Bram Stoker's Dracula [Blu-ray] [Region B] [1993]

Awesome steelbook to an awesome movie

I have been a fan of this film for many years. It first prompted me to buy the accompanying book back in 1992. This book was actually the novel as Bram Stoker wrote it. Be careful; I notice Amazon are now selling an accompanying book with a very similar cover to mine but it is about the film rather than the novel. Once I started collecting DVD's, the standard version, which Amazon also offers, became one of the first to be added. I have recently upgraded to the 2 disc deluxe version. Comparing the 2 versions, the film is actually the same length on both, no additions or deletions. The deluxe version houses a brand new HD transfer of the original 1992 film. The picture quality seemed much the same on both versions on my HD TV screen. However, I felt the voice dialogue was slightly clearer on the deluxe version. Well everybody knows Dracula or at least thinks they do. In reality most film portrayals emphasize the gory bloodlust horror aspects of the character, excluding everything else. These stereo-types probably do for Dracula what "Jaws" did for the white shark. Bram Stoker intended his novel to be a Gothic Romance. Although Francis Coppola does not stick faithfully to the novel, his film is probably the closest so far. Coppola's Dracula, superbly portrayed by Gary Oldman, is definitely not human but at times displays some distinctly human qualities. He hopes and dreams, he laughs and cries. He can be afraid. Also, he is cultured and above all, he can love. The ruthlessly single-minded monster is still present; he deals with Jonathan, Lucy, Renfield and anybody else who gets in the way with the usual expected cold-bloodedness. However, when it comes to Mina, the possible reincarnation of his late wife, Dracula actually needs some persuading to grant her eternal life. He loves Mina too much to condemn her to a soulless existence and it is not until she willingly participates that he relents. A Dracula that can show compassion is something very different. This is what Coppola intended to add to the story. Furthermore, we are introduced to Vlad the Impaler, a Romanian prince who is said to be the real life Dracula. The film does take liberties with history; it is thought that Vlad's wife, whose name is unknown, threw herself to her death to evade capture by the advancing Turks, rather than because she thought her prince was dead. The storyline followed by the film, which I believe again to be Coppola's mark gives Dracula a motive. He is not being evil for the sake of it and this somehow helps to soften the character even further. Clearly at the beginning of the film Dracula is shown to be victorious in battle, but curiously when Van Helsing later confronts him in Seward's quarters he taunts him that his armies were defeated! It is known that Vlad fought the Turks more than once and spent some time in captivity. It is possible that he was brutally murdered. Is this an error in the script that was not spotted during final editing or a hint at the real history of the man? Usually a Dracula film is a straightforward fight between the Count and Van Helsing. Here all the characters are portrayed much as Bram Stoker intended. The Count is killed in this version by a combination of Jonathan and Mina and their lesser known companions rather than by Van Helsing himself. The film has been criticised for bad English accents particularly those of Winona Ryder and Keanu Reeves. I think fairly good editing has limited the problem. However, when Jonathan is telling Van Helsing about Carfax abbey, I couldn't help thinking "The rain in Spain falls mainly in the plain"! If you take advantage of the extras in the deluxe version the unseen deleted scenes are of great interest. Some lengthy dialogues which would have made the film follow the novel more closely but would have caused problems, have been cut and the overall film is better for it. It is really if you are interested in the extras that you would buy the deluxe version. The production interviews are more comprehensive than before. It is amazing to think that the special effects were not computer generated. The time and trouble taken with the photography and the stunning costumes made for a huge budget and probably mean that this film too is the last of its kind.

There have been countless cinema adaptations of the Dracula legend/story, with every once in a while a milestone. There was Murnau's NOSFERATU, there was Tod Browning's 1931 version with Bela Lugosi, there was the Hammer DRACULA with Christopher Lee, Werner Herzog's NOSFERATU, PHANTOM DER NACHT, and there is this brilliant version by Coppola. I saw it in the theater, then on DVD, now on BLU RAY. The first time, I walked out of the theater with mixed feelings. This movie was, indeed, visually overwhelming, almost `over-ornate', and therefore somewhat hard to digest in one viewing. Every time I watch it again, however, I realize this is a superior work of art (something I also experience with Kubrick films). Coppola's DRACULA on BLU RAY is a feast for the eyes and ears. Set decoration, costumes, unique `retro' special effects, make-up, it all shows to advantage. Sound and music are great. If you have it on DVD and you love it, then definitely buy it on BLU RAY. This is the final treat. Interesting extra's also. That's the sort of films high definition was made for. Can't wait to see Coppola's Vietnam epic on BLU RAY, one of my top 10 favorites (hopefully it'll include `HEARTS OF DARKNESS' as a bonus!).

