the disc version 0:09:19.440 --> 0:09:22.720 I have by the film and horror historian David J. Skall. 0:09:23.679 --> 0:09:25.760 Some of the things, like probably a lot of the 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:28.200 behind the scenes things I know about the movie I 0:09:28.320 --> 0:09:31.240 learned through Skall's commentary, So credit to him. That's a 0:09:31.320 --> 0:09:33.720 source of a lot of my just general information. 0:09:34.360 --> 0:09:38.040 Yes, Skall, who sadly passed away last year, is also 0:09:38.080 --> 0:09:41.000 an important part of the documentary shorts on the disc, 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:44.560 and among his many books you'll find vas for Vampire 0:09:44.640 --> 0:09:47.240 and a to Z Guide to Everything Undead that was 0:09:47.240 --> 0:09:50.280 published in ninety six. I've already added a used copy 0:09:50.280 --> 0:09:52.360 of that to my cart I think I need that 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:53.040 in my collection. 0:09:54.440 --> 0:09:57.560 They're all undead, Okay, trying to think what the X is? 0:09:58.679 --> 0:10:02.199 Oh yeah, this might be a pull. Yeah, all right, 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:04.600 well let's talk about the connections here the people behind 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:07.720 this film. I do have to note that, as usual, 0:10:07.840 --> 0:10:10.840 we can't cover everyone and a film this big. I 0:10:10.880 --> 0:10:13.320 feel like there's been so much written about it and 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:16.360 explored about the picture. Every little part has probably been 0:10:16.360 --> 0:10:19.600 explored to some degree or another, and we just don't 0:10:19.600 --> 0:10:22.160 have time for all of that. So my apologies to 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:25.960 anyone whose efforts and talent we left out here. 0:10:26.840 --> 0:10:30.520 Yeah. Also worth noting that this film is incredibly huge 0:10:30.520 --> 0:10:32.559 and important in Hollywood history, and we're not going to 0:10:32.600 --> 0:10:34.640 be able to explore all of this. This is not 0:10:34.720 --> 0:10:39.079 your complete history lesson on the universal monsters in Dracula. 0:10:39.640 --> 0:10:42.080 We can't do that today. We're not really qualified for that, 0:10:42.160 --> 0:10:43.640 but we're going to do what we can. 0:10:43.760 --> 0:10:47.120 Absolutely all right. Starting at the top. The director is, 0:10:47.160 --> 0:10:50.360 of course Todd Browning, who ofd eighteen eighty through nineteen 0:10:50.440 --> 0:10:54.160 sixty two, American director who was quite successful during the 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:58.480 silent era and by some estimates less sure of himself 0:10:58.640 --> 0:11:01.559 entering into the talky era. And that's something you'll pick 0:11:01.640 --> 0:11:03.840 up on with this film and its frequent use of 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:08.079 silence and at times a kind of like stagy ritualistic 0:11:08.160 --> 0:11:12.160 framing that feels very you know, in keeping with this 0:11:12.280 --> 0:11:18.160 film's roots on the stage as a play, but also 0:11:19.160 --> 0:11:20.920 fitting for the silent era as well. 0:11:21.400 --> 0:11:25.040 Yeah, I guess we can talk more later about the 0:11:25.040 --> 0:11:28.199 different musical compositions that have been paired with the movie 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:31.880 over the years, but one thing that will feel kind 0:11:31.880 --> 0:11:34.360 of unusual about it to a lot of modern audiences 0:11:34.480 --> 0:11:36.760 is the lack of music throughout the film. There are 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:39.280 a couple of scenes with music, you know, with the 0:11:39.280 --> 0:11:41.920 credits and the old version you get the Swan Lake, 0:11:42.040 --> 0:11:45.000 and there's a scene that takes place at a symphony 0:11:45.040 --> 0:11:48.240 performance where there's music in the background. Because it's diegetic music, 0:11:48.240 --> 0:11:50.880 it's supposed to be part of the narrative. But most 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:53.040 of the scenes it's just kind of silence and the 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:56.720 characters talking, and some of the most dramatic scenes in 0:11:56.760 --> 0:11:59.760 the film, there's nothing at all to listen to. It's 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:02.680 just it's utterly silent. Well like you know, the vampire 0:12:02.760 --> 0:12:03.480 creeps up. 0:12:04.000 --> 0:12:06.640 Yeah, I mean you almost it's almost unheard off when 0:12:06.679 --> 0:12:09.440 you compare it to modern films, like so many films 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:14.520 are just non stop blaring music and sound effects and explosions. 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:17.679 And it depends on the genre obviously, but yeah, it 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:20.800 can be almost shocking how silent this picture is. But 0:12:20.840 --> 0:12:24.960 you're also you're not missing the cacophony either. It's also 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:27.800 worth noting that films of this era were also released 0:12:27.800 --> 0:12:32.800 in silent film versions, in part for older theaters, but 0:12:32.880 --> 0:12:37.240 also for international markets since dubbing subtitles were not really 0:12:37.280 --> 0:12:40.280 all that establish yet. So you'll find versions of nineteen 0:12:40.320 --> 0:12:43.600 thirty one's Dracula that have the full like silent film 0:12:43.679 --> 0:12:47.480 dialogue set up, where you know, the inter titles. Yeah, yeah, oh, 0:12:47.720 --> 0:12:48.359 I feel. 0:12:48.080 --> 0:12:49.960 Like that would there would be so many there's a 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:54.040 lot of dialogue in this movie, because generally talkies had 0:12:54.080 --> 0:12:56.760 more dialogue in them than silent films. Did I feel 0:12:56.760 --> 0:12:58.920 like that would extend the run time a lot, if 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:01.160 you had to have an intertie for every line. 0:13:01.480 --> 0:13:04.040 Yeah, they must have. I haven't seen it in full myself. 0:13:04.080 --> 0:13:05.400 I've just seen some clips. I'm not sure if a 0:13:05.440 --> 0:13:09.040 full version exists, but yeah, they would have to cut 0:13:09.080 --> 0:13:09.880 some stuff, right. 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:12.920 I would think so. Well, I don't know who knows. 0:13:13.080 --> 0:13:16.880 I've never edited a talkie into a silent film, but yeah, 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:19.000 I would think it would. It would end up running 0:13:19.040 --> 0:13:20.960 really long and they'd have to cut some stuff down. 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:24.000 They should do that. When the new Nosferatu film that 0:13:24.080 --> 0:13:26.400 came out, they need to do a silent film cut 0:13:26.400 --> 0:13:28.560 of it. You know. People directors keep doing like black 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:30.800 and white cuts of films. It's like, that's great, but 0:13:30.920 --> 0:13:35.240 let's see, let's see the silent Cut's see what that's like. Anyway, 0:13:35.240 --> 0:13:38.240 back to Todd Browning. Browning wrote and directed his first 0:13:38.240 --> 0:13:41.959 full length silent picture in nineteen seventeen, and found success 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:45.559 with nineteen twenties The Virgin of Stambul. His first talkie 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:48.080 was nineteen twenty nine, It's the Thirteenth Chair. That was 0:13:48.080 --> 0:13:50.200 a murder mystery that had Legosi in it. And so 0:13:50.320 --> 0:13:53.360 we'll come back to and Dracula of course, followed shortly 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:56.560 after that. His other films include the notable lost film 0:13:56.640 --> 0:14:00.320 nineteen twenty sevens London After Midnight, nineteen thirty two's Free Weeks, 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:03.680 nineteen thirty five's Mark of the Vampire in nineteen thirty 0:14:03.720 --> 0:14:06.520 six is The Devil Doll. His last film was nineteen 0:14:06.520 --> 0:14:09.760 thirty nine's Miracles for Sale, and he retired in nineteen 0:14:09.800 --> 0:14:13.720 forty two, with Hollywood trends and tastes drifting further away 0:14:13.720 --> 0:14:15.160 from his sensibilities at the time. 0:14:16.080 --> 0:14:20.880 When Browning was younger, he had some experience working with 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:25.720 circus performers, I believe, and this sort of came out 0:14:25.760 --> 0:14:30.320 in an ongoing obsession that appears in many of his works. 0:14:30.360 --> 0:14:34.160 Certainly there in nineteen thirty two's Freaks, which is a 0:14:34.760 --> 0:14:36.920 ooh man. I haven't seen that movie in many years, 0:14:36.960 --> 0:14:39.800 but I'd be very interested to see what modern critics 0:14:39.800 --> 0:14:44.440 think about that as a retrospective. I mean, it's a 0:14:44.560 --> 0:14:48.000 very surprising film for the nineteen thirties in many ways. 0:14:48.360 --> 0:14:51.920 Yeah, this was his famous for the One of Us song, right, yeah, yeah, 0:14:52.640 --> 0:14:54.120 it's kind of a chant. I guess it's a. 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:56.400 Song Google gobble one of Us. 0:14:56.520 --> 0:15:00.440 Yeah, yeah, all right. Dracula if you're not aware. Original 0:15:00.480 --> 0:15:04.200 novel is by Brown Stoker, who lived eighteen forty seven 0:15:04.280 --> 0:15:08.240 through nineteen twelve, Irish author and theater critic, whose eighteen 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:11.000 ninety seven novel was Seeming. You know that a lot 0:15:11.000 --> 0:15:14.520 has been written and discussed about where this novel arises, 0:15:14.720 --> 0:15:19.440 you know, in brown Stoker's life and mindset, but seems 0:15:19.440 --> 0:15:22.120 to have spun out of various accounts and experiences of 0:15:22.160 --> 0:15:26.040 disease in the world around him. And perhaps you know 0:15:26.280 --> 0:15:28.320 he was sick as a child. That sort of thing 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:33.640 also folklore of Ireland as well as mainland Europe. And 0:15:34.000 --> 0:15:37.440 of course it's also worth noting that in the book 0:15:37.440 --> 0:15:41.120 there's a lot of use of phonographs. It's often crazy 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:44.840 to realize how thoroughly modern the novel was at its release. 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:47.160 If he had written it today, Mino would have been 0:15:47.200 --> 0:15:48.120 on TikTok i fee. 0:15:48.160 --> 0:15:48.400 Yeah. 0:15:48.480 --> 0:15:48.720 Yeah. 0:15:49.200 --> 0:15:53.280 Wasn't doctor Seward in the book doing like phonograph diaries 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:54.840 or something? He was? Yes. 0:15:55.720 --> 0:15:59.680 Another detail that we often overlook I was reading about 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:02.920 this is that the novel was only a moderate success 0:16:03.640 --> 0:16:07.000 at the time, and Merritt's only brief mention in Stoker's 0:16:07.040 --> 0:16:11.840 nineteen twelve obituary. It wasn't until the copyright battle over 0:16:12.040 --> 0:16:17.000 a little nineteen twenty two film titled Nosferatu stirred everything out. 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:22.080 That's when Stoker's widow, Florence Balcombe, gave approval to Hamilton 0:16:22.160 --> 0:16:26.720 Dean for this stage adaptation of Dracula, And of course 0:16:26.720 --> 0:16:28.920 from that we get this film eventually, and all of 0:16:29.000 --> 0:16:33.840 this blossoms. Dracula's cinematic legacy in the novel truly becomes 0:16:33.840 --> 0:16:34.840 a popular classic. 0:16:35.160 --> 0:16:39.080 Now, wait a minute, did bram Stoker not himself adapt 0:16:39.200 --> 0:16:41.520 the novel to the stage. I thought there was at 0:16:41.600 --> 0:16:44.080 least one play version that he wrote, but I could 0:16:44.080 --> 0:16:47.160 be wrong. Well, folks, neither of us knew the answer 0:16:47.160 --> 0:16:49.600 for sure, so I just looked it up to find out. Yes, 0:16:49.880 --> 0:16:53.840 bram Stoker did create at least one version of the 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:58.040 novel for the stage that apparently debuted before the novel 0:16:58.120 --> 0:17:00.600 was even released, or at least the same year. So 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:04.040 he wrote the novel then made a stage adaptation, which 0:17:04.200 --> 0:17:08.840 debuted under the title Dracula or the Undead, and that 0:17:09.240 --> 0:17:13.760 was performed in May eighteen ninety seven, the same month 0:17:13.960 --> 0:17:17.879 that the novel was released. And according to an article 0:17:17.920 --> 0:17:20.520 that I just dug up about this. Apparently only two 0:17:20.600 --> 0:17:23.320 people came and showed up in the audience to watch it. 0:17:23.640 --> 0:17:28.119 Oh wow. So yeah, it can be a little surprising 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:34.720 to realize that the popularity of the novel really rises 0:17:34.760 --> 0:17:38.720 alongside it sent the book cinematic history. And I think 0:17:38.760 --> 0:17:42.320 part of the sort of confusion that can occur, in 0:17:42.320 --> 0:17:44.560 my opinion anyway, is the fact that we often love 0:17:44.720 --> 0:17:48.439 Dracula and Frankenstein together. But Mary Shelley's book was published 0:17:48.440 --> 0:17:51.160 in eighteen eighteen. That's seventy nine years earlier. 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:56.239 Yeah. So another weird thing to think about is that 0:17:56.320 --> 0:17:59.320 when this movie was made, the movie we're talking about today, 0:17:59.440 --> 0:18:03.480 the Universe versa Dracula, the novel was only like thirty 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:07.119 three or thirty four years old. Wow, Dracula feels like 0:18:07.160 --> 0:18:10.480 an ancient story to us. But it is the equivalent 0:18:10.760 --> 0:18:14.000 of making a movie today based on a novel that 0:18:14.160 --> 0:18:18.560 was originally published like in the early nineties. I looked up, like, 0:18:18.600 --> 0:18:21.679 what were the big novels on the bestseller lists in 0:18:21.720 --> 0:18:24.560 like nineteen ninety one, So it would be like today 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.600 making an adaptation of the Sum of All Fears by 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:31.040 Tom Clancy, which that really puts it in a different 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:31.960 perspective for me. 0:18:32.560 --> 0:18:37.400 Yeah, yeah, that man, that's mind blowing for sure. All right, 0:18:37.400 --> 0:18:41.000 now getting into the various adaptations here, So yes, we 0:18:41.119 --> 0:18:46.800 have the authorized initial stage adaptation of Dracula by Hamilton Dean, 0:18:46.880 --> 0:18:50.080 who lived eighteen seventy nine through nineteen fifty eight. He 0:18:50.160 --> 0:18:53.840 was a family friend. He was brom Stoker's widow's choice 0:18:54.480 --> 0:18:57.920 to make the official stage adaptation. Dean himself initially played 0:18:57.960 --> 0:19:02.080 Van Helsing and in nineteen twenty four play here became popular, 0:19:02.160 --> 0:19:05.040 but some revisions proved necessary before it could really make 0:19:05.080 --> 0:19:08.240 that move to Broadway in nineteen twenty seven. That's also 0:19:08.280 --> 0:19:11.040 when Bella Lagosi comes on board to play the Count. 