Nosferatu -- 1979 -- PG

Despite what the critics may think of this remake of the 1922 classic, to call this film an adaptation of Dracula is an insult to Mr. Stoker's work. I have sort of a two fold review to go into here: one is a criticism on how much of Dracula was actually used; the second is how the film plays by itself.

When it comes to an adapatation (which this most surely is due to the use of names and rough characters), this barely uses the story. It spends a huge amount of time getting to the castle -- an even that in the novel happens almost immediately. Mina is no longer Jonathan Harker's fiancee/wife, but not its Lucy. Renfield goes from Harker's boss to the madman (I've noticed several adaptations dropping characters and swapping roles all over the place). No one except Harker is turned into a Vampire. Van Helsing is a sniveling weenie, and no where close to the authority he was in the novel. The black plague doesn't even exist in the novel; or at least not as overtly as it is here. Lucy does most of the final footwork. What remains is Dracula as a vampire, and Jonathan going to his crib to sign a contract for a house in London. Beyond that are pieces of the original plot, but none of the compelling story that Bram Stoker laid down.

As for this film as a presentation, it was boring. Just like that. The pacing was non-existant. A lot of time was devoted to scenery rather than plot or character. Jonathan Harker supposely rode a horse from London to Eastern Romania. I'm sorry, but my geography tells me that a trip like tht on a single horse is highly improbable, not to mention would give his saddle sores beyond reckoning. He later says the trip took 4 weeks. No wonder his horse was tired.

He decides to walk up the mountain and instead of taking the road, he goes cross country, until the coach that refused to take him before just shows up to take him that last few yards to Dracula's California vacation ho-...er...castle, yeah, that's it. That's what it looked like. A castle. Sure.

Now, what did this trip look like on film? I think we spent a good five to ten minutes watching Jonathan travel. He rode his horse for a while, stopped off in the town to get some exposition...er...rations, and then we spend more time watching him walk. He walks down the road, past a river, across some rocks...it was ready for this part to end. Unfortunately, most of the film consisted of long, long, long scenes just like this where we stare at veritably nothing for long periods of time.

Much of the film was silent, likely due to it bein an adaptation, and since I haven't seen the 1922 version (that's what I was hoping to get when I snagged this one), I'm not sure whether this is intentional to copy the earlier version or, he just didn't want to double up too many scenes (since he shot it in English AND German). Whatever it was, it didn't work. Very little of this film was explained, and a lot of stuff happened that I only (barely) followed because I've read Dracula. Without that knowledge, I would be completely lost in this movie.

Jonathan was originally the hero of this story, but after he was bitten, he took a secondary role shifting the lead role to Lucy, of all people. She decided she needed to destroy the black coffins, and so she entered Dracula's house, and sprinkled what I can only presume is a communion wafer on the dirt in ONE coffin, and then left (again, using my prior knowledge of the Dracula novel which didn't actually do this -- they set the house on fire). She runs into this big celebration of people who feel they're going to die anyway, so they're making the most of their time. I was lost in this whole scene until one of them explained it.

As for the star of the Dracula novel, Dr. Abraham Van Helsing...well, he was a wuss. He whined and complained about doing things scientifically, tried to debunk everything Lucy had seen with Dracula, and generally wandered around doing nothing until he staked Dracula in a useless denouement scene before he's arrested. He was no where near the confident powerhouse he is in the novel or in most adaptations.

The climax made a little bit of sense, and it was mostly setup in prior expositional scenes. It wasn't a satifying conclusion by any stretch of the imagination, and played off as kind of dumb. Then, we don't even get satisfaction from Jonathan being restored. No, he remains a vampire, and rides off into the distance across a desert (?!), which the camera fixates on for a good minute or two after he disappears in the distance.

Bottom line, whatever his was supposed to be, it didn't make it. Whatever the critics loved about it, I didn't see it. To me, this was a film that tried to capitalize on a previous film's success. It failed in pacing, in plot, and in character. If this is, as the DVD case suggests, "the definitive version of the Dracula legend as will as one of the most extraordinarily haunting films ever made," then making an extraordinary film must be quite an easy mark to hit, and Bram Stoker is rolling in his grave.