Delivered on time and in perfect condition by the seller. The DVD played fine in my UK DVD player. Has bonus making of content and other bits such as trailers etc. The movie was great. Incredible acting particularly from Gary Oldman who headed an all star cast. A gothic horror with a different take on previous versions of Dracula. A cross between a tortured love story and a Halloween slasher. Highly recommended seller and movie is one not to miss.

Released in 1992, Francis Ford Coppola's blood-soaked adaptation of Bram Stoker's definitive vampire novel remains arguably the best screen version of the Dracula story to date. Essentially a gothic period drama laced with gore, sex and scares, 'Bram Stoker's Dracula' is surprisingly faithful to the source material and is brought to life by a superb cast in authentic looking period costume. Gary Oldman is excellent as the charismatic, but malevolent count (in numerous forms), while Anthony Hopkins delivers a great performance as the batty, but brilliant professor Van Helsing. The film is visually stunning and filled with striking imagery. The scene that starts with the vampire Lucy descending into the crypt while clutching a small child is one of the creepiest and most atmospheric sequences EVER committed to celluloid. The picture and sound quality of this 'Collector's Edition' Blu-ray is noticeably better than the DVD version. The disc also boasts a good selection of extras, including documentaries, featurettes and deleted scenes, making this an excellent edition of a modern horror classic that is highly recommended to all fans of the genre, but especially those with a fondness for Stoker's most famous creation.

Love this film. The beast vampire film I've ever seen. Great acting especially Cary Elwes who played Lucy's fiancée. Dark with a modern twist.

Brilliant movie, of course, but here I'm reviewing the blu-ray production. It's my first ever blu-ray; I'm a bit late to this business. As a photographer, I know what a full resolution 1080 high image looks like, and this is nowhere that near even though the packaging claims 1080 and the player also reports true 1080. I'm playing on a quality photograher's Eizo colour corrected (and sRGB accurate), IPS 1080 16:9 screen. I am comparing this to the superbit version of the DVD of this movie: a special version with less compression, so less compression artifacts, and better colour than a normal DVD (and usually less sharpening halos which is how a DVD compensates for the radical lack of resolution, and over-compression, on larger monitors). As an aside, from looking at DVD file sizes, multi DVD disk special editions are often super-bit even if they aren't advertised as such, but there was a time when at least one studio explicitly brought out labelled 'Superbit' versions of some films including this movie. Compared to the 'super-bit' DVD it's definitely superiour. Better resolution and loses the obvious sharpening halos that the super-bit version has. But it's not radically better. The lack of sharpening halos would seem to be because it isn't sharpened at all. You might think that's an advantage but a bit of sharpening, without the need to induce halos, makes a significant subjective increase in clarity and seeming resolution without significant downsides unless oversharpened. Sharpening is mandatory in photography as the last step before placing on a wepage even with a full resolution pic. Pot Player's sharpening, when switched on, is high quality, better than VLC, and hugely improves such old, almost foggy movies like Dawn of the Dead and Close Encounters of the Third Kind DVDs. So it's crazy that they haven't used any sharpening at all for this blu-ray since the overall impression is that it doesn't have all that much more resolution/clarity than the over-sharpened DVD even despite the technical quality being better. With the touch of sharpening it needs there wouldn't have been any sharpening halos anyway. Sure, it's visibly much better and it's nice to not have sharpening halos, but your expectations may be disappointed. Now this wouldn't be such a problem for me if I had a fast enough computer because VLC player does have sharpening if you switch it on, but unhappily for blu-ray playback my old Pentium R dual-core 2.1Ghz doesn't have enough power for VLC's slow decoder with choppy playback. Meanwhile, the infinitely superiour and fast decoding Pot Player, which sharpens DVDs just fine, isn't currently doing anything for the blu-ray; no effect whatsoever; switch it on, switch it off, no difference at all. I tried Windows Media player just to see, also no sharpening so it really does seem to be the source image data that isn't sharpened. In any case, this being one of my favourite movies and visually so rich, the blu-ray is certainly still justified. Perhaps if I had an enormous screen, the extra resolution despite the lack of sharpening, would make it a necessary purchase. But many less ardent viewers may be content to save a few pennies by getting the DVD instead.