0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:14.760 It's funny that there are so many different versions of 0:19:14.880 --> 0:19:17.800 Dracula before it even makes it to the movie that 0:19:17.960 --> 0:19:21.639 made it so famous, you know. So like you've got 0:19:21.720 --> 0:19:25.680 the original novel, you've got bram Stoker's stage adaptation, You've 0:19:25.680 --> 0:19:28.800 got multiple different other play versions of the play. You 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:31.119 got the Hamilton Dean play. You've got at least a 0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:33.680 couple of versions you said that went through revisions going 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:37.560 on to Broadway. And then also you've got No Speratu, 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:42.400 the the FW Murnau movie, which we said, as we said, 0:19:42.520 --> 0:19:45.560 is an unofficial adaptation of the story making some changes. 0:19:45.840 --> 0:19:48.560 So it's like this novel that is not even thirty 0:19:48.640 --> 0:19:51.679 years old is getting all of these different rewrites in 0:19:51.720 --> 0:19:56.080 different versions before it even reaches its best known form. 0:19:56.480 --> 0:19:59.679 Yeah, and you know, Nosfaratu was not even the first adaptation. 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:03.120 There was a nineteen twenty one film called Dracula's Death. 0:20:03.160 --> 0:20:05.359 It was a Hungarian silent film that apparently had very 0:20:05.359 --> 0:20:07.240 little to do with the actual plot of Dracula, but 0:20:07.560 --> 0:20:08.439 still there it was. 0:20:08.960 --> 0:20:12.280 But surely once we get the play version on Broadway 0:20:12.320 --> 0:20:15.080 starring Bella Lagosi, then that's exactly what we get in 0:20:15.119 --> 0:20:15.760 the film. 0:20:15.600 --> 0:20:20.520 Right, No, no, not no, probably not so the Broadway 0:20:20.520 --> 0:20:23.280 revision though. That's where John L. Balderston comes in, who 0:20:23.280 --> 0:20:26.680 lived eighteen eighty nine through nineteen fifty four, playwright and screenwriter, 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:29.560 and he'd later work on the screenplays for Frankenstein and 0:20:29.600 --> 0:20:31.600 also in thirty one, thirty two Is the Mummy, thirty 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:36.560 Five's Bride of Frankenstein, Mad Love, Dracula's Daughter, Gaslight and many. 0:20:36.400 --> 0:20:39.480 Others wrote a lot of my favorites of the era. 0:20:39.800 --> 0:20:44.680 Yeah, and as we've alluded to this already, and we'll 0:20:44.760 --> 0:20:48.840 keep mentioning this. The play is already a notable condensing 0:20:48.880 --> 0:20:52.359 of Dracula, which if you've ever read it, you already 0:20:52.440 --> 0:20:54.159 know that. You know, it's only like four hundred and 0:20:54.200 --> 0:20:57.400 something pages long. It's not a sprawling book in terms 0:20:57.400 --> 0:21:00.000 of length, but it can kind of feel sprawling at times, 0:21:00.400 --> 0:21:05.040 just the way that's it's written. Composed of these overlapping correspondences, 0:21:05.080 --> 0:21:10.679 diary entries and phonograph recordings. The beginning of the novel 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:13.879 is arguably a lot more exciting than some of the 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:17.520 latter stretches and so forth. And we should also note 0:21:17.560 --> 0:21:21.080 the other like major influential change that is made in 0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:24.760 the stage adaptation of Dracula. Here is our changes to 0:21:24.840 --> 0:21:28.359 what Dracula is. The way Dracula is presented as a 0:21:28.400 --> 0:21:29.560 creature and a character. 0:21:30.040 --> 0:21:32.800 Yeah that's right. I mean, Dracula is the bad guy 0:21:33.000 --> 0:21:36.480 of the movie, but he is much more of the 0:21:36.480 --> 0:21:40.520 Bella Legosi. Dracula is much more charming and interesting than 0:21:40.560 --> 0:21:45.640 the Dracula of the novel, who is a filthy, repulsive demon. 0:21:46.040 --> 0:21:49.560 Just you know, there's not the Dracula in the book 0:21:49.680 --> 0:21:51.240 is just not lovable. 0:21:51.920 --> 0:21:55.719 He's a creature of dust. He's more in line with this, 0:21:56.240 --> 0:22:00.639 he's an grotesque, undead warrior king. And here this is 0:22:00.680 --> 0:22:03.080 the kind of Dracula that can stand shoulder to shoulder 0:22:03.119 --> 0:22:07.240 with London's elite later on and is greeted as an 0:22:07.320 --> 0:22:13.520 equal and is charming and erotic in ways that the 0:22:14.200 --> 0:22:18.919 original Dracula in the script in the novel is not. Yeah, 0:22:19.000 --> 0:22:22.440 all right. Garrett Fort has the screenplay credit who lived 0:22:22.480 --> 0:22:25.800 nineteen hundred and nineteen forty five, American screenwriter, playwright, and author. 0:22:26.119 --> 0:22:30.320 His credits include Frankenstein, Dracula's Daughter, the Devil Doll. Both 0:22:30.320 --> 0:22:32.560 of those Dracula's Daughter and Devil Doll were thirty six 0:22:32.640 --> 0:22:35.520 and nineteen forties, The Mark of Zaro, just to name 0:22:35.560 --> 0:22:35.920 a few. 0:22:44.280 --> 0:22:46.160 Okay, well we got to talk about Bayla now. 0:22:46.640 --> 0:22:50.520 Yes, bail Legosi plays Count Dracula, of course, who lived 0:22:50.520 --> 0:22:54.119 eighteen eighty two through nineteen fifty six. So we've discussed 0:22:54.240 --> 0:22:58.600 some films with iconic, even career defining performances here on 0:22:58.640 --> 0:23:02.120 Weird House before, but the case of Bella Legosi and Dracula, 0:23:02.119 --> 0:23:04.240 I feel like this is on an entirely different level, 0:23:04.840 --> 0:23:08.960 like even compared to things like Carlofs Frankenstein. It's because 0:23:08.960 --> 0:23:12.680 it's not only career defining its genre defining. He not 0:23:12.720 --> 0:23:16.800 only becomes Dracula in this picture, but defines what Dracula 0:23:16.920 --> 0:23:21.320 is for the next one hundred years and beyond anyone else. 0:23:21.359 --> 0:23:24.719 Playing Dracula in the shadow of this film has no 0:23:24.840 --> 0:23:29.960 choice but to either embrace Legosi's performance or to play 0:23:30.000 --> 0:23:33.000 against it, which is what you often see, but you 0:23:33.080 --> 0:23:37.439 absolutely cannot ignore it like this really sets the tone 0:23:38.320 --> 0:23:41.840 and sets the course for not only Dracula films, not 0:23:41.880 --> 0:23:45.560 only vampire films, but horror cinema in large. 0:23:46.119 --> 0:23:48.280 He brings a lot to the role that I think 0:23:48.280 --> 0:23:52.080 you wouldn't necessarily get about the character on the page. 0:23:52.320 --> 0:23:55.639 I don't know if Bela Legosi is the sexiest Dracula 0:23:55.680 --> 0:23:57.600 there has ever been, but he does bring a kind 0:23:57.640 --> 0:24:01.760 of interesting suaveness and attractiveness to the role. He brings 0:24:01.880 --> 0:24:05.240 a smile and a sense of humor to the character 0:24:05.480 --> 0:24:08.400 that I think was not really there previously, was certainly 0:24:08.440 --> 0:24:12.879 not there in the previous film adaptations. In like in 0:24:13.320 --> 0:24:18.000 nos Feratu, you know Max Shrek no attacking Max Shrek's 0:24:18.000 --> 0:24:21.320 performances count orlock there, but that's a totally different take 0:24:21.359 --> 0:24:24.199 on the character. Does not have the kind of charm 0:24:24.240 --> 0:24:27.480 and sense of humor that Belle Lagosi brings to this 0:24:27.600 --> 0:24:31.720 role that actually makes it much more sinister in those 0:24:31.840 --> 0:24:35.119 rare moments where in this movie you get flashes of 0:24:35.240 --> 0:24:38.120 anger and malice from Dracula, like in the moment where 0:24:38.119 --> 0:24:40.679 he slaps down the after they pulled the trick on 0:24:40.760 --> 0:24:43.760 him by opening the cigarette box and shining the mirror 0:24:43.760 --> 0:24:46.320 in his face, smacks it away, and you see him, 0:24:46.400 --> 0:24:48.880 you know, scowling at Van Helsing and the other men, 0:24:49.280 --> 0:24:52.679 and that moment is quite shocking. And it's because of 0:24:52.920 --> 0:24:57.440 the you know, the calmness and the coolness that Legosi 0:24:57.520 --> 0:25:00.800 brings to this character. He's kind of like it's he's 0:25:00.840 --> 0:25:04.280 in on a joke that only he gets, and the 0:25:04.359 --> 0:25:06.359 joke is that you will serve him. 0:25:06.760 --> 0:25:09.600 Yeah, the sexiness of Dracula. It brings me back to 0:25:09.640 --> 0:25:11.600 what I said earlier about the about being you can 0:25:11.600 --> 0:25:14.840 be overly familiar with this picture and you can also 0:25:15.000 --> 0:25:17.320 just be more accustomed to stills from it, and maybe 0:25:17.320 --> 0:25:21.240 even stills of an older Legosi playing Count Dracula dressing 0:25:21.320 --> 0:25:24.200 up as Count Dracula. But I feel like you really 0:25:24.240 --> 0:25:26.040 have to see the full performance. You have to see 0:25:26.119 --> 0:25:30.600 him in motion. You have to hear him make every 0:25:30.640 --> 0:25:34.960 little enunciation to the Dracula dialogue, and it all adds 0:25:35.080 --> 0:25:37.960 up to what, especially for the time period, is like 0:25:38.119 --> 0:25:42.840 a very erotically charged performance. Like there is a hypnotic 0:25:43.359 --> 0:25:46.720 charisma to him, and there is I think a strong 0:25:47.000 --> 0:25:50.840 like pan sexual eroticism to him as he you know, 0:25:50.880 --> 0:25:53.480 because he doesn't see gender or anything. He sees blood. 0:25:53.800 --> 0:25:56.439 Doesn't matter if you're a if you're a male, female 0:25:56.480 --> 0:25:59.439 or what have you. Dracula is going to come for you. 0:25:59.480 --> 0:26:03.399 There Dracula's embrace. Yeah, I would say that that is 0:26:03.520 --> 0:26:06.440 implicit in the film. It's not explicit like it is 0:26:06.480 --> 0:26:08.760 in a lot of the later Dracula adaptations which make 0:26:08.840 --> 0:26:13.720 him overtly sexual and stuff. But it's a strong subtext here. 0:26:14.400 --> 0:26:18.159 And to emphasize again what we said earlier that like 0:26:18.160 --> 0:26:21.159 whatever sexual themes about Dracula are there in the novel 0:26:21.240 --> 0:26:24.720 or whatever, I do not think there's really much about 0:26:24.800 --> 0:26:29.320 him being potentially like alluring in any way. I mean, dude, 0:26:29.320 --> 0:26:31.360 whatever's there is just purely predatory. 0:26:31.920 --> 0:26:36.440 Yeah. Yeah, again nineteen twenty two, nos Faratu not really sexy. 0:26:36.920 --> 0:26:40.480 And as we were discussing off Mic earlier twenty twenty four, 0:26:40.560 --> 0:26:44.600 nos Faratu maybe perhaps sexy. I haven't seen it yet, 0:26:44.640 --> 0:26:48.160 but if that Nosparatu is sexy, it's because that Nosparatu 0:26:48.280 --> 0:26:53.520 stands in the long shadow of Bella Lugosi's Dracula, because. 0:26:53.280 --> 0:26:56.160 That one is remixing different themes that have come through 0:26:56.200 --> 0:26:59.520 in all the different interpretations of Dracula over the years. Yes, 0:26:59.560 --> 0:27:02.520 I would argue that the new Robert Eggers knows Ferrautu, 0:27:02.600 --> 0:27:06.320 which I have seen and I greatly enjoyed. In fact, 0:27:06.359 --> 0:27:07.919 I was talking about this with Rachel and we were 0:27:07.920 --> 0:27:10.240 trying to say, like, is Dracula sexy in that? I 0:27:10.280 --> 0:27:13.240 think the goal, actually, the specific thing they were trying 0:27:13.240 --> 0:27:19.080 to accomplish was to go for maximally disgusting and revolting 0:27:19.520 --> 0:27:22.520 and sexy at the same time. It is kind of 0:27:22.720 --> 0:27:26.439 an oxymoron. They were trying to accomplish something that should 0:27:26.480 --> 0:27:30.399 be impossible to do. Is like polar opposite kind of 0:27:30.760 --> 0:27:33.080 qualities to the character. But I think they did a 0:27:33.080 --> 0:27:33.960 pretty good job. 0:27:34.520 --> 0:27:36.280 Awesome. Well, I look forward to seeing it at some 0:27:36.320 --> 0:27:36.800 point here. 0:27:37.359 --> 0:27:39.400 And if you look up fan reception on the internet, 0:27:39.440 --> 0:27:41.920 definitely there are a lot of people who find this 0:27:42.480 --> 0:27:48.760 this rotting, decomposing plague corpse somewhat somewhat exciting for some reason, right, 0:27:48.880 --> 0:27:49.919 I'm not knocking to you know. 0:27:51.760 --> 0:27:55.120 Well, back to Legosi again, an immortal performance, no two 0:27:55.160 --> 0:27:57.440 ways about it. Now. We've talked about Lagosi twice on 0:27:57.480 --> 0:27:59.960 the show before, in our episodes on The Devil Bat 0:28:00.040 --> 0:28:03.240 and Son of Frankenstein. He's wonderful and Son of Frankenstein, 0:28:03.240 --> 0:28:05.520 and even in Devil of Bat, as with many of 0:28:05.520 --> 0:28:08.520 his other, like later lesser roles, he still finds a 0:28:08.520 --> 0:28:11.199 way to shine through it all. But here he is 0:28:11.240 --> 0:28:12.919 at the height of his powers, and it is a 0:28:12.960 --> 0:28:18.440 thing to behold, richly charismatic, frightening, erotic, and above all hypnotic. 0:28:19.520 --> 0:28:21.960 I was asking my kid about how this one stacked 0:28:22.000 --> 0:28:24.000 up to Son of Frankenstein, and they told me that 0:28:24.200 --> 0:28:26.960 Dracula was definitely the scarier of the two, and the 0:28:27.000 --> 0:28:30.800 scariest moments were Dracula's gaze. Oh he's looking right at 0:28:30.800 --> 0:28:31.280 the camera. 0:28:31.720 --> 0:28:33.760 But they do, and actually I meant to bring this 0:28:33.840 --> 0:28:36.920 up in the plot section. If you know anything about 0:28:36.960 --> 0:28:40.959 this shot they do. It's a recurring visual theme where 0:28:41.000 --> 0:28:44.160 we come in on Dracula's face. Maybe the camera is moving, 0:28:44.280 --> 0:28:47.160 zooming in on him, or it's just still on Dracula's face, 0:28:47.200 --> 0:28:51.040 but the most of the shot is dark and there's 0:28:51.080 --> 0:28:54.920 sort of a beam of light falling over his eyes. 0:28:55.200 --> 0:28:59.000 It's just the eyes and it's just there scowling with 0:28:59.080 --> 0:29:02.280 the eyes wide. I don't know if you knew why 0:29:02.320 --> 0:29:04.920 they selected that, like the beam on the eyes only, 0:29:05.040 --> 0:29:06.640 but I always thought that was interesting. 0:29:07.240 --> 0:29:11.840 Yeah, it really adds to this like otherworldly hypnotizing power 0:29:12.000 --> 0:29:15.760 of the character. And Yeah, on top of that, Legosi's 0:29:15.800 --> 0:29:18.920 performance is just one thing that's pointed out by by 0:29:18.960 --> 0:29:22.000 some of the Dracula experts is that there are no 0:29:22.160 --> 0:29:26.640 small moments at all in it. Every annunciation, but every 0:29:26.760 --> 0:29:31.280 even like subtle movement feels very calculated and essential. Some 0:29:31.400 --> 0:29:36.400 have chalked this up to the possibility that Legosi memorized 0:29:36.440 --> 0:29:39.160 his parts phonetically, at least at the stage of his career, 0:29:40.320 --> 0:29:43.120 but I'm not sure where the truth falls and all 0:29:43.160 --> 0:29:46.920 of that at any rate, the finished product, the actual performance, 0:29:46.960 --> 0:29:52.440 like the way that he stresses words in each line, 0:29:52.480 --> 0:29:57.000 like it seems to bring across like cryptic meaning to things, 0:29:57.040 --> 0:29:58.479 like even some of the lines you think, you know, 0:29:58.640 --> 0:30:02.360 like like children of the Night, what music they make? 0:30:03.240 --> 0:30:06.280 You know, it's what music they make, you know, like 0:30:06.320 --> 0:30:11.320 the choices there are so absolutely cryptic, and it feels 0:30:11.400 --> 0:30:17.240 like perfectly the perfectly calculated way that this cold, immortal 0:30:17.320 --> 0:30:20.920 being would be, you know, cutting through to our fear 0:30:20.920 --> 0:30:23.360 and desire with every word and every movement. 0:30:23.880 --> 0:30:27.520 I couldn't agree more. I've really loved that. Yeah, the 0:30:27.680 --> 0:30:31.160 enunciation of the lines does add this mystery to the 0:30:31.160 --> 0:30:34.640 intended meaning of them, which lends itself well to something 0:30:34.680 --> 0:30:37.320 that is here in Legosi's performance. And actually I noticed 0:30:37.360 --> 0:30:39.680 in all three of the movies we've covered of his, 0:30:40.200 --> 0:30:42.200 two of them much better than the other one. I mean, 0:30:42.240 --> 0:30:44.360 I really enjoyed all three. But Son of frank and 0:30:44.440 --> 0:30:46.720 Dracula are much better movies than Devil Back. But in 0:30:46.800 --> 0:30:51.160 all three, the thing that's common is bell Leegosi has 0:30:51.200 --> 0:30:55.160 this way of delivering lines that he understands in a 0:30:55.240 --> 0:30:58.440 different way than the person he's talking to, you know, 0:30:59.040 --> 0:31:02.640 like double meaning, kind of sinister irony lines. There's a 0:31:02.640 --> 0:31:04.880 lot of that in Dracula. There's a lot of that. 0:31:04.880 --> 0:31:07.200 There was a lot of that in Son of Frankenstein, 0:31:07.560 --> 0:31:10.120 you know, and they're what's that part where you know 0:31:10.160 --> 0:31:14.440 they're talking about like bringing the creature back, healing him up, 0:31:14.480 --> 0:31:17.560 and the other you know, the son of Frank is like, well, 0:31:17.600 --> 0:31:19.760 I don't know if he's if he's well enough yet, 0:31:19.880 --> 0:31:25.440 and and Igor is like, well enough for me. Oh, 0:31:25.480 --> 0:31:27.920 And it's just he has a lot of that kind 0:31:27.920 --> 0:31:33.920 of thing, these dry, threatening, humorous little ironies in that 0:31:34.000 --> 0:31:38.320 are often expressed exquisitely in the way he inflects words 0:31:38.360 --> 0:31:40.360 in an unexpected way. 0:31:40.440 --> 0:31:44.440 Absolutely so. As we discussed in the previous lego see episodes, 0:31:44.480 --> 0:31:47.240 he started out in Hungarian theater in silent films before 0:31:47.240 --> 0:31:49.959 making his way to Germany and finally America via New Orleans. 0:31:50.320 --> 0:31:52.120 He's made his way to New York. He became very 0:31:52.120 --> 0:31:55.040 active in the theater scene there. He did some silent 0:31:55.080 --> 0:31:59.120 films and eventually lands that lead role in the Broadway 0:31:59.160 --> 0:32:02.680 played Dracula twenty seven, ends up moving to la in 0:32:02.720 --> 0:32:07.520 twenty eight part of the tour, and this kicks off 0:32:07.520 --> 0:32:09.960 his Hollywood career. The next year, he appeared in Todd 0:32:09.960 --> 0:32:13.880 Browning's The Thirteenth Chair, and the Interesting thing is Bella 0:32:14.040 --> 0:32:16.520 was clearly the obvious choice for the film adaptation of 0:32:16.560 --> 0:32:19.520 the play. He'd been performing it to rave reviews, and 0:32:19.600 --> 0:32:21.520 yet he was not the first pick for the film. 0:32:22.040 --> 0:32:25.200 The producers considered the likes of Laon Cheney, who ended 0:32:25.240 --> 0:32:29.480 up dying before the film could be produced. Conrad Vitt, 0:32:30.320 --> 0:32:34.240 the Man who Laughs, was also considered, but he had 0:32:34.280 --> 0:32:37.520 moved back to Europe, and I think the idea is 0:32:37.560 --> 0:32:39.760 like he wasn't He didn't really, it wasn't as comfortable 0:32:39.800 --> 0:32:43.440 with English language, and so eventually they're like, Okay, well 0:32:43.920 --> 0:32:46.520 Legosi's there, will hire Legosi. And they got him somewhat 0:32:46.520 --> 0:32:49.040 on the cheap. It's a role that made him an 0:32:49.120 --> 0:32:52.520 undying legend, obviously, but as has been covered in many 0:32:52.520 --> 0:32:56.400 a biography, it also typecast him. It was the high 0:32:56.400 --> 0:32:59.160 point of a life and career that didn't always maintain 0:32:59.200 --> 0:32:59.920 an even trueject. 0:33:02.160 --> 0:33:04.320 But I want to be clear again, not his only 0:33:04.360 --> 0:33:07.760 great performance. I mean his turn as Igor and son 0:33:07.760 --> 0:33:11.640 of Frankenstein is fantastic, hilarious, is so good in that. 0:33:12.040 --> 0:33:13.320 Yeah, and there are a number of other ones that 0:33:13.360 --> 0:33:17.240 are often cited. Is like strong Legosi performances, So we 0:33:17.320 --> 0:33:20.160 may have to come back to more Legosi in the future. 0:33:20.840 --> 0:33:23.280 All right, getting into the rest of the cast here, 0:33:24.040 --> 0:33:26.680 I'm gonna spend less time with the remainders here. But 0:33:27.080 --> 0:33:29.760 Helen Chandler plays Mina. She lived nineteen oh six through 0:33:29.800 --> 0:33:32.640 nineteen sixty five, American actress of stage and screen, best 0:33:32.640 --> 0:33:36.600 remembered for Dracula. David Manners plays Jonathan Harker. He lived 0:33:36.640 --> 0:33:40.000 nineteen one hundred through nineteen ninety eight, Canadian born leading 0:33:40.040 --> 0:33:45.080 man here, completely overshadowed by stronger character performances and also, 0:33:45.120 --> 0:33:48.120 as we'll discuss in a very reduced Jonathan Harker. 0:33:48.200 --> 0:33:50.080 Yeah, just as shadowed by the script. 0:33:51.960 --> 0:33:55.120 Yeah, I mean, he's just he's overshadowed by yeah, other 0:33:55.160 --> 0:33:58.320 performances and also the writings. He's not sent to the 0:33:58.360 --> 0:34:02.440 castle in the he does not have the Keanu Reeves 0:34:03.360 --> 0:34:04.800 version of Jonathan Harker here. 0:34:04.960 --> 0:34:07.000 No, we need to talk about this later in the plot. 0:34:07.000 --> 0:34:09.480 But it's almost like, why is this character even in 0:34:09.520 --> 0:34:10.880 the story exactly? 0:34:11.880 --> 0:34:14.359 He's best remembered for his roles in Dracula nineteen thirty 0:34:14.400 --> 0:34:16.200 two is the Mummy and nineteen thirty four is the 0:34:16.239 --> 0:34:16.799 Black Cat. 0:34:17.239 --> 0:34:20.040 Now Rob again. I was surprised to find out that 0:34:20.080 --> 0:34:23.360 you'd never seen Dracula in its entirety before, but it 0:34:23.480 --> 0:34:26.479 caused me to remember back back to the first time 0:34:26.560 --> 0:34:29.640 I saw Dracula. Like you, I grew up, you know, 0:34:29.640 --> 0:34:31.839 knowing bits of it, seeing bits of it on TV 0:34:32.080 --> 0:34:34.959 and things like that, especially in clip show type things. 0:34:35.760 --> 0:34:39.719 But when I finally saw it in full, honestly, one 0:34:39.800 --> 0:34:41.920 of the things that made the biggest impression on me 0:34:43.320 --> 0:34:45.160 was Dwight Frye as Renfield. 0:34:45.920 --> 0:34:51.000 Absolutely, this is a just bonker's performance by the great 0:34:51.080 --> 0:34:54.160 Dwight fry lived eighteen ninety nine through nineteen forty three, 0:34:54.440 --> 0:34:58.600 American character actor of stage and screen with broad range, 0:34:59.360 --> 0:35:02.400 but be member for his outlandish horror roles and certainly 0:35:02.440 --> 0:35:05.200 typecast to those. After a while, he went on to 0:35:05.200 --> 0:35:09.080 play Fritz in thirty ones Frankenstein, Carl in thirty five's 0:35:09.080 --> 0:35:13.120 Bride of Frankenstein, and smaller often uncredited roles and subsequent 0:35:13.160 --> 0:35:15.719 Frankenstein films. He was also in nineteen thirty one's The 0:35:15.760 --> 0:35:16.600 Maltese Falcon. 0:35:17.320 --> 0:35:20.040 Renfield is really a highlight of the movie apart from 0:35:20.160 --> 0:35:23.960 Lagosi here because in multiple ways, like the way the 0:35:24.080 --> 0:35:30.080 character is written is both intentionally and unintentionally funny, the 0:35:30.160 --> 0:35:34.200 unintentional part being like the fourth time he escapes from 0:35:34.239 --> 0:35:37.120 the sanitarium and just wanders into a scene in the house, 0:35:37.200 --> 0:35:39.799 It's like, how does this guy keep getting out of 0:35:39.800 --> 0:35:40.200 his cell. 0:35:40.760 --> 0:35:42.920 Yeah, he's kind of like the Kramer of the picture, 0:35:43.040 --> 0:35:47.399 just randomly busts in whenever they need a little need 0:35:47.400 --> 0:35:48.399 a little Renfield action. 0:35:48.640 --> 0:35:51.760 Yeah, yeah, he slides in and he's got the crazy 0:35:51.800 --> 0:35:54.120 hair and he's like, oh, the Master is gonna give 0:35:54.160 --> 0:35:59.279 me blood this time. Oh. It's but also just he 0:35:59.600 --> 0:36:03.600 has the deranged monologues about needing lives and blood and 0:36:03.640 --> 0:36:06.600 wanting to eat spiders, and then also has kind of 0:36:06.640 --> 0:36:10.000 a you know, he's mostly a heel after being turned 0:36:10.040 --> 0:36:12.080 by the Count, but he has a face turn at 0:36:12.080 --> 0:36:16.200 one point that doesn't quite stick. It's yeah, it's just great. 0:36:16.440 --> 0:36:19.640 I love Dwight Fry here it thumbs up, thumbs up. 0:36:19.719 --> 0:36:22.279 Yeah, if not for Legosi, he would be the most 0:36:22.360 --> 0:36:26.960 memorable performer in the piece. Yeah, totally all right. It's 0:36:27.000 --> 0:36:29.440 a Dracula movie. Who also have to have a Van helsing, 0:36:29.600 --> 0:36:31.839 you have to have a Dracula slayer, and that's Edward 0:36:31.920 --> 0:36:34.759 Van Sloan, who lived eighteen eighty two through nineteen sixty four, 0:36:35.200 --> 0:36:38.160 American character actor, here reprising the role that he played 0:36:38.200 --> 0:36:41.440 in the stage adaptation. This was only his second film, 0:36:41.719 --> 0:36:45.799 followed by the role of doctor Waldman in nineteen thirty one. 0:36:45.840 --> 0:36:48.520 S Frankenstein doctor Mueller in thirty two's The Mummy, and 0:36:48.560 --> 0:36:51.800 he played Professor van Helsing in nineteen thirty six is 0:36:51.880 --> 0:36:53.480 Dracula's daughter, So he. 0:36:53.520 --> 0:36:56.160 Was just always the professor who shows up too to 0:36:56.280 --> 0:36:57.440 know about the monster. 0:36:57.920 --> 0:37:00.359 Yeah. I mean, probably a little bit of typecasting going 0:37:00.400 --> 0:37:03.360 on here as well, but it's another strong performance. I 0:37:03.400 --> 0:37:04.880 really like him in this part of it is the 0:37:04.920 --> 0:37:06.000 haircut in the glasses. 0:37:06.360 --> 0:37:08.439 Yeah. I don't know if he's ever made as huge 0:37:08.440 --> 0:37:12.400 an impression on me, but he does certainly drive the 0:37:12.400 --> 0:37:14.200 scenes in the middle of the movie that would, I 0:37:14.280 --> 0:37:17.600 think otherwise be the weakest links in the film, basically, 0:37:17.680 --> 0:37:20.680 the investigation scenes where the heroes are trying to figure 0:37:20.680 --> 0:37:23.120 out what's going on. They're the scenes that either don't 0:37:23.120 --> 0:37:26.160 have Legosi or don't have a Dwight Fry in them 0:37:26.280 --> 0:37:29.640 yet until he bursts in later in the scene. Those 0:37:29.680 --> 0:37:32.759 would be the dullest parts. But he does pretty well there. 0:37:33.360 --> 0:37:36.360 He feels a little unhinged in a great way, you know, 0:37:36.520 --> 0:37:39.160 like one of the first people to believe that we're 0:37:39.160 --> 0:37:42.279 actually dealing with vampires. You know, it's probably somebody who 0:37:42.560 --> 0:37:44.200 lives their life a little bit on the edge. 0:37:44.400 --> 0:37:48.360 And later adaptations would generally take this principle a lot further, 0:37:48.680 --> 0:37:53.560 I'd say, compared to later Van Helsing portrayals, Edward Van 0:37:53.600 --> 0:37:56.640 Sloan is a pretty straight shooter. I mean, thinking about 0:37:56.680 --> 0:38:01.200 Anthony Hopkins and Copola's Dracula, where Van Helsing borderline insane 0:38:02.120 --> 0:38:05.080 thinking about Willem Dafoe in the in the New nos Ferratu. 0:38:05.160 --> 0:38:08.640 I mean they later really embraced the idea that the 0:38:08.680 --> 0:38:11.680 professor who knows how to fight evil is himself an 0:38:11.719 --> 0:38:13.560 extremely eccentric figure. 0:38:15.600 --> 0:38:19.319 All right. The other principal investigator here is, of course, 0:38:19.320 --> 0:38:23.160 doctor Seward, played by Herbert Bunston, who lived eighteen seventy 0:38:23.160 --> 0:38:26.160 four through nineteen thirty five, British actor best remembered for 0:38:26.239 --> 0:38:28.640 this film. He also had a supporting role in nineteen 0:38:28.640 --> 0:38:31.360 thirty as the Lady of Scandal in nineteen thirty three's 0:38:31.360 --> 0:38:36.239 The Monkeys Paw again somewhat reduced here, he's essentially in 0:38:36.280 --> 0:38:38.400 a lot of these older pictures, you really need like 0:38:38.480 --> 0:38:41.439 a supporting cast of two to three old white guy 0:38:41.520 --> 0:38:45.600 experts to help you fight your alien invasion or monster attacks. 0:38:45.600 --> 0:38:46.799 And this is what this guy is. 0:38:46.920 --> 0:38:49.560 His role in this movie is, I say, could it 0:38:49.600 --> 0:38:50.600 be true. 0:38:51.680 --> 0:38:53.400 All right, you can't have a Mina unless you have 0:38:53.400 --> 0:38:57.000 a Lucy. And that's where Francis Dad comes in. She 0:38:57.080 --> 0:39:00.000 lived nineteen ten through nineteen sixty eight, American actress, only 0:39:00.120 --> 0:39:02.320 active in the late twenties and early thirties. This was 0:39:02.360 --> 0:39:05.160 her most memorable role, but she has a supporting role 0:39:05.200 --> 0:39:07.920 in the nineteen thirty one Anime Wong film Daughter of 0:39:07.960 --> 0:39:08.480 the Dragon. 0:39:08.920 --> 0:39:12.480 Like many characters in this version, Lucy's role is greatly 0:39:12.560 --> 0:39:14.719 reduced from what it is in the novel. You know, 0:39:14.920 --> 0:39:17.080 a big part of the investigation in the middle of 0:39:17.160 --> 0:39:20.200 the novel is like the characters trying to figure out 0:39:20.280 --> 0:39:24.000 what the cause of Lucy's wasting disease is. You know, 0:39:24.040 --> 0:39:27.560 why is she losing blood? What's going on? In this movie? 0:39:27.600 --> 0:39:30.640 They just like acts all that. It's done in like 0:39:30.800 --> 0:39:32.320 ninety seconds of screen time. 0:39:34.040 --> 0:39:36.759 We of course have the brides. We'll talk more about 0:39:36.760 --> 0:39:41.320 the brides later, but Geraldine Devoric, Dorothy Tree, and Cornelia 0:39:41.400 --> 0:39:45.960 Thaw those are your brides. Let's see getting behind the 0:39:46.040 --> 0:39:50.560 scenes here a bit. Carl Fround, of course, did the cinematography, 0:39:51.120 --> 0:39:55.120 rather famous for his work on this picture and subsequent films. 0:39:55.320 --> 0:39:59.960 Lived eighteen ninety through nineteen sixty nine legendary Austrian Hungarian 0:40:00.040 --> 0:40:04.320 born cinematographer and director, two time Oscar winner, four time nominee. 0:40:04.880 --> 0:40:06.960 Much of the visual splendor of this film is often 0:40:07.000 --> 0:40:13.200 attributed to frend and many have have also said that 0:40:13.239 --> 0:40:15.920 he probably directed parts of it as well. He was 0:40:15.960 --> 0:40:18.440 reportedly like a very strong presence on the set sometimes 0:40:18.480 --> 0:40:21.600 when Browning wasn't. He went on to direct nineteen thirty 0:40:21.600 --> 0:40:23.480 two's The Money, as well as nineteen thirty five is 0:40:23.520 --> 0:40:26.600 Mad Love, which we talked about in one of, if 0:40:26.600 --> 0:40:30.600 not our first episodes, and he did several other pictures 0:40:30.640 --> 0:40:31.480 as well. 0:40:31.520 --> 0:40:36.120 Freud did the cinematography on most of the movies that 0:40:36.360 --> 0:40:39.080 from the nineteen thirties that I think look the best, 0:40:39.560 --> 0:40:42.000 Like a lot of the thirties movies that I see, 0:40:42.000 --> 0:40:44.360 I'm like, wow, this is gorgeous. It's like, oh, that 0:40:44.440 --> 0:40:48.359 was Carl Freud, so yeah, he in the movie does 0:40:48.400 --> 0:40:53.359 look great. There are typically like the scenes in it 0:40:53.440 --> 0:40:56.200 that look the best tend to be the ones that 0:40:56.600 --> 0:40:59.680 film historians say this is like a signature Carl Freun 0:40:59.760 --> 0:41:03.080 type shot. And I think this has led some people 0:41:03.120 --> 0:41:08.000 to speculate that for the less interesting cinematography in the 0:41:08.000 --> 0:41:10.000 movie that he was kind of he was kind of 0:41:10.040 --> 0:41:14.120 on leash, like he was not necessarily being allowed to 0:41:15.480 --> 0:41:17.359 do all he could do. I don't know if that's 0:41:17.400 --> 0:41:19.439 true or not, but that's what some people have said. 0:41:20.000 --> 0:41:23.640 It's often pointed out that the also nineteen thirty one 0:41:24.320 --> 0:41:26.920 Mexican Dracula film that they shot at night on the 0:41:26.960 --> 0:41:32.840 same sets, is more technically proficient and maybe more daring. 