Beautiful looking steelbook

Bien

Que dire… projecteur fullhd : il passe super bien 👍

Eigentlich ist es doch allen klar, worum es bei dieser Sache mit den Vampiren und ihren schönen, weiblichen Opfern wirklich geht, oder? Um Sex. Und darum, dass Sex irgendwie gefährlich ist, lebensgefährlich. Kein Wunder, dass der Mythos gerade im viktorianischen, neunzehnten Jahrhundert populär geworden ist. Damals sah man Sex durchaus als Gefahr. Für die Moral, die Gesundheit und die guten Werte in der Familie. Eigentlich ist das daher eine ganz einfache Geschichte, und damit die Moral stimmt, muss am Ende natürlich das Böse, also der Vampir, dran glauben. Dieser Film zeichnet sich vor allen anderen Verfilmungen dadurch aus, dass er es sich mit dieser Geschichte und der Moral nicht so einfach macht. Denn die Fronten sind nur zu Beginn klar. Deutlich sehen wir die Triebe am Wirken. Vor allem in der großartigen Szene in Draculas Schloss, in der sich die drei schönen weiblichen Vampire über den jungen, von Keanu Reeves wunderbar naiv und jungfräulich dargestellten Jonathan Harker hermachen und von Dracula nur mühsam gestoppt werden können (nur ganz nebenbei: Unter den drei schönen findet sich auch die junge, damals noch unbekannte Monica Bellucci). Auch die Szene der Verführung oder sogar Vergewaltigung von Lucy durch Dracula in der Gestalt einer Bestie macht klar, worum es hier geht. Wenn wir Menschen wirklich Sex wollen, sind wir nur schwer zu stoppen. Tief unter dem Herzen sind wir doch nur Tiere fern jeder bürgerlichen Moral. Und dennoch sehen wir nur wenig später in Film eine eindeutig in den bösen Dracula verliebte Mina Murray. Die ihren Verlobten, den schon erwähnten Jonathan, nicht mehr wirklich als reizvoll empfindet. Ist auch dass wieder nur das Wirken der Triebe? Spannend wird es, als dieser böse Dracula plötzlich völlig anders mit seiner Mina umgeht, als dies vorher mit seinen Opfern der Fall war. Will er sie beißen, also auf Deutsch auch Sex mit ihr haben? Natürlich auch das. Aber der Witz ist, dass wir uns hier durch die erotischen Verwicklungen nicht die Sicht auf die eigentliche Geschichte verstellen lassen sollten. Eine Liebesgeschichte wird hier von Winona Ryder als Mina und Gary Oldmann als Dracula großartig dargestellt. Eine Form der Liebe, die von der Gesellschaft natürlich nicht akzeptiert werden darf und kann. Ein moralischer Tabubruch. Und damit wären wir dann im zwanzigsten Jahrhundert angekommen. Man darf sich nichts vormachen. Liebe ohne Glück im Bett, das geht einfach nicht, und so ist dieser Jonathan Harker einfach zu langweilig. Verlobung hin, Verlobung her. Das ganze Szenario wird dann noch komplettiert durch den Auftritt von Anthony Hopkins als von Helsing, der Dracula wohl nur deshalb besiegen kann, weil er ebenfalls dieser Sache mit Lust und Erotik alles andere als fremd gegenüber steht. Als er Mina das erste Mal begegnet, scheint er mit ihr nicht viel anderes vorzuhaben, als Dracula selbst. Und bei der Jagd auf den Vampir handelt er nicht immer nur überlegt, er lebt seine Gefühle und Instinkte aus. Eine großartige Leistung des Schauspielers, der hier auch für viele komische Elemente im Film verantwortlich ist. Ist das nun wirklich eine werkgetreue Verfilmung des erfolgreichen Romans von Bram Stoker aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert? Natürlich nicht. Der Roman ist ein Briefroman, in dem die verschiedenen Beteiligten jeweils ihre Perspektive auf die geheimnisvollen, oft unverständlichen Ereignisse darstellen. Diese subjektive Sicht nimmt der Film praktisch nie ein. Und auch die Entwicklung des Charakters von Dracula im Verlauf des Films, seine echte Liebe zu Mina, finde ich um Buch nicht vergleichbar dargestellt. Mag diese Verfilmung auch näher an dem Roman sein als die berühmten Trashfilme mit Christopher Lee aus den 50er und 60er Jahren, es bleibt ein eigenständiges Kunstwerk, was wir hier zu sehen bekommen, das weit über den ursprünglichen Roman hinausgeht. Und das ist natürlich auch gut so, denn zum Glück sind wir heute weiter als die Menschen des viktorianischen Zeitalters. Fassen wir zusammen: Der Film hat eine intelligente Story, Spannung, Sex, Liebe, gute Schauspieler, schöne Frauen und viel Witz. Was will man noch mehr?

Excellent

My favorite Dracula film, wonderful cast, music, & story. I actually own this DVD already, with the slipcover, but the slipcover was bent, falling apart, so I bought this new version. I have it on 4K too, not sure if it has the special features like the DVD though, either way I have both. If you love Dracula, this is my personal favorite, and I’m sure a lot of other people feel the same way. A must own!