0:41:33.520 --> 0:41:36.160 And for part of that is that apparently they could 0:41:36.160 --> 0:41:39.719 look back at what the day crew was doing and 0:41:39.760 --> 0:41:41.319 figure out how to one up it, right. 0:41:41.600 --> 0:41:44.399 Yeah, So the English language production would shoot and then 0:41:44.560 --> 0:41:46.719 they would shoot afterwards, and so they could look at 0:41:46.719 --> 0:41:48.960 all the mistakes made in the earlier shoots and like 0:41:49.000 --> 0:41:51.359 figure out ways to correct them before they before they 0:41:51.400 --> 0:41:51.879 set up. 0:41:52.160 --> 0:41:55.440 Yeah, spice things up sometimes and so forth. All right. 0:41:55.640 --> 0:41:58.560 Set decoration. Russell A Gossman who lived eighteen ninety two 0:41:58.600 --> 0:42:00.880 through nineteen sixty three. Oscar winner for his work on 0:42:01.000 --> 0:42:03.840 forty fourth Phantom of the Opera and sixty one Spartacus. 0:42:04.239 --> 0:42:08.000 He also worked on other major and minor universal horror films. 0:42:08.680 --> 0:42:11.799 Jack P. Pierce did the makeup eighteen eighty nine through 0:42:11.840 --> 0:42:15.479 nineteen sixty eight. Monster Makeup Master of the day who 0:42:15.560 --> 0:42:20.680 worked on like Frankenstein, the Man who Laughs, the Invisible Man, 0:42:20.719 --> 0:42:24.200 the Wolfman, and so many others. I guess on the 0:42:24.239 --> 0:42:26.880 surface it might seem like he had less to do here. 0:42:26.760 --> 0:42:30.400 There's not. There's no monster makeup on the level of 0:42:30.400 --> 0:42:34.520 Frankenstein in this picture, but clearly makeup is a part 0:42:34.560 --> 0:42:38.200 of bringing Count Dracula and the brides to their to 0:42:38.320 --> 0:42:43.239 undead life on the screen. And finally, Heinz Roemheld has 0:42:43.280 --> 0:42:46.800 a conductor musical arrangement credit of nineteen one through nineteen 0:42:46.840 --> 0:42:49.080 eighty five, but again this is a needle drop score, 0:42:50.080 --> 0:42:52.920 owing in part to budgetary issues. Again, sometimes there's no 0:42:53.040 --> 0:42:56.520 music at all, but music used in the picture includes 0:42:56.560 --> 0:43:02.279 Schaikowski Swan Lake, Opus twenty, Franz Schubert's Unfinished Symphony, and 0:43:02.360 --> 0:43:07.640 a selection from Wagner's The Meister Singer von Nunberg. 0:43:08.080 --> 0:43:11.520 I mainly associate Dracula with Swan Lake due to this movie, 0:43:11.600 --> 0:43:15.280 but I have actually seen it with the Philip Glass 0:43:15.480 --> 0:43:17.400 score that was done later. I don't know when, was 0:43:17.400 --> 0:43:18.520 that in the nineteen nineties. 0:43:18.680 --> 0:43:23.400 Yeah, that was ninety eight legendary Philip Glass composed. It 0:43:23.440 --> 0:43:27.120 was performed by the Kronos Quartet. I've never seen it, 0:43:27.160 --> 0:43:29.000 but I did listen to part of that while I 0:43:29.040 --> 0:43:31.160 was researching and writing up notes here, and it sounds 0:43:31.239 --> 0:43:35.680 quite good. 0:43:40.200 --> 0:43:42.440 Oh hey, mentioning Swan Lake. By the way, that is 0:43:42.480 --> 0:43:44.480 what plays over the opening credits, at least in the 0:43:44.560 --> 0:43:48.319 version I watched. And another thing I wanted to call 0:43:48.360 --> 0:43:51.719 attention to in the opening credits I don't recall if 0:43:51.760 --> 0:43:55.800 I've ever really noticed this before, is the stylized bat 0:43:55.920 --> 0:44:00.319 in the background of the title card here. You know, 0:44:00.440 --> 0:44:03.480 it works fine if you're not paying very close attention, 0:44:03.600 --> 0:44:06.440 but when you really look at it, this illustration does 0:44:06.440 --> 0:44:09.200 seem kind of odd. Looks like something that would be 0:44:09.280 --> 0:44:12.200 on like the Adam West Batman TV show. There's a 0:44:12.239 --> 0:44:15.880 whimsical comic bookiness to it. It does not look super gothic. 0:44:16.760 --> 0:44:19.040 Yeah, yeah, it looks a little art deco, I guess. 0:44:19.480 --> 0:44:21.640 But it interesting that you would bring up Batman because 0:44:21.680 --> 0:44:24.480 Batman wouldn't be invented till nineteen thirty nine and first 0:44:24.480 --> 0:44:27.319 committed to the screen in forty three, So I don't know. 0:44:27.600 --> 0:44:30.880 It's not impossible that this had an influence on the 0:44:30.920 --> 0:44:31.640 Cape Crusader. 0:44:31.920 --> 0:44:33.560 Oh yeah, I can see that, But like, do you 0:44:33.640 --> 0:44:36.080 see that the shape of the ears on the head 0:44:36.280 --> 0:44:39.080 looks exactly like the Batman logo or not the logo 0:44:39.200 --> 0:44:40.440 like the costume. 0:44:40.080 --> 0:44:42.520 M it looks like Batman. Yeah. 0:44:42.640 --> 0:44:45.480 Also, speaking of bats, you know, there's so many things 0:44:45.560 --> 0:44:50.520 that the like in the Dracula movie tradition that are 0:44:50.600 --> 0:44:53.000 different from how they are in the book. When I 0:44:53.040 --> 0:44:56.160 was watching this, I genuinely could not remember if Dracula 0:44:56.200 --> 0:44:58.239 transforms into a bat in the book, and I had 0:44:58.280 --> 0:45:00.759 to look it up and oh, yeah, he definitely does. 0:45:00.840 --> 0:45:03.000 That's there in the novel. The book is in fact 0:45:03.160 --> 0:45:06.359 full of talk about bats. There's this whole section where 0:45:06.360 --> 0:45:08.560 they're trying to figure out what's happening to Lucy, and 0:45:08.600 --> 0:45:11.320 they talk about these bats in South America that swoop 0:45:11.360 --> 0:45:14.160 down from the trees and drink the blood of sailors 0:45:14.160 --> 0:45:16.480 as they sleep at night, leaving them without a single 0:45:16.560 --> 0:45:22.359 drop left in the morning. That's not true, but anyway, Yeah, 0:45:22.400 --> 0:45:27.319 so the book definitely is all about bats. That's originally there. 0:45:27.800 --> 0:45:30.440 But from here after the credits, we come on to 0:45:30.520 --> 0:45:34.880 the opening shot, and wow, what a strong opening shot. 0:45:34.920 --> 0:45:39.800 We start on this deep landscape shot with a tremendous 0:45:39.880 --> 0:45:43.400 sense of vertical reach. In the foreground, there is a 0:45:43.480 --> 0:45:46.879 horse drawn carriage. It's clattering over a dirt road toward 0:45:46.960 --> 0:45:49.600 the camera, and in the background we see the road 0:45:49.760 --> 0:45:55.120 is surrounded by gargantuan mountains, appearing as these shards of bare, 0:45:55.440 --> 0:45:59.960 unforested rock reaching up toward the clouds. And this made 0:46:00.160 --> 0:46:02.839 me think about how while there are a lot of 0:46:03.200 --> 0:46:06.560 there are lots of reasons for preferring the modern widescreen 0:46:06.600 --> 0:46:11.480 aspect ratio and film. This shot shows one cinematic benefit 0:46:11.840 --> 0:46:14.399 of the roughly one point two or one point three 0:46:14.480 --> 0:46:18.360 by one format, which is the ability to create this 0:46:18.520 --> 0:46:22.520 sense of towering height and depth, like a tiny subject 0:46:22.960 --> 0:46:26.480 in a desolate valley in the middle, encircled by these 0:46:26.520 --> 0:46:27.920 skyscrapers of rock. 0:46:28.560 --> 0:46:29.080 Yeah. 0:46:29.160 --> 0:46:31.600 Yeah, And we get this feeling a few different points 0:46:31.640 --> 0:46:33.360 at a few different points in the picture, So this 0:46:33.440 --> 0:46:34.480 is a great point. Yeah. 0:46:34.640 --> 0:46:37.120 Apparently this shot was accomplished by a kind of composite 0:46:37.160 --> 0:46:41.080 effect where you can bine a real, live moving photography 0:46:41.120 --> 0:46:43.600 shot of a carriage and road in the foreground and 0:46:43.600 --> 0:46:46.360 then the mountains in the background or a painted backdrop. 0:46:46.400 --> 0:46:48.279 I think I believe it was painted on a piece 0:46:48.320 --> 0:46:51.200 of glass that may actually have been done in the 0:46:51.239 --> 0:46:54.200 camera with the painted glass positioned over the camera lens. 0:46:54.360 --> 0:46:57.880 I'm not sure about that in this shot, but Skyll 0:46:57.920 --> 0:47:00.000 talks about that for at least some of these extra 0:47:00.040 --> 0:47:03.440 ear shots in the commentary track. But I'd also like 0:47:03.480 --> 0:47:08.560 to point out something about the feeling of these painted mountains, 0:47:09.040 --> 0:47:12.920 a kind of art history resonance. Actually, to me, these 0:47:12.960 --> 0:47:18.160 mountains resemble things you see in paintings from the Romantic 0:47:18.320 --> 0:47:23.479 movement of the late eighteenth early nineteenth century. So one 0:47:23.760 --> 0:47:25.560 very well known example if you want to look it 0:47:25.600 --> 0:47:28.280 up and see this kind of artistic sensibility in painting 0:47:28.840 --> 0:47:31.960 is A Wanderer above Sea and Fog from eighteen eighteen 0:47:32.040 --> 0:47:35.560 by Casper David Friedrich Robert. Have you seen this painting before? 0:47:36.000 --> 0:47:38.680 Oh? Not only have I seen it, I like a 0:47:38.680 --> 0:47:42.520 lot of liberal arts majors had this on my dormitory wall. Okay, 0:47:42.760 --> 0:47:45.960 n as a post or form, because I guess a 0:47:45.960 --> 0:47:49.480 lot of liberal arts majors probably see themselves like this. Sure, 0:47:49.520 --> 0:47:53.920 A lone figure standing atop a mysterious, you know, craggy 0:47:54.000 --> 0:47:56.960 environment above the mists, surveying everything. That's kind of like 0:47:57.000 --> 0:47:58.400 a gentleman scholar vibe. 0:47:58.680 --> 0:48:01.759 Yeah, yeah, I mean, but so how would you describe 0:48:01.800 --> 0:48:04.719 the like the the landscape here, it's it's like very 0:48:04.800 --> 0:48:08.440 active and emotional and dramatic, right you mentioned the crags. 0:48:08.800 --> 0:48:12.000 Yeah, yeah, definitely very emotionally charged. There's a sense of 0:48:12.040 --> 0:48:16.319 wonder and possibility here, and it's maybe inverted to a 0:48:16.320 --> 0:48:18.960 certain extent, or at least there's a darker sense of 0:48:19.000 --> 0:48:22.719 wonder and possibility in Dracula. But yeah, similar vibes in 0:48:22.719 --> 0:48:23.799 a way, similar. 0:48:23.480 --> 0:48:28.320 Frequency exactly and realized through these like very jagged edged 0:48:28.960 --> 0:48:32.400 depictions of nature, you know, like the it's just like 0:48:32.440 --> 0:48:36.600 the rocks are infused with drama. A lot of Romantic 0:48:36.680 --> 0:48:40.960 landscape paintings, I think, have this feeling depicting natural objects 0:48:41.080 --> 0:48:44.480 like mountains in particular, mountains are very popular subject of 0:48:45.360 --> 0:48:49.520 you know, painters of this style from this era, but 0:48:49.600 --> 0:48:53.080 also of rocks, bodies of water, trees, et cetera. There 0:48:53.160 --> 0:48:57.120 was a convention at this time of kind of showing 0:48:57.160 --> 0:49:02.080 these things as overwhelming, almost magical in some way, epic, dramatic, 0:49:02.280 --> 0:49:07.960 bursting with irrepressible emotion. And I would say that modern 0:49:08.040 --> 0:49:12.759 genres of horror, especially Gothic horror, have strong roots in 0:49:12.840 --> 0:49:16.960 the nineteenth century European Romantic movements in the arts, in 0:49:17.120 --> 0:49:21.000 arts and literature. Dracula itself as a novel was not 0:49:21.239 --> 0:49:23.919 born of this period, as we've said, it came much later. 0:49:23.960 --> 0:49:27.799 It was in the eighteen nineties. But Frankenstein was from 0:49:27.840 --> 0:49:31.840 this period. Frankenstein is a Romantic novel in many ways, 0:49:31.840 --> 0:49:34.319 and if you go back and read Frankenstein you might 0:49:34.360 --> 0:49:38.600 be shocked how much mountains and epic landscapes play a 0:49:38.680 --> 0:49:41.560 role in the story. For example, when Victor first meets 0:49:41.600 --> 0:49:44.880 the creature again after their initial separation, it's while he 0:49:45.000 --> 0:49:48.680 is out hiking alone in the Alps. And so even 0:49:48.719 --> 0:49:52.000 though Dracula was not a novel from the Romantic period, 0:49:52.080 --> 0:49:56.399 I think Romantic artistic and literary conventions have influenced how 0:49:56.440 --> 0:50:00.399 it was later brought to life on film. You see 0:50:00.400 --> 0:50:03.680 this kind of in themes that want to come out 0:50:03.800 --> 0:50:06.680 in different versions of the telling of the vampire story, 0:50:06.719 --> 0:50:08.640 and in this kind of visual imagery of like the 0:50:08.680 --> 0:50:13.640 great Romantic emotional mountains. So these common Romantic literary tropes. Again, 0:50:13.840 --> 0:50:16.640 this is my take, and I'm sure i'm oversimplifying. You know, 0:50:16.719 --> 0:50:18.640 literature scholars might get mad at me, but this is 0:50:18.680 --> 0:50:20.359 what I think. I think you see a lot of 0:50:20.440 --> 0:50:24.960 like themes of the awe inspiring power of nature and instinct, 0:50:25.520 --> 0:50:30.240 a preference for emotion and passion over cold blooded reason, 0:50:31.239 --> 0:50:34.040 a kind of a sensibility of rebellion, a desire to 0:50:34.080 --> 0:50:39.600 rebel against authority and institutions, and themes of the ways 0:50:39.640 --> 0:50:43.279 in which personal experiences are kind of unique and precious 0:50:43.440 --> 0:50:47.719 and difficult to share or express, and beyond all that, 0:50:48.040 --> 0:50:51.759 just kind of a general attraction to mystery and amazement. 0:50:53.320 --> 0:50:56.920 I do not think that these themes are especially present 0:50:56.960 --> 0:50:59.680 in my reading of the novel Dracula, but I do 0:50:59.719 --> 0:51:03.880 think these themes really come out in movie adaptations of Dracula. 0:51:04.440 --> 0:51:07.239 Yes, and really even in the opening here in a sense, 0:51:07.280 --> 0:51:10.840 a stranger in a strange land. What's going to happen? 0:51:11.600 --> 0:51:15.360 So anyway, we're down with the people now in the carriage, 0:51:16.040 --> 0:51:17.640 and this is the part what I think this is 0:51:17.719 --> 0:51:20.840 Carla Limley, isn't it who's reading reading from like a 0:51:20.880 --> 0:51:23.280 travel book? Here there are like five or six people. 0:51:23.320 --> 0:51:26.240 One of them is Dwight Fry. They're in this carriage. 0:51:26.320 --> 0:51:28.759 Dwight Fry is dressed in a tidy suit and tie 0:51:28.800 --> 0:51:31.839 with a white fedora. And I was just thinking, dude, you're 0:51:31.840 --> 0:51:33.680 going to go in a full three piece suit to 0:51:33.719 --> 0:51:34.680 the Borgo Pass. 0:51:35.520 --> 0:51:36.920 It's just how you traveled back then. 0:51:37.440 --> 0:51:39.640 So the other woman in the carriage, she's reading from 0:51:39.640 --> 0:51:42.240 the travel book, and she says, among the rugged peaks 0:51:42.239 --> 0:51:45.840 that frowned down upon the Borgo Pass are found crumbling 0:51:45.960 --> 0:51:51.200 castles of a bygone age, and a little real world. 0:51:51.239 --> 0:51:54.560 Note this is a real mountain pass. The Borgo Pass exists. 0:51:54.560 --> 0:51:57.640 It's called some different today, but it is located in 0:51:57.680 --> 0:52:01.359 modern day Romania. At the time then was written, this 0:52:01.600 --> 0:52:04.440 was part of the region of Transylvania, which I believe 0:52:04.520 --> 0:52:08.480 at the time was part of Hungary. Bramstoker almost certainly 0:52:08.520 --> 0:52:11.120 never went there. He probably just found the name on 0:52:11.160 --> 0:52:15.440 a map and it sounded cool, And according to experts, 0:52:15.440 --> 0:52:17.839 like the way he describes it is not really how 0:52:17.840 --> 0:52:18.560 this place. 0:52:18.400 --> 0:52:21.360 Is right right. I've often heard it pointed out that 0:52:21.360 --> 0:52:25.200 there's really more Irish mythology than Eastern European mythology. I mean, 0:52:25.200 --> 0:52:27.640 there's a bit of it. The vampire does have Eastern 0:52:27.680 --> 0:52:31.000 European origins, but there's a lot of Irish mythology bound 0:52:31.080 --> 0:52:33.160 up in what bram Stoker is creating here. 0:52:33.360 --> 0:52:37.800 That's right. So Dwight Fry looks bored and annoyed. Everybody 0:52:37.880 --> 0:52:40.759 in the carriage is getting tossed around by the bumpy road, 0:52:41.239 --> 0:52:43.319 and he calls out to the driver to slow down, 0:52:43.400 --> 0:52:46.480 but another man in the carriage, a local with a mustache, 0:52:46.680 --> 0:52:50.319 leans over to sharply rebuke him, and he says, we 0:52:50.400 --> 0:52:53.600 must reach the inn before sundown. So ain't no slowing 0:52:53.680 --> 0:52:56.239 down this carriage. That is the wrong choice. We've got 0:52:56.280 --> 0:52:58.520 to go as fast as we can to get to shelter. 0:52:59.040 --> 0:53:01.960 Now why would it be to get there before sundown? Well, 0:53:02.000 --> 0:53:05.120 he says, it is well, Purgas night, the night of evil. 0:53:05.880 --> 0:53:09.440 That's April thirtieth, by the way, everyone, for those who 0:53:09.480 --> 0:53:12.560 don't celebrate, And then he goes on to shout nos 0:53:12.600 --> 0:53:15.440 Feratu before the woman in the carriage next to him. 0:53:15.440 --> 0:53:17.279 I think this must be his wife. She tries to 0:53:17.280 --> 0:53:19.560 cover up his mouth, but he will not be silent. 0:53:19.680 --> 0:53:23.160 He says, on this night, madame, the doors they are barred, 0:53:23.280 --> 0:53:27.000 and to the Virgin we pray. So the carriage does 0:53:27.040 --> 0:53:29.960 make it to the end before sundown, and we see, 0:53:30.239 --> 0:53:33.799 you know, the locals going about their business praying in Hungarian. 0:53:34.840 --> 0:53:37.319 And here we get a scene versions of which are 0:53:37.320 --> 0:53:40.279 in many adaptations of Dracula where the locals try to 0:53:40.400 --> 0:53:43.600 warn the visiting real estate agent about the evils that 0:53:43.680 --> 0:53:46.560 lurk at Castle Dracula. You know, No, it's a bad place, 0:53:46.600 --> 0:53:49.919 don't go there, and they eventually will usually give him 0:53:50.080 --> 0:53:53.759 some form of talismanic protection, usually a crucifix. Here it 0:53:53.800 --> 0:53:54.680 is a crucifix. 0:53:55.360 --> 0:53:55.600 Now. 0:53:55.680 --> 0:53:59.320 One thing that makes this adaptation unlike both the novel 0:53:59.520 --> 0:54:04.640 and most later movie adaptations is the identity of the 0:54:04.719 --> 0:54:09.359 agent making the visit. Usually, the agent that comes here 0:54:09.400 --> 0:54:13.600 to Transylvania is one of our main young protagonists. It's 0:54:13.719 --> 0:54:17.280 Jonathan Harker, or, in the German adaptations like nos Feraratu, 0:54:17.520 --> 0:54:23.520 Thomas Hutter. In this version, the character is Wrenfield. Now, 0:54:23.880 --> 0:54:28.719 for those not familiar with the story, Harker is the young, handsome, 0:54:29.040 --> 0:54:33.600 ambitious fiance of Mina, who Mina will become, by the 0:54:33.719 --> 0:54:37.200 end of the story the ultimate target of Dracula's predations, 0:54:37.560 --> 0:54:41.600 Whereas Wrenfield in the novel is a former colleague of 0:54:41.680 --> 0:54:46.560 Harker's who I believe had also previously traveled to Transylvania, 0:54:46.560 --> 0:54:48.680 but that's not part of the narrative. It's the background. 0:54:48.680 --> 0:54:51.880 He had gone there to conduct business with Count Dracula. 0:54:52.200 --> 0:54:55.719 He ends up coming back having been driven mad, and 0:54:55.840 --> 0:54:59.919 he is turned into Dracula's loyal servant and familiar spins 0:55:00.120 --> 0:55:03.160 the rest of the story housed in doctor Seward's sanitarium 0:55:03.239 --> 0:55:07.080 near Carfax, eating flies and pining to serve his master. 0:55:07.320 --> 0:55:09.880 I do about right with that, Rob, Yes, that's correct. 0:55:10.160 --> 0:55:13.200 So in the novel, Harker, the character who's our real 0:55:13.320 --> 0:55:16.399 like protagonist, has to pick up where Renfield left off. 0:55:16.480 --> 0:55:19.239 So he goes to Dracula's castle and we go with 0:55:19.360 --> 0:55:21.960 him because we read his letters. He's going there to 0:55:22.040 --> 0:55:25.440 bring signing papers for the purchase of an estate in England, 0:55:25.920 --> 0:55:30.000 and we learn about Dracula first through Harker's letters here. 0:55:30.360 --> 0:55:34.800 Harker will later escape the castle and be reunited with Mina, 0:55:35.239 --> 0:55:38.000 and he is part of the posse of heroes who 0:55:38.080 --> 0:55:40.440 chase down Dracula at the end of the novel to 0:55:40.600 --> 0:55:43.879 free Mina from his curse. But this movie has made 0:55:43.960 --> 0:55:48.279 some executive editing decisions and they have decided instead to 0:55:48.480 --> 0:55:52.160 just give all of the action in Transylvania to Renfield, 0:55:52.600 --> 0:55:55.640 which is in a way an efficient storytelling choice that 0:55:56.239 --> 0:55:58.480 I can see ways in which that's a good edit. 0:55:59.040 --> 0:56:03.000 But I would also argue that leaves Jonathan Harker without 0:56:03.000 --> 0:56:05.680 a very good reason to be in the story and 0:56:05.760 --> 0:56:08.400 without much interesting to do. It's just kind of like 0:56:08.800 --> 0:56:11.600 Dracula is preying on Mina. Oh and Mina's got a 0:56:11.640 --> 0:56:13.200 fiance somewhere. What's his deal? 0:56:13.480 --> 0:56:17.200 Yeah? Yeah, yeah, I mean I applaud the adaptation for 0:56:17.280 --> 0:56:20.880 doubling down on weird Renfield, and it makes for the 0:56:20.920 --> 0:56:23.719 intro to be I think, in a way more horrifying 0:56:23.960 --> 0:56:27.440 because it is going to meet it ended madness for him. 0:56:27.480 --> 0:56:31.799 He's not truly going to escape the count. But yeah, 0:56:31.840 --> 0:56:33.800 Harker is reduced to almost nothing in the picture. 0:56:34.040 --> 0:56:36.280 I'm not trying to be mean to the actor or anything, 0:56:36.320 --> 0:56:38.960 but it's just he he has strong, like why is 0:56:39.000 --> 0:56:39.880 he here energy? 0:56:40.040 --> 0:56:40.960 Yeah. 0:56:40.960 --> 0:56:44.080 One note I wanted to make about Renfield and the 0:56:44.800 --> 0:56:46.959 actor Dwight Fry who plays him here. This is from 0:56:47.280 --> 0:56:51.680 David Skal's commentary Scout talks about how you know, really 0:56:51.760 --> 0:56:55.640 Dwight Fry had the makings of a dashing leading man 0:56:55.640 --> 0:56:58.040 of Hollywood. He had good looks, he had you know, 0:56:58.120 --> 0:57:00.520 good acting skills, like he could have been that type 0:57:00.560 --> 0:57:04.879 of character, that kind of leading player. But his role 0:57:04.960 --> 0:57:07.600 as Renfield and then his later role as the grave 0:57:07.680 --> 0:57:11.720 robbing assistant Fritz and James Wales. Frankenstein made it really 0:57:11.840 --> 0:57:14.640 hard for Fry to get these roles, to get the 0:57:14.719 --> 0:57:17.920 leading roles. He was kind of pigeonholed as the grinning 0:57:18.000 --> 0:57:21.240 lunatic who you catch rooting around in the hospital Morgue 0:57:21.640 --> 0:57:25.120 and they're just like it in a way. It was 0:57:25.240 --> 0:57:29.520 like a very successful acting turn that proved to be 0:57:29.560 --> 0:57:30.640 a curse for his career. 0:57:31.160 --> 0:57:33.000 Yeah. Yeah, I mean you can make some comparisons to 0:57:33.120 --> 0:57:36.080 Lugosi there as well, but yeah, a shame. It's also 0:57:36.160 --> 0:57:39.400 shame that he died rather young heart attack or heart condition, 0:57:39.920 --> 0:57:43.880 and yeah, it's you know, what could we have gotten 0:57:43.880 --> 0:57:46.000 out of him had we had ten or twenty more 0:57:46.080 --> 0:57:57.080 years of him as an active actor. Yeah yeah. 0:57:57.160 --> 0:57:59.680 Anyway, so back to the scene that the locals try 0:57:59.680 --> 0:58:02.240 to warn Renfield away, but he insists that he has 0:58:02.280 --> 0:58:04.840 to meet the Count because he's made it. He's got 0:58:04.840 --> 0:58:07.000 an appointment with Count Dracula's carriage and they've got to 0:58:07.040 --> 0:58:09.880 meet at the Borgo Pass at midnight. It sounds like fun. 0:58:10.840 --> 0:58:12.360 By the way. One of the people who tries to 0:58:12.400 --> 0:58:15.920 warn him off is this innkeeper here who is the 0:58:15.960 --> 0:58:18.560 actor is great. I love this scene where he's he's 0:58:18.600 --> 0:58:21.840 like telling him all of the vampire lore. He's telling him, like, listen, 0:58:21.920 --> 0:58:24.240 no vampires are at the castle. You can't go there. 0:58:24.360 --> 0:58:27.400 Vampires drink blood, they sleep in coffins, they change into 0:58:27.440 --> 0:58:30.120 bats and wolves, they can be repelled by the cross. 0:58:30.240 --> 0:58:32.200 This is all the stuff you need to know. But 0:58:32.280 --> 0:58:36.000 it doesn't feel like the kind of tight lore dump 0:58:36.080 --> 0:58:38.960 that it is. Instead, it's like this innkeeper is ranting 0:58:39.000 --> 0:58:40.360 at me and I want him to stop. 0:58:41.000 --> 0:58:43.440 Yeah, yeah, I had to look this guy at. Michael Visarov, 0:58:43.960 --> 0:58:46.800 Russian born actor most mostly active in did parts in 0:58:46.800 --> 0:58:47.800 the thirties and forties. 0:58:48.040 --> 0:58:50.480 Anyway, after this, Renfield does take off in the carriage 0:58:50.480 --> 0:58:53.560 again to meet Dracula's carriage at the Borgo Pass at midnight, 0:58:53.600 --> 0:58:57.160 and we get another great dramatic landscape shot. This was 0:58:57.160 --> 0:59:00.560 once again by combining real photography and painting. It's the 0:59:00.840 --> 0:59:05.680 perilous rock bridge crossing to the vampire's castle. Now, before 0:59:05.720 --> 0:59:08.560 Renfield arrives, we actually get what I think is one 0:59:08.560 --> 0:59:10.560 of the best shots in the film, which is a 0:59:10.680 --> 0:59:15.760 dolly shot, a moving camera shot through the filthy catacombs 0:59:15.800 --> 0:59:19.760 and the bowels of Dracula's castle, and we're approaching this 0:59:19.920 --> 0:59:23.680 brood of coffins that lie nestled in the dust, and 0:59:23.800 --> 0:59:27.680 there's this great effect where mist is pouring eerily across 0:59:27.720 --> 0:59:30.160 the surface of the earth, and we get closer and 0:59:30.200 --> 0:59:33.080 closer to the coffin, and finally the lid creaks open 0:59:33.320 --> 0:59:35.400 and out comes a pale hand. 0:59:36.040 --> 0:59:38.920 This, I believe is one of a few shots that 0:59:39.160 --> 0:59:42.680 is pointed out as being clearly inspired by twenty two's Nosferatu. 0:59:43.080 --> 0:59:45.240 Oh yeah, okay, I don't think I would have made 0:59:45.280 --> 0:59:49.200 that connection, but that sounds right to me. Now. Interesting note, 0:59:49.640 --> 0:59:52.480 we don't see Draculu's face in this moment where the 0:59:52.520 --> 0:59:55.360 hand is coming out of the coffin. In fact, before 0:59:55.400 --> 0:59:57.640 we see his face, we see the face of one 0:59:57.640 --> 1:00:02.120 of his wives. So, despite some movie trivia, sources say 1:00:02.160 --> 1:00:05.480 the first on screen vampire in a talkie was not 1:00:05.680 --> 1:00:09.160 bela Lagosi, but one of his three demon brides. I'm 1:00:09.200 --> 1:00:12.000 almost certain this is the one played by Geraldine de Vorak. 1:00:12.200 --> 1:00:13.960 She beats him by a few seconds. 1:00:14.320 --> 1:00:16.280 However, she does not talkie herself. 1:00:16.640 --> 1:00:17.200 That's true. 1:00:17.360 --> 1:00:17.920 Very quiet. 1:00:18.960 --> 1:00:22.880 Also in the scene possums, you know, yes, but Dracula's castles. 1:00:23.000 --> 1:00:25.640 It's full of possums. They're crawling around in the bones, 1:00:25.640 --> 1:00:27.960 they're getting up all in all the cracks and crevices. 1:00:28.000 --> 1:00:29.520 They've got a real possum issue. 1:00:29.760 --> 1:00:32.640 Oh man. When I started watching Dracula the other day 1:00:32.880 --> 1:00:35.120 with my kid, I wasn't fully considering it for this 1:00:35.120 --> 1:00:38.800 week's Weird House Cinema until the possums and the armadillos 1:00:38.960 --> 1:00:43.800 showed up, rooting around caskets and generally just infesting Dracula's castle. 1:00:45.440 --> 1:00:47.920 So the possums show up first, and I was like, okay, 1:00:47.960 --> 1:00:51.080 fair enough, possums look like big gross rats. I'll allow it. 1:00:51.240 --> 1:00:53.959 But then there are armadillas as well, armadillos as well. 1:00:54.360 --> 1:00:57.880 And to be clear, possums and armadillo's are both endemic 1:00:57.920 --> 1:01:01.680 to the Americas. They absolutely don't live in Transylvania or 1:01:01.680 --> 1:01:04.600 Eastern Europe. And yet at the same time, you know 1:01:04.640 --> 1:01:06.840 you have to acknowledge they do look creepy rooting around 1:01:06.880 --> 1:01:10.360 in a Gothic castle. So what's going on here? Well, 1:01:10.720 --> 1:01:13.600 the most obvious interpretations are, of course, this was shot 1:01:13.640 --> 1:01:18.480 in California and on a depression trunken budget, so you know, 1:01:18.520 --> 1:01:21.480 you use what you can get your hands on, and 1:01:21.520 --> 1:01:23.760 if you didn't know any better, these animals again look 1:01:23.800 --> 1:01:27.640 creepy in a Gothic castle setting. A deeper answer, however, 1:01:27.720 --> 1:01:31.240 seems to exist in attitudes concerning these two species, especially 1:01:31.240 --> 1:01:34.640 at the time I was reading Dale Hudson's Of Course 1:01:34.680 --> 1:01:38.240 there are werewolves and vampires from the American Quarterly twenty thirteen, 1:01:38.520 --> 1:01:42.080 and this author argues that the presence of these creatures 1:01:42.080 --> 1:01:47.400 serve to animalize Dracula himself. Additionally, the contagion aspects of 1:01:47.400 --> 1:01:50.560 Stoker's novel are perhaps summoned here in the presence of 1:01:50.600 --> 1:01:55.000 two creatures often associated with diseases possums. I look this up. 1:01:55.040 --> 1:01:57.320 They can carry a number of diseases that are transferable 1:01:57.320 --> 1:02:02.520 to humans, and Armatilla's, of course, can carry Furthermore, there 1:02:02.600 --> 1:02:07.000 are slash were apparently tall tales of Armadillo's digging up 1:02:07.040 --> 1:02:08.440 graves and eating corpses. 1:02:08.680 --> 1:02:09.880 What I've never heard that. 1:02:10.120 --> 1:02:11.760 I mean, they do root around, and I think the 1:02:11.840 --> 1:02:16.400 idea is that this led to, you know, tall tails 1:02:16.640 --> 1:02:18.880 of them digging up and eating corpses, and you know, 1:02:18.920 --> 1:02:21.400 there may be some accounts of them, you know, eating 1:02:22.000 --> 1:02:25.520 non insect meat, scavenging it if the availability is there. 1:02:25.560 --> 1:02:28.160 I mean, we've seen that in other animals, but it 1:02:28.400 --> 1:02:31.280 seems to be yeah, just you know, a myth and 1:02:31.600 --> 1:02:34.880 a legend. But yeah, despite all the other aspects of 1:02:34.920 --> 1:02:38.480 this adaptation of Dracula that becomes set in Stone, the 1:02:38.520 --> 1:02:41.600 inclusion of possums and Armadilla's doesn't seem to be like 1:02:41.680 --> 1:02:44.600 something that really stuck. I don't think cope Wi used 1:02:44.600 --> 1:02:45.160 this at all. 1:02:45.720 --> 1:02:49.040 I do not recall it. But anyway, so after that, 1:02:49.480 --> 1:02:52.080 we finally get to the iconic shot where we first 1:02:52.120 --> 1:02:55.640 see Bella Legosi in full standing tall in a black 1:02:55.680 --> 1:02:59.400 cloak with the tall collar, and the dark catacombs under 1:02:59.440 --> 1:03:02.880 the stone arches and the cobwebs, with the light curiously 1:03:02.920 --> 1:03:04.840 falling on his face in a way that makes him 1:03:04.840 --> 1:03:08.320 look unnaturally pale, and the camera closes in and it 1:03:08.360 --> 1:03:11.520 brings us closer and closer to him, and it's almost 1:03:11.520 --> 1:03:14.520 like he's floating through the air toward us as the 1:03:14.520 --> 1:03:18.320 camera zooms in. Just great, great shot. It's one of 1:03:18.320 --> 1:03:21.720 those all time epic movie introductions. It's like, when you 1:03:21.760 --> 1:03:23.560 see a guy for the first time like this, you'll 1:03:23.600 --> 1:03:24.400 never forget him. 1:03:24.720 --> 1:03:26.760 Yeah, it's like he is floating towards us. We are 1:03:26.760 --> 1:03:30.800 being drawn towards him. Yeah, we are already captivated. 1:03:31.440 --> 1:03:33.840 We also see Dracula's brides for the first time in 1:03:33.880 --> 1:03:36.480 this scene. They're like creeping along through the catacombs, also 1:03:36.600 --> 1:03:41.000 under these arches, and very very unsettling as well. So 1:03:41.240 --> 1:03:43.320 the next scene is the one where Dracula picks up 1:03:43.360 --> 1:03:46.800 Rinfield at the Borgo Pass at midnight. Dracula is supposed 1:03:46.840 --> 1:03:50.240 to be in disguise as the coachman here in the novel. 1:03:50.960 --> 1:03:53.520 I think he doesn't want Harker to realize that he's 1:03:53.560 --> 1:03:56.400 doing everything himself and that he doesn't actually have any 1:03:56.440 --> 1:03:59.640 living servants inside his castle, so he you know, he's 1:03:59.680 --> 1:04:01.680 into guys. But this is not a good disguise. 1:04:01.720 --> 1:04:05.200 It's bel Legosi, okay, basically just as a scarf and 1:04:05.240 --> 1:04:05.680 a hat. 1:04:06.000 --> 1:04:09.680 Yeah yeah, but yeah, maybe if you've never seen Belli 1:04:09.720 --> 1:04:14.200 Lagosi before, just like, okay, it's another guy. Renfield meets 1:04:14.240 --> 1:04:18.040 the carriage in a haunted, misty landscape filled with crooked trees, 1:04:18.120 --> 1:04:20.880 and then he gets aboard. The driver does not speak. 1:04:21.240 --> 1:04:23.320 At one point along the way, Renfield looks out the 1:04:23.320 --> 1:04:25.800 window and sees the team of horses being led by 1:04:25.840 --> 1:04:28.680 a bat in flight. Good. Good, little moment. 1:04:29.240 --> 1:04:31.320 Yeah, I want to add a note here about the 1:04:31.720 --> 1:04:34.400 you know, their rubber bats on yeah, on the strings essentially. 1:04:34.400 --> 1:04:37.880 We've seen so many flapping rubber bats on strings and 1:04:37.960 --> 1:04:41.160 various films, but here they do look really good. I 1:04:41.160 --> 1:04:45.040 mean there's never any doubt that you're watching an effect 1:04:45.080 --> 1:04:47.720 and not a real animal, but it looks really good. 1:04:47.800 --> 1:04:50.200 I absolute props. 1:04:50.240 --> 1:04:52.960 It's a rubber bat. But I like this rubber bat. Yeah, 1:04:53.000 --> 1:04:55.240 the rubber bat is better than the rubber spider that 1:04:55.320 --> 1:04:57.280 climbs the wall in a few minutes. 1:04:57.400 --> 1:05:00.200 Oh, it's true. Yeah, they couldn't keep live spider. Try 1:05:00.240 --> 1:05:02.960 to use live spiders. There are some. There are some 1:05:03.000 --> 1:05:07.200 live crickets as well, but yeah, live spiders. That's got 1:05:07.280 --> 1:05:08.200 eaten up pretty quickly. 1:05:08.760 --> 1:05:13.600 Okay, some notes about the scene where where Renfield arrives 1:05:13.640 --> 1:05:15.640 at the castle. It's great. You know, the door creaks 1:05:15.680 --> 1:05:18.560 open by itself. Again, most people have probably seen some 1:05:18.640 --> 1:05:21.280 kind of adaptation of Dracula, so you know this scene, 1:05:21.920 --> 1:05:25.280 Renfield cautiously steps into the main hall, which looks as 1:05:25.280 --> 1:05:28.440 if it had been deserted for centuries. Everything's covered in 1:05:28.520 --> 1:05:31.920 just ages worth of dust, giant spider webs. You got 1:05:31.960 --> 1:05:35.600 bats bobbing and cheapen outside the window. Uh are here, 1:05:35.600 --> 1:05:37.600 Here's where we meet the Armadillos for the first time. 1:05:37.640 --> 1:05:42.280 They're just crawling out of the furniture. Another beautiful set, 1:05:42.640 --> 1:05:45.400 once again a composite shot made by I think it's 1:05:45.480 --> 1:05:51.160 a real photograph, real photography of a stage, a sound 1:05:51.200 --> 1:05:53.560 stage made up set on the bottom, and then I 1:05:53.560 --> 1:05:56.080 think the painted editions are higher up in the frame. 1:05:56.960 --> 1:05:59.840 Yeah, it's absolutely gorgeous. The depth is amazing and is 1:05:59.880 --> 1:06:06.440 nov in the Road to Dracula documentary. This look, this set, 1:06:06.600 --> 1:06:09.640 like this really sets the tone for the look of 1:06:09.720 --> 1:06:12.960 horror films, all the horror films that come afterwards, particularly 1:06:13.040 --> 1:06:17.440 gothic horror films to come. This cathedral of the macabre. 1:06:18.440 --> 1:06:21.320 It just yeah, you know what you're looking at here, 1:06:21.360 --> 1:06:26.480 and it just resonates through horror cinema and things adjacent 1:06:26.480 --> 1:06:28.480 to horror cinema, Like this is like your basic Scooby 1:06:28.480 --> 1:06:31.000 Doo haunted house as well. So it does get deluded 1:06:31.240 --> 1:06:34.040 to a certain extent, but here in its original form, 1:06:34.120 --> 1:06:35.400 I mean, it's still astounding. 1:06:35.880 --> 1:06:37.960 Yeah, that's right. I mean it is beautiful, and it's 1:06:38.000 --> 1:06:42.360 the mother of all movie haunted castles. So we get 1:06:42.400 --> 1:06:45.600 the introductory scene he Dracula comes down the stairs with 1:06:45.600 --> 1:06:49.520 the candelabra. He says, I am Dracula. He says to Renfield, 1:06:49.520 --> 1:06:52.720 I bid you welcome. Renfield says, is just kind of 1:06:52.760 --> 1:06:55.840 nervously stammering and you know, saying a bunch of stuff 1:06:55.880 --> 1:06:59.680 that's not necessary. And as they start to go up 1:06:59.680 --> 1:07:03.240 the stairs, we get the great moment where Count Dracula says, 1:07:03.720 --> 1:07:07.120 they hear wolves howling outside, and Dracula says, listen to them, 1:07:07.680 --> 1:07:11.680 chill the rain of the night. What music they make? 1:07:12.600 --> 1:07:15.320 I'm sorry if I didn't deliver that right, but it's 1:07:16.200 --> 1:07:19.440 it's I think Skull points out that actually, in a 1:07:19.480 --> 1:07:22.680 lot of later adaptations of the Dracula story, this line 1:07:22.680 --> 1:07:26.840 gets embellished. They start adding other words to it, where 1:07:26.880 --> 1:07:30.600 it's like what beautiful music they make or what sweet 1:07:30.760 --> 1:07:35.000 music they make? And the simplicity of what music they 1:07:35.040 --> 1:07:38.240 make is so much better. I like that this Dracula 1:07:38.360 --> 1:07:39.440 is understated. 1:07:40.240 --> 1:07:42.600 Yeah, yeah, and again yeah, the cryptic nature of it 1:07:42.680 --> 1:07:45.600 and the fact that Lugosi makes every syllable count. And 1:07:45.720 --> 1:07:47.920 I think it was Joe Dante who made the point 1:07:47.920 --> 1:07:50.280 in the Road to Dracula that that Legosi also had 1:07:50.320 --> 1:07:53.000 a great ability to find every possible syllable in a 1:07:53.040 --> 1:07:56.160 word yes and bring it to full life. 1:07:56.960 --> 1:07:59.040 The scene also has the moment where Dracula is going 1:07:59.120 --> 1:08:01.760 up the stairs and he passes through the spider web 1:08:01.840 --> 1:08:05.560 without parting it, and then Renfield going through. You know, 1:08:05.600 --> 1:08:07.880 there's a spider web across the Dracula is already gone 1:08:07.920 --> 1:08:09.800 and he has to split the web and go through, 1:08:10.080 --> 1:08:13.000 which is eerie, but there are actually no special effects needed. 1:08:13.000 --> 1:08:14.880 It's just a no ominous cut. You see him walking 1:08:14.960 --> 1:08:17.120 up toward it and it cuts away and suddenly he's 1:08:17.160 --> 1:08:19.040 on the other side of it, but it's still intact. 1:08:20.040 --> 1:08:25.000 And then a rubber spider scuttles up the wall. So 1:08:25.120 --> 1:08:27.320 Renfield is brought up to a more hospitable room with 1:08:27.400 --> 1:08:30.519 a roaring fireplace and supper set out for him. This 1:08:30.720 --> 1:08:33.840 drag hospitality scene also appears in some form in most 1:08:34.080 --> 1:08:37.160 versions of the story. As usual, they discuss business here, 1:08:37.200 --> 1:08:39.639 you know, Dracula signs the lease on the property he's 1:08:39.640 --> 1:08:45.080 acquiring in England. He works out shipping arrangements. He explains 1:08:45.120 --> 1:08:50.120 that he's taking three boxes on the ship that he's 1:08:50.200 --> 1:08:53.760 chartered for England, which is leaving tomorrow evening. Wow, that's 1:08:53.760 --> 1:08:57.400 soon three boxes. I think he takes more boxes in 1:08:57.439 --> 1:08:59.800 the book, but three, I guess that. Yeah, that's right. 1:09:00.040 --> 1:09:01.840 It seems like you could take four, right. I must 1:09:01.880 --> 1:09:04.040 be missing something here because he needs one for each 1:09:04.080 --> 1:09:06.679 bride and then himself. But maybe there's. 1:09:06.560 --> 1:09:08.639 I don't know, that's a good point. Yeah. 1:09:09.080 --> 1:09:13.040 Even then there were carry on lints and and so forth. 1:09:13.120 --> 1:09:15.280 So it was like, I have four buckses and they're like, well, 1:09:15.320 --> 1:09:16.760 we have to charge you for the fourth, when it's 1:09:16.800 --> 1:09:19.080 like I can make do with three. 1:09:20.520 --> 1:09:23.040 So Renfield in this scene, of course, you know, he 1:09:23.080 --> 1:09:25.879 gets a paper cut all those documents. That's a little dangerous. 1:09:26.240 --> 1:09:28.840 You're gonna you're gonna cut your fingers, and he does, 1:09:29.240 --> 1:09:32.280 and DrAk can't help himself. He starts creeping up to him, 1:09:32.960 --> 1:09:35.639 but then the sign of the cross, the crucifix given 1:09:35.680 --> 1:09:37.599 to him by the woman at the end, makes Dracula 1:09:37.640 --> 1:09:41.160 recoil m And around here is where we start getting 1:09:41.200 --> 1:09:45.200 these great close ups on Dracula's face with the light 1:09:45.320 --> 1:09:47.559 just falling over his eyes where he seems to be 1:09:47.640 --> 1:09:50.639 hypnotizing the person in front of him. Uh. The scene 1:09:50.680 --> 1:09:53.720 also has the great wine exchange, you know, where he 1:09:53.760 --> 1:09:56.559 offers wine to Renfield. He says, this is very old wine. 1:09:56.560 --> 1:09:59.280 I hope you will like it. And Renfield's like, oh, 1:09:59.360 --> 1:10:03.599 thank you. Aren't you you having any I never drink why. 1:10:05.680 --> 1:10:06.639 We know what he drinks. 1:10:06.960 --> 1:10:09.920 So after this, Dracula leaves Renfield for the evening, but 1:10:10.000 --> 1:10:13.920 he's not leaving for long. Renfield, when finally alone, looks 1:10:13.960 --> 1:10:19.080 moderately disconcerted. But then uh h. Immediately some trouble starts 1:10:19.120 --> 1:10:22.240 creeping in. So we see Dracula's three demon brides approaching 1:10:22.280 --> 1:10:25.240 the door through a through a misty hallway, and then 1:10:25.320 --> 1:10:28.000 Renfield goes to the window of his room, outside of 1:10:28.040 --> 1:10:31.200 which there are these crooked tree branches and it's a 1:10:31.680 --> 1:10:33.759 I don't know, just a very creepy kind of landscape 1:10:33.760 --> 1:10:37.200 out there again, like mists covering the ground. And then 1:10:37.240 --> 1:10:39.720 a bat there's a bat. Oh, bat comes to the 1:10:39.720 --> 1:10:42.200 window and it sort of floats in front of him. 1:10:42.439 --> 1:10:46.040 Renfield collapses on the floor as if you know, hypnotized 1:10:46.080 --> 1:10:49.519 into unconsciousness somehow by the bat. And then the brides 1:10:49.560 --> 1:10:52.960 creep into the room. They're advancing on Renfield's body. They're 1:10:53.520 --> 1:10:56.000 obviously they're going to drink his blood, but no, no, 1:10:56.479 --> 1:11:00.120 Renfield is not for them. Dracula himself comes back in 1:11:00.360 --> 1:11:03.280 through the window into the room, and he drives away 1:11:03.320 --> 1:11:06.400 his wives as if to say he is mine, and 1:11:06.439 --> 1:11:10.160 then the Count descends on Wrinfield's unconscious body and leans 1:11:10.240 --> 1:11:11.920 over him to take him in his arms. 1:11:12.520 --> 1:11:16.400 Yeah, it's great, Steveuince. And we never actually see him 1:11:16.479 --> 1:11:18.880 like bite into Renfield. Correct me if I'm wrong, But 1:11:19.680 --> 1:11:23.160 do we ever see fangs in nineteen thirty one Stracula 1:11:23.240 --> 1:11:23.559 at all? 1:11:24.960 --> 1:11:28.840 That's a very good point. I'm afraid to be wrong, 1:11:28.960 --> 1:11:32.080 but I think you never do. Yeah, I think you 1:11:32.120 --> 1:11:33.200 never see them. Yeah, yeah. 1:11:33.280 --> 1:11:35.559 If you do see them there, it's not much as 1:11:35.600 --> 1:11:38.120 made out of it, And it almost seems like they 1:11:38.160 --> 1:11:41.479 couldn't show for things, you know, like that would be 1:11:41.520 --> 1:11:45.120 too much for thirty one, and therefore it's implied rather 1:11:45.160 --> 1:11:48.120 than shown. And I mean you don't miss them because 1:11:48.120 --> 1:11:49.799 your imagination takes you there already. 1:11:50.000 --> 1:11:53.400 That's right. So we get the standard interlude of a 1:11:53.439 --> 1:11:57.120 ship on route to England. A difference from most versions 1:11:57.120 --> 1:12:00.120 here is that because it's Wrinfield rather than Harker who 1:12:00.120 --> 1:12:03.840 went to the castle, Renfield is on the ship with Dracula. 1:12:04.040 --> 1:12:07.040 There's like there are two creeps on this journey, and 1:12:07.120 --> 1:12:10.400 he's a full on vampire thraw already. You know, he's 1:12:10.439 --> 1:12:13.400 crouching next to the to the vampire's coffin, saying, you 1:12:13.439 --> 1:12:16.400 will keep your promise when we get to London, won't you? Master? 1:12:16.760 --> 1:12:18.480 You will see that I get lives. 1:12:18.960 --> 1:12:21.400 I think for some reason, it's not the Demeter as well, 1:12:21.439 --> 1:12:24.280 like it venta Yeah, because they I guess, you know, 1:12:24.560 --> 1:12:28.280 they didn't give themselves enough time to make that particular ship, 1:12:28.320 --> 1:12:30.559 so they had to deal with the deal with another one. Yeah. 1:12:30.680 --> 1:12:36.160 Yeah, so, uh so Dracula is like he never answers 1:12:36.200 --> 1:12:38.360 the question about whether he's gonna get lives, does he. He 1:12:38.479 --> 1:12:41.519 just gives him this withering look like no promises, kid. 1:12:41.680 --> 1:12:44.439 Yeah, we've already talked about this. We're not going through 1:12:44.439 --> 1:12:46.280 all this again. Yeah, you get what you get. You 1:12:46.280 --> 1:12:46.960 don't pitch a fit. 1:12:47.160 --> 1:12:51.320 We've got lives at home. So of course Dracula, you know, 1:12:51.360 --> 1:12:53.599 he eats the crew along the way. When they arrived. 1:12:53.640 --> 1:12:55.679 The only sailors left on the ship are dead. There's 1:12:55.720 --> 1:12:58.840 one tied to the wheel, which we only see in silhouette. 1:12:58.920 --> 1:13:02.599 But here we start to get Dwight Fry's deranged high 1:13:02.680 --> 1:13:06.120 energy performance, like they throw open the doors down into 1:13:06.120 --> 1:13:09.040 the hold and Dwight Fry is just standing there at 1:13:09.040 --> 1:13:14.240 the bottom of the stairs, laughing maniacally with this unbelievably 1:13:14.320 --> 1:13:16.040 devilish grin. It's so good. 1:13:16.520 --> 1:13:17.120 Oh yes. 1:13:17.520 --> 1:13:20.280 We also get a newspaper clipping here to sort of 1:13:20.280 --> 1:13:23.360 fill us in on what's going on. It tells us 1:13:23.720 --> 1:13:27.679 that the soul survivor is a raving maniac, says quote. 1:13:27.720 --> 1:13:31.040 His craving to devour ants, flies, and other small living 1:13:31.080 --> 1:13:35.320 things to obtain their blood puzzles scientists. At present, he 1:13:35.520 --> 1:13:39.880 is under observation in doctor Seward's sanitarium near London. Now 1:13:39.880 --> 1:13:41.680 Here we also get a scene that say, in a 1:13:41.680 --> 1:13:44.679 lot of versions of this story, the sort of first 1:13:44.800 --> 1:13:48.160 taste of the fish out of water horror scenario, and 1:13:48.200 --> 1:13:52.120 it's Dracula walking the streets of modern London. The old 1:13:52.240 --> 1:13:54.439 curse has been taken out of the old world and 1:13:54.560 --> 1:13:59.240 inserted into the modern world. So he menacingly approaches a 1:13:59.240 --> 1:14:02.120 girl selling fla on the street corner and then slowly 1:14:02.280 --> 1:14:06.120 envelops her with his arms to drink her blood. And 1:14:06.240 --> 1:14:08.120 I wanted to take a moment to talk here about 1:14:08.160 --> 1:14:11.680 the staging of how Dracula descends upon a victim in 1:14:11.720 --> 1:14:16.720 this movie, it almost looks sort of awkward. Usually, it's 1:14:16.760 --> 1:14:20.040 clearly a deliberate choice to make him move like this. 1:14:20.520 --> 1:14:25.719 It is a stiff, extremely slow movement into the victim's 1:14:25.760 --> 1:14:28.559 space and around them. He did the same thing when 1:14:28.600 --> 1:14:31.240 he descended on Dwight Fry's unconscious body. He'll do the 1:14:31.280 --> 1:14:34.080 same thing later when we see him leaning down toward 1:14:34.160 --> 1:14:39.960 Mina's bed. It's just this slow, stiff, rigid kind of approach. 1:14:40.439 --> 1:14:43.240 I don't know exactly why they made that choice or 1:14:43.280 --> 1:14:46.760 what it means, but it's interesting and different, and I 1:14:46.760 --> 1:14:48.080 don't know, it looks very weird. 1:14:48.439 --> 1:14:49.760 Yeah, it makes me think of some of the later 1:14:49.800 --> 1:14:53.160 scenes where we see him using his full power of 1:14:53.280 --> 1:14:56.679 enthrallment over victims. You know, he doesn't have to lunge, 1:14:56.800 --> 1:14:59.719 he doesn't have to move quickly because he's already snared 1:14:59.760 --> 1:15:00.519 you with his eyes. 1:15:01.080 --> 1:15:01.320 Yeah. 1:15:01.400 --> 1:15:05.920 Yeah, that's a good point. That's a good comparison. I 1:15:05.920 --> 1:15:08.759 don't know, I'll have to think more about that anyway. 1:15:08.880 --> 1:15:11.639 Dracula makes his way to an auditorium in the city 1:15:11.680 --> 1:15:15.080 center where a symphony performance is taking place. He eventually 1:15:15.080 --> 1:15:18.520 makes his way to the box bearing our main good characters. 1:15:19.280 --> 1:15:22.840 These are Mina Seward and Lucy Weston, two young women 1:15:22.960 --> 1:15:26.120 close friends since childhood who will become the targets of 1:15:26.120 --> 1:15:30.120 Count Dracula's blood hunt in London. Jonathan Harker again with 1:15:30.280 --> 1:15:35.599 big whys he here now energy Mina's fiance. He's Mina's fiance. 1:15:35.880 --> 1:15:39.640 There he is. There's doctor Seward, who runs the sanitarium 1:15:39.640 --> 1:15:43.040 where Rinfield has been committed, which also just happens to 1:15:43.040 --> 1:15:45.800 be right next door to Carfax Abbey, the estate that 1:15:45.880 --> 1:15:50.120 Dracula has leased. In this version of the story, doctor 1:15:50.240 --> 1:15:54.800 Seward is Mina's father in the novel, that's not the case. 1:15:54.880 --> 1:15:57.680 I think he is. He's younger, and I believe he 1:15:57.760 --> 1:16:00.760 is one of Lucy's mini suitors. That's the whole thing. 1:16:00.800 --> 1:16:02.800 In the novel, She's got like five different guys who 1:16:02.800 --> 1:16:03.760 are trying to marry her. 1:16:05.320 --> 1:16:12.760 Unnecessary love triangle removed. I'm in favor love Pentagon, Yeah, Pentagon. 1:16:13.720 --> 1:16:17.559 So Dracula uses a ploy to talk himself into the 1:16:17.720 --> 1:16:20.439 sort of opera box here to meet these characters. I 1:16:20.520 --> 1:16:23.240 think one thing I was a little unclear on is 1:16:23.280 --> 1:16:25.840 like why he's trying to meet them, And I think 1:16:25.880 --> 1:16:31.320 the issue is that he knows Renfield, his vampire Thrall, 1:16:31.720 --> 1:16:35.439 has been committed to the sanitarium the Doctor Seward runs, 1:16:35.600 --> 1:16:39.519 and so he's trying to to like influence them related 1:16:39.560 --> 1:16:41.080 to that, or maybe because they're neighbors. 1:16:41.120 --> 1:16:42.040 Now, maybe that's why. 1:16:42.120 --> 1:16:43.719 Yeah, their neighbors's neighborly. 1:16:43.840 --> 1:16:48.160 This is neighborly, that's exactly yes, So he introduces himself 1:16:48.160 --> 1:16:51.040 to the three younger Londoners. Doctor Seward takes a phone call, 1:16:52.200 --> 1:16:54.280 and you know, they bring up that he's moving into 1:16:54.280 --> 1:16:57.400 Carfax Abbey and Harker's like, oh, that's very old. Will 1:16:57.400 --> 1:17:01.040 it need repairs? And Dracula says, I shall do very 1:17:01.080 --> 1:17:02.280 little repairing. 1:17:02.880 --> 1:17:05.840 This is such a great everyone plays. The next time 1:17:05.880 --> 1:17:08.960 you move to a new town or new home, keep 1:17:09.000 --> 1:17:11.439 this one with you. When someone, when a neighbor like 1:17:11.520 --> 1:17:14.040 subtly brings up some sort of repair that might need 1:17:14.080 --> 1:17:16.960 to happen, be like, I shall do very little repair. 1:17:17.640 --> 1:17:21.400 Very good. Yeah. So, but he explains it's because he 1:17:21.560 --> 1:17:23.439 likes the way that the abbey reminds him of the 1:17:23.479 --> 1:17:27.040 old broken battlements of his castle in Transylvania. And then 1:17:27.160 --> 1:17:29.080 Lucy says, oh, you know, that reminds me of an 1:17:29.120 --> 1:17:31.240 old toast. I don't remember everything she says, but it 1:17:31.320 --> 1:17:34.280 ends with a line about dying, and then Dracula says, 1:17:34.360 --> 1:17:38.280 to die, to be really dead. That must be glorious. 1:17:39.439 --> 1:17:42.040 Oh that's so good. And there's more too. That's great 1:17:42.040 --> 1:17:45.960 because then Mina says, why Count Dracula, and that alone 1:17:46.000 --> 1:17:49.880 is excellent. I love that, Oh Dracula. But then then 1:17:49.920 --> 1:17:53.360 the Count says, they are far worse things awaiting men 1:17:53.479 --> 1:17:56.400 than death, and oh my god, this is another moment 1:17:56.400 --> 1:17:58.760 where I just love the ambiguity and the cryptic nature 1:17:58.800 --> 1:18:02.000 of it. Is he talking about is he talking about undeath? 1:18:02.560 --> 1:18:05.120 Or is it something else, like something so terrible that 1:18:05.160 --> 1:18:07.679 we morals haven't even conceived of it yet. It's only 1:18:07.800 --> 1:18:09.440 known to the vampires. 1:18:09.880 --> 1:18:14.479 Yes, that's right. So in this scene, Dracula somewhat charms them. 1:18:15.680 --> 1:18:18.920 I clearly he becomes fixated on Lucy, and in a 1:18:18.960 --> 1:18:21.200 later scene at home between Mina and Lucy, we see 1:18:21.200 --> 1:18:23.639 that Lucy's kind of fixated on him, like they're making 1:18:23.720 --> 1:18:26.479 jokes about his accent, but Lucy talks about how she's 1:18:26.520 --> 1:18:27.719 fascinated by the Count. 1:18:28.200 --> 1:18:30.919 Yeah, they're just both kind of hanging out crushing on Dracula. 1:18:30.960 --> 1:18:31.320 I love it. 1:18:31.400 --> 1:18:34.800 Yeah. But then later that night, in Lucy's bedroom while 1:18:34.840 --> 1:18:37.680 she sleeps, there's a bat floating out the window. You 1:18:37.720 --> 1:18:41.160 don't want that. And then he appears in Legosi form 1:18:41.200 --> 1:18:44.280 in her room, standing over her bed, and once again 1:18:44.479 --> 1:18:48.280 he slowly descends and we cut away right as he's 1:18:48.320 --> 1:18:52.519 over her. I guess here's a good part in the 1:18:52.840 --> 1:18:54.599 in the plot to kind of take a step back 1:18:55.000 --> 1:18:58.800 and acknowledge the plot falls A follows a similar structure 1:18:59.240 --> 1:19:02.479 to most Stracks adaptations, and we can kind of note 1:19:02.520 --> 1:19:05.320 some interesting things and differences. So at this point in 1:19:05.360 --> 1:19:08.680 the story, usually Lucy takes ill as a result of 1:19:08.720 --> 1:19:12.120 having her blood drained by the vampire each night. In 1:19:12.200 --> 1:19:15.120 the book, this illness and the mystery as to its 1:19:15.160 --> 1:19:18.760 cause are protracted, but in this movie we just We're 1:19:18.760 --> 1:19:21.160 going to cut straight to her death and the autopsy, 1:19:22.200 --> 1:19:24.920 and doctor Seward and colleagues note that there are two 1:19:25.000 --> 1:19:26.840 marks on her neck, the same as with the other 1:19:26.960 --> 1:19:29.479 victims in London that have been found drained of blood. 1:19:30.200 --> 1:19:33.839 So from here doctor Seward recruits the aid of his mentor, 1:19:33.960 --> 1:19:37.839 doctor Van Helsing, who deduces that they may be dealing 1:19:37.840 --> 1:19:41.000 not with an ordinary illness, but with a vampire. No 1:19:41.160 --> 1:19:45.800 s Feratu, and then Lucy dies. In this version, she 1:19:45.840 --> 1:19:49.679 dies quite quickly and the vampire turns his attention to Mina, 1:19:49.840 --> 1:19:53.320 whom he visits in the Night for blood, eventually starting 1:19:53.360 --> 1:19:56.320 to turn her into a vampire herself. And the heroes 1:19:56.320 --> 1:19:58.799 in the end have to solve the mystery and realize 1:19:58.840 --> 1:20:00.720 that the only way they can save Mina is to 1:20:00.840 --> 1:20:04.639 destroy the vampire, which they do. So things to discuss 1:20:04.720 --> 1:20:06.720 within the structure. As the movie goes on, we got 1:20:06.760 --> 1:20:09.559 scenes of Rinfield at the sanitarium raving about how he 1:20:09.600 --> 1:20:13.120 wants to eat spiders. He's trying to upgrade from flies, 1:20:13.160 --> 1:20:15.519 like he's been eating flies, but he decides they're not 1:20:15.560 --> 1:20:20.040 good enough now he wants spiders. Of course, we meet 1:20:20.080 --> 1:20:22.360 doctor van Helsing when we meet him here. I think 1:20:22.479 --> 1:20:25.880 he's like doing some chemistry experiments right after the death 1:20:25.880 --> 1:20:29.439 of Lucy, and he's like, yep, tests came back. Knows Faratu, 1:20:29.640 --> 1:20:32.000 that's what we're dealing with. So they I don't know. 1:20:32.040 --> 1:20:34.679 They cut over what, from my memory is a huge 1:20:34.720 --> 1:20:37.360 section in the middle of the book to get from 1:20:37.400 --> 1:20:40.720 like Lucy starts falling sick to they figure out that 1:20:40.760 --> 1:20:45.080 a vampire is involved. That's a couple minutes in this movie. 1:20:45.400 --> 1:20:48.320 Yeah, yeah, I mean it's a quick test. But yeah, 1:20:48.360 --> 1:20:50.839 the van Helsing here, I guess maybe it's the chemistry 1:20:50.880 --> 1:20:53.240 set in the glasses kind of helps give him a 1:20:53.320 --> 1:20:57.160 slight mad scientist air for me, and I guess, like 1:20:57.200 --> 1:21:00.640 the van Helsing that I'm mostly familiar with is Peter Cushings, 1:21:00.880 --> 1:21:03.599 and Peter Cushing's Van Helsing, of course, is very prim 1:21:03.680 --> 1:21:04.440 and proper. 1:21:04.680 --> 1:21:08.839 Very Yeah. Yeah, this guy's weirder than Peter Cushing definitely. 1:21:16.800 --> 1:21:20.400 So the mystery in this is not whether it's a vampire. 1:21:20.479 --> 1:21:22.320 I mean, I guess some of the other like Seward 1:21:22.360 --> 1:21:25.840 and Harker take some convincing, but Van Helsing gets there immediately. 1:21:26.760 --> 1:21:30.080 So the mystery is not like what is hurting Lucy, 1:21:30.200 --> 1:21:33.880 but it is who is the vampire? Renfield is the 1:21:33.920 --> 1:21:37.400 initial subject, and this is plausible because Renfield keeps escaping 1:21:37.439 --> 1:21:41.120 the sanitarium. The scene where Van Helsing first meets Renfield 1:21:41.160 --> 1:21:44.000 is great, like he asks Renfield asked to be sent 1:21:44.040 --> 1:21:47.599 away from the sanitarium? Why? He says, because my cries 1:21:47.640 --> 1:21:50.920 at night might disturb Mina. They might give her bad dreams, 1:21:51.520 --> 1:21:55.640 which is this great combination of sweet and threatening. You 1:21:55.640 --> 1:21:59.840 can't tell which one it is, but Van Helsing drives 1:22:00.160 --> 1:22:02.680 Field mad with a sprig of wolf Spain. He's like, you, 1:22:03.000 --> 1:22:05.880 I have some of this, and how about little wolf 1:22:05.920 --> 1:22:08.720 Spain Renfield, and Renfield says, you know too much to 1:22:08.800 --> 1:22:12.599 live van Helsing, and this, of course confirms Van Helsing's 1:22:12.640 --> 1:22:17.200 suspicions some vamping is going on. So Dracula attacks Mina 1:22:17.200 --> 1:22:20.599 in the night, and after this happens, there's a haunting 1:22:20.600 --> 1:22:24.240 scene where she explains her experience the next morning. I 1:22:24.320 --> 1:22:26.360 thought this is a good monologue. She says, I heard 1:22:26.400 --> 1:22:29.439 dogs howling, and when the dream came, it seemed the 1:22:29.479 --> 1:22:32.519 whole room was filled with mist. It was so thick. 1:22:32.680 --> 1:22:34.840 I could just see the lamp by the bed, a 1:22:34.920 --> 1:22:37.719 tiny spark in the fog. And then I saw two 1:22:37.800 --> 1:22:41.200 red eyes glaring at me, and a white, livid face 1:22:41.320 --> 1:22:44.600 came down out of the mist. It came closer and closer. 1:22:44.800 --> 1:22:47.799 I felt its breath on my face, and then its lips. 1:22:48.120 --> 1:22:48.880 Oh. 1:22:48.920 --> 1:22:51.600 And we compare this with what we saw from the 1:22:51.640 --> 1:22:54.599 scene before, where Dracula is descending over her bed. And 1:22:55.200 --> 1:22:59.759 it's funny because Dracula is often very composed and calm 1:22:59.800 --> 1:23:03.120 and movie but he as he's leaning right over her. 1:23:03.160 --> 1:23:06.479 He makes this grimace that I don't think we've seen 1:23:06.520 --> 1:23:07.280 anywhere else. 1:23:08.680 --> 1:23:10.720 Yeah, yeah, this is like, this is the scene where 1:23:10.760 --> 1:23:12.760 you would see the things. I feel like if we 1:23:12.760 --> 1:23:16.720 were going to see things. But yeah, it's horrifying and 1:23:16.760 --> 1:23:17.800 he's coming right at us. 1:23:18.040 --> 1:23:20.839 Yeah. Yeah. And this scene leads to doctor van Helsing 1:23:20.920 --> 1:23:23.760 doing a throat check on Mina. Like he takes her 1:23:23.800 --> 1:23:25.960 scarf off, and what do you know, She's got some 1:23:26.000 --> 1:23:29.120 punctures on the neck. She was hiding them behind a scarf. 1:23:29.320 --> 1:23:31.639 Something kind of interesting there. The movie doesn't really draw 1:23:31.680 --> 1:23:33.679 a lot of attention to it, but why was Mina 1:23:33.760 --> 1:23:39.040 hiding the wounds? Anyway, This scene is suddenly interrupted by 1:23:39.080 --> 1:23:43.160 a visit from Count Dracula. Mina kind of perks up 1:23:43.200 --> 1:23:45.720 on Dracula's arrival. I remember she didn't seem to like 1:23:45.800 --> 1:23:47.559 him that much when they first met, but now she's 1:23:47.640 --> 1:23:49.680 kind of eager to talk to him and smiles in 1:23:49.720 --> 1:23:53.479 his presence. Apparently Dracula has been telling Mina grim tales 1:23:53.479 --> 1:23:57.439 about his home country and she likes that. Another interesting 1:23:57.520 --> 1:23:59.439 choice in this scene. I don't recall if this is 1:23:59.439 --> 1:24:01.720 in the novel or not. I don't think so. But 1:24:01.880 --> 1:24:06.240 Dracula knows of Van Helsing. It's like, oh, yes, we're 1:24:06.240 --> 1:24:08.560 familiar with your work, even in Transylvania. 1:24:08.960 --> 1:24:11.880 Well, you know, Van Helsing probably publishes in the various 1:24:11.960 --> 1:24:17.400 occult journals, and you know, Dracula and his kind read up. 1:24:17.760 --> 1:24:21.680 They want to stay abreast of new findings in vampire sciences. 1:24:21.680 --> 1:24:24.000 Of course, yeah, you got to know your enemy, right, 1:24:24.080 --> 1:24:27.960 So read what van Helsing writes. Another great thing in 1:24:28.000 --> 1:24:30.599 the scene the mirror in the cigarette case. I love 1:24:30.720 --> 1:24:34.840 this part. So Van Helsing first notices that Dracula has 1:24:34.880 --> 1:24:37.639 no reflection in the mirrored lid of a cigarette case, 1:24:38.160 --> 1:24:40.719 and then he sets a trap for Dracula. Where before 1:24:40.880 --> 1:24:43.840 they're parting ways, he suddenly opens the case in front 1:24:43.880 --> 1:24:47.120 of him. And I love the way Legosi reacts to 1:24:47.200 --> 1:24:51.200 this trick. It's a you know, he reacts with surprise 1:24:51.280 --> 1:24:53.559 and alarm, and the slaps the case out of Van 1:24:53.600 --> 1:24:57.760 Helsing's hand onder the floor, steps back and glares at him. 1:24:57.960 --> 1:25:01.479 But then slowly the glare turns into a composed smile. 1:25:02.280 --> 1:25:04.320 Oh and also he turns into a wolf as he's 1:25:04.360 --> 1:25:09.040 running away across the lawn. So you know, as I said, 1:25:09.120 --> 1:25:13.000 Harker and Sewer takes some convincing by Van Helsing that 1:25:13.080 --> 1:25:17.320 they're definitely dealing with a vampire, but they're slowly getting there. 1:25:18.320 --> 1:25:20.479 This leads to another lore dump. We got a lore 1:25:20.560 --> 1:25:24.479 dump for Renfield earlier, but here's one from Van Helsing. 1:25:24.560 --> 1:25:26.679 It's like, you know, yeah, vampires have to drink blood 1:25:26.680 --> 1:25:29.639 to survive. They sleep in their native soil every day, 1:25:29.640 --> 1:25:31.720 which means he must have brought some soil with him 1:25:31.760 --> 1:25:35.320 from Transylvania. They're talking about this, but they get interrupted 1:25:35.320 --> 1:25:39.640 by maniacal laughter when Dwight Fry comes in again. Hilarious 1:25:39.920 --> 1:25:41.800 keeps escaping. He's here once more. 1:25:42.720 --> 1:25:46.080 They I guess they just have a trust policy, you know, yeah, 1:25:46.280 --> 1:25:49.160 the sanatorium, like stop leaving. You're not going to leave 1:25:49.200 --> 1:25:50.480 this time, right, Okay. 1:25:50.160 --> 1:25:54.400 I promise they're on the honor system. Yeah. But Renfield 1:25:54.760 --> 1:25:57.080 in this scene, this is the part I was talking about, 1:25:57.080 --> 1:25:59.240 where he does a face turn, like he explains to 1:25:59.280 --> 1:26:02.880 the heroes that Dracula is targeting Mina and he can't 1:26:02.960 --> 1:26:06.360 let Dracula take Mina. I guess maybe Renfield loves her 1:26:06.520 --> 1:26:08.479 or just feels protective of her in some way. 1:26:09.120 --> 1:26:09.680 I guess so. 1:26:10.240 --> 1:26:13.240 But in the scene, Dracula reappears in bat form and 1:26:13.320 --> 1:26:17.280 menaces Renfield, which makes him clam up and declare his 1:26:17.320 --> 1:26:21.120 loyalty wants more to the Master. And then suddenly everybody 1:26:21.120 --> 1:26:23.760 goes running because a maid calls out that Mina has 1:26:23.800 --> 1:26:28.200 been found dead. Oh no, which leads to this horrifying scene, 1:26:28.280 --> 1:26:32.280 another great Dwight Fry moment, where like the maid is 1:26:32.360 --> 1:26:34.679 left alone in the room with Dwight Fry and he's 1:26:35.120 --> 1:26:38.879 grinning maniacally and doing this horrible laughter, and she faints 1:26:39.000 --> 1:26:42.519 and then he's like crawling on the floor toward her body. 1:26:43.040 --> 1:26:46.040 Yeah, like he's an anaconda that is going to go 1:26:46.120 --> 1:26:48.759 to swallow her hole. It's super creepy. 1:26:48.880 --> 1:26:51.800 Love it. Yeah, But fortunately we find out that Mina 1:26:52.000 --> 1:26:54.200 is not dead, as she was near death, but they 1:26:54.200 --> 1:26:57.240 got there just in time. So some other stuff goes on. 1:26:57.280 --> 1:27:01.000 There's a side plot with Lucy being a vampire who's 1:27:01.040 --> 1:27:05.320 running around stealing children and stuff. But one thing that 1:27:05.560 --> 1:27:08.120 they do in this movie is there's no garlic for Mina. 1:27:08.200 --> 1:27:10.839 When they set a trap for Dracula and Mina's chambers 1:27:10.840 --> 1:27:13.120 with stuff to repel him. It's wolf Spain. It's just 1:27:13.160 --> 1:27:13.920 all wolf Spain. 1:27:14.560 --> 1:27:17.439 Yeah, I mean, I can understand people being a little 1:27:17.439 --> 1:27:20.840 bit too familiar with garlic. And why would this scare 1:27:20.840 --> 1:27:22.960 away of vampires. Maybe we go with wolf Spain because 1:27:22.960 --> 1:27:24.200 it has a little more mistique to it. 1:27:24.479 --> 1:27:27.280 Yeah, yeah, yeah, I can see that too. Now here's 1:27:27.280 --> 1:27:30.439 where we get to. There's another Renfield escape scene, of course, 1:27:30.439 --> 1:27:34.800 and then he is describing the appeal that Dracula made 1:27:34.800 --> 1:27:36.680 to him. He says, he came and stood below my 1:27:36.760 --> 1:27:39.400 window in the moonlight, and he promised me things, not 1:27:39.520 --> 1:27:42.360 in words, but by doing them. He's talking to Van Helsing. 1:27:42.760 --> 1:27:46.000 He says, by making them happen. A red mist spread 1:27:46.040 --> 1:27:48.439 over the lawn, coming on like a flame of fire. 1:27:48.840 --> 1:27:50.840 And then he parted it, and I could see that 1:27:50.880 --> 1:27:53.920 there were thousands of rats with their eyes blazing red 1:27:54.240 --> 1:27:57.120 like his, only smaller. Then he held up his hand 1:27:57.320 --> 1:27:59.439 and they all stopped, and I thought he seemed to 1:27:59.479 --> 1:28:03.800 be saying, rats, rats, rats, thousands, millions of them, all 1:28:03.880 --> 1:28:07.080 red blood, all these I will give you if you 1:28:07.160 --> 1:28:08.040 will obey me. 1:28:09.200 --> 1:28:09.439 Wow. 1:28:09.920 --> 1:28:13.040 I love that. That's the thing that Renfield. You know, 1:28:13.120 --> 1:28:15.160 some people when they make a deal with the devil, 1:28:15.200 --> 1:28:19.519 they want riches, somewhat, you know, power. He wants rats. 1:28:20.000 --> 1:28:22.880 Yeah. In that line, he promised me things, not in words, 1:28:22.920 --> 1:28:27.400 but by doing them, like oh, it's just perfect. 1:28:27.520 --> 1:28:30.240 But promised in return for what I think it's for. 1:28:30.640 --> 1:28:35.160 I believe Renfield sabotaged the protections that against Dracula that 1:28:35.200 --> 1:28:36.840 were in Mina's room, like he got rid of the 1:28:36.840 --> 1:28:39.679 wolf Spain or something. I don't know. Somehow Dracula got 1:28:39.680 --> 1:28:43.360 into Mina's room and I think Renfield was involved. And whoops, 1:28:43.400 --> 1:28:46.160 he has turned to Mina into a vampire now, and 1:28:46.200 --> 1:28:48.640 so this is going to accelerate us toward the conclusion. 1:28:48.680 --> 1:28:51.200 The only way to get Mina back is to destroy 1:28:51.240 --> 1:28:53.960 the vampire. Now, there's a scene where we have were 1:28:54.000 --> 1:28:56.960 like Harker is left alone with Mina here and she's 1:28:56.960 --> 1:28:59.720 creepy now right, Like she doesn't like the smell of 1:28:59.720 --> 1:29:03.720 wolf Spain. She's really interested in Harker's neck. She keeps 1:29:03.760 --> 1:29:07.160 staring at it. And Chandler is good in this, Like 1:29:07.200 --> 1:29:10.000 she puts on the creeps and she keeps him close. 1:29:10.720 --> 1:29:11.360 Absolutely. 1:29:11.640 --> 1:29:14.040 She's talking about like I love the fog. I love 1:29:14.200 --> 1:29:16.960 nights with the fog. And it's like you never you 1:29:17.000 --> 1:29:19.200 said in the past that you hated the night time 1:29:19.240 --> 1:29:21.200 in the fog, And she's like well, I like it now, 1:29:24.240 --> 1:29:26.840 But anyway, we're going on toward the conclusion. We know 1:29:26.880 --> 1:29:29.240 that we gotta have a final showdown where the heroes 1:29:29.320 --> 1:29:33.120 find Dracula's coffins and Carfax Abbey and drive the steak 1:29:33.200 --> 1:29:36.080 into him. Before that, one one great moment as we 1:29:36.160 --> 1:29:38.240 get the sort of the death of w Renfield, like 1:29:38.320 --> 1:29:42.880 Dracula is taking Mina back to his lair and he 1:29:43.000 --> 1:29:48.040 confronts w Renfield on this long, creepy staircase and Renfield says, no, 1:29:48.240 --> 1:29:50.559 please don't kill me, master, I can't die with all 1:29:50.600 --> 1:29:54.439 those lives on my conscience. And Dracula just I think, 1:29:54.520 --> 1:29:56.760 breaks his neck and throws him down the staircase and 1:29:56.760 --> 1:29:58.320 Renfield tumbles like a doll. 1:29:58.800 --> 1:30:01.240 Great saint, Great Saint again. Like this said, the set 1:30:01.320 --> 1:30:04.559 is amazing that there's real tension in minutes there. 1:30:05.000 --> 1:30:08.280 Yeah, yeah, it's wonderful. And then of course we get 1:30:08.280 --> 1:30:11.799 the final staking, the final staking of Dracula in his coffin, 1:30:12.640 --> 1:30:15.640 and Mina is rescued from from her demonic fate and 1:30:15.680 --> 1:30:18.479 reunited with John. So there is a happy ending. But 1:30:19.320 --> 1:30:23.160 like many adaptations of Dracula, I thought we would mention 1:30:23.240 --> 1:30:26.519 this the final staking of Dracula in his coffin has 1:30:26.560 --> 1:30:29.559 always felt a bit anti climactic. You know, in this case, 1:30:29.600 --> 1:30:32.320 it's not even done by the young hero who's to 1:30:32.320 --> 1:30:35.559 be reunited with his love. Is done by Van helsing Uh. 1:30:35.840 --> 1:30:38.759 And I don't know, it's like it happens off screen. 1:30:38.800 --> 1:30:41.200 You just hear Dracula yell and then you know it's 1:30:41.280 --> 1:30:43.280 kind of a hammering and a yelling and that's it. 1:30:44.160 --> 1:30:46.559 Yeah, it's kind of like what happens to the villain. Well, 1:30:46.600 --> 1:30:48.479 we hunted him down and killed him in his sleep, 1:30:48.840 --> 1:30:53.799 like it's you know, it's it doesn't feel as heroic. 1:30:54.280 --> 1:30:58.160 I still love it, but but you know, it makes 1:30:58.160 --> 1:31:00.080 you in a way. Maybe it's the thing that make 1:31:00.200 --> 1:31:03.519 people love Dracula so much though, because like a lot 1:31:03.520 --> 1:31:07.360 of these universal horror films, we identify with the monster 1:31:07.520 --> 1:31:10.600 so much, and subsequent generations identify with the monster, you know, 1:31:10.640 --> 1:31:14.800 the creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein's Monster, and Dracula, like, 1:31:14.880 --> 1:31:17.200 we feel a certain amount of sympathy for him at 1:31:17.200 --> 1:31:21.759 the end because he is this outsider character who cannot 1:31:21.800 --> 1:31:24.599 quite make a life for himself in this new place, 1:31:24.960 --> 1:31:29.599 and then he's hunted down and killed by the local inhabitants, Like, yes, 1:31:29.720 --> 1:31:33.080 they were eradicating because he's a bloodsucking demon, but still 1:31:33.720 --> 1:31:37.040 feel you feel for him in a way because he 1:31:37.160 --> 1:31:38.799 is killed in his sleep. 1:31:39.240 --> 1:31:41.719 I absolutely see what you're saying. And of course Bella 1:31:41.800 --> 1:31:45.439 Lagosi makes the character more interesting and fun and likable 1:31:46.040 --> 1:31:49.160 than he would be otherwise. I still think the universal 1:31:49.240 --> 1:31:52.920 Dracula in this movie is a less sympathetathetic character than 1:31:52.920 --> 1:31:55.400 the other monster. As you mentioned, he's less sympathetic than 1:31:55.400 --> 1:31:59.400 Frankenstein's creature certainly. I would also say less sympathetic than 1:31:59.400 --> 1:32:01.880 the creature from Black Lagoon who's just hanging out at home. 1:32:01.960 --> 1:32:04.800 People go to where he is and bother him. Yeah, uh, 1:32:05.120 --> 1:32:09.960 and certainly less sympathetic than some Dracula adaptations that would 1:32:09.960 --> 1:32:13.120 come later. That it make him a more explicitly like, tragic, 1:32:13.720 --> 1:32:17.519 wronged and romantic figure. I mean, in this movie, there's 1:32:17.560 --> 1:32:20.519 no mistaken he's the bad guy. Like he yes, he's 1:32:20.520 --> 1:32:22.840 going out of his way to hurt other people. 1:32:23.000 --> 1:32:25.280 And I think that's ultimately the way I like my 1:32:25.520 --> 1:32:27.879 I mean, I like some romantic Draculas, and Gary Oldman's 1:32:27.920 --> 1:32:32.080 Dracula is terrific. Yeah, and that in Coppola's version, and 1:32:32.120 --> 1:32:35.280 you know that plays up the tragic aspects of the character. 1:32:35.760 --> 1:32:38.479 But you know, I love it when when you have 1:32:38.560 --> 1:32:41.080 like a Christopher Lee Dracula or the bell Legosti Dracula 1:32:41.120 --> 1:32:44.120 that is that is more just absolutely evil, or even 1:32:44.160 --> 1:32:46.720 the Dracula in Blacula that we previously talked about in 1:32:46.760 --> 1:32:49.320 the show, where that is a really evil Dracula. 1:32:50.400 --> 1:32:53.320 Oh oh, you're talking about Dracula himself, not not the 1:32:53.479 --> 1:32:54.560 not Mama Walde. 1:32:54.680 --> 1:32:57.559 No, yeah, yeah, yeah, the racist Dracula from the film. 1:32:57.600 --> 1:33:01.120 Evil racist Dracula, who's like I I love drinking blood 1:33:01.160 --> 1:33:02.160 and I approve. 1:33:01.840 --> 1:33:03.879 Of the slave trade. Yes, that Dracula. 1:33:04.400 --> 1:33:06.519 But anyway, coming back to this thing about the anti 1:33:06.520 --> 1:33:09.360 climactic ending of staking the Dracula in his coffin, I 1:33:09.360 --> 1:33:12.639 feel like this is actually a change from the nineteen 1:33:12.680 --> 1:33:15.400 twenty two nos Feratu that was like a good a 1:33:15.439 --> 1:33:19.400 good change to you know, to invert the ending where 1:33:19.560 --> 1:33:23.400 instead of attacking the vampire in his sleep, you force 1:33:23.479 --> 1:33:25.640 him to stay out too late. That is more like 1:33:26.040 --> 1:33:30.040 the vampire is undone or is destroyed by being trapped 1:33:30.240 --> 1:33:32.320 by his own greed and violence. 1:33:32.920 --> 1:33:34.280 Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. 1:33:34.680 --> 1:33:36.879 Anyway, that's the universal Dracula. 1:33:37.520 --> 1:33:40.360 Love it absolutely. I mean, it's a classic. It's an 1:33:40.560 --> 1:33:42.920 icon for a reason. And if you haven't seen it, 1:33:42.960 --> 1:33:44.760 if you haven't seen it in a long time, it's 1:33:44.800 --> 1:33:47.920 well worth looking up. I mean, maybe save it for Halloween, 1:33:47.920 --> 1:33:50.160 but you know why deprive yourself. Go ahead and watch 1:33:50.160 --> 1:33:52.560 it now. All right, We're going to go ahead and 1:33:52.560 --> 1:33:56.320 close the book on nineteen thirty one's Dracula. Just a 1:33:56.320 --> 1:33:58.800 reminder that Stuffed to Bow Your Mind is primarily a 1:33:58.800 --> 1:34:02.800 science and culture podcast with core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. 1:34:02.920 --> 1:34:05.280 Dracula has come up in a number of them. He 1:34:05.320 --> 1:34:08.000 even came up in our episodes on Dust from last year. 1:34:08.240 --> 1:34:10.880 But for the most part, we don't talk about Dracula 1:34:10.960 --> 1:34:13.240 in every Stuff to Blow Your Mind episode, but he 1:34:13.280 --> 1:34:16.479 does come up generally, though. We set aside most serious 1:34:16.479 --> 1:34:19.800 concerns on Fridays when we have a Weird House Cinema 1:34:19.880 --> 1:34:22.000 episode and we just talk about a nice weird movie. 1:34:22.080 --> 1:34:24.280 If you want to keep up with the various weird movies. 1:34:24.280 --> 1:34:26.680 So we've discussed on Weird House Cinema. We have an 1:34:26.680 --> 1:34:30.320 account on a letterboxed that's Weird House. You can find 1:34:30.400 --> 1:34:31.559 us there, and we have a list of all the 1:34:31.600 --> 1:34:34.360 films that we've covered so far, and sometimes there's a 1:34:34.360 --> 1:34:35.920 peek ahead at what comes next. 1:34:36.360 --> 1:34:40.240 Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway. 1:34:40.680 --> 1:34:42.240 If you would like to get in touch with us 1:34:42.240 --> 1:34:44.599 with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest 1:34:44.680 --> 1:34:46.960 topic for the future, or just to say hello, you 1:34:47.000 --> 1:34:49.559 can email us at contact at stuff to Blow your 1:34:49.600 --> 1:34:57.080 Mind dot com. 1:34:57.240 --> 1:35:00.200 Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For 1:35:00.280 --> 1:35:04.080 more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, 1:35:04.160 --> 1:35:05.960 or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.