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Synopsis

This is the first screen version of Bram Stoker’s famous tale based on the smash hit stage production. Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi) arrives in London and immediately works to enrapture and transform into vampires young Lucy Weston (Frances Dade) and her friend Mina Seward (Helen Chandler). After he succeeds in turning Lucy, and Mina’s health suddenly deteriorates, Mina’s father (Herbert Bunston), calls in a specialist, Professor Abraham Van Helsing (Edward Van Sloan). Van Helsing quickly recognizes Dracula’s vampirism, and sets about saving Mina (and in the process, becomes Dracula’s archenemy). The film, arguably the most influential of the legend’s film versions, launched Lugosi’s career in horror movies and forever invited vampires across Hollywood’s threshold, spawning many sequels and variations.

Director

Original

Tod Browning

Tod Browning (12 July 1880 – 6 October 1962) was an American motion picture actor, director and screenwriter.

Browning’s career spanned the silent and talkie eras. Best-known as the director of Dracula (1931 in film), the cult classic Freaks (1932 in film), and classic silent film collaborations with Lon Chaney, Sr., Browning directed many movies in a wide range of genres.

He was born Charles Albert Browning, Jr., in Louisville, Kentucky, the second son of Charles Albert and Lydia Browning, and the nephew of baseball star Pete Browning. As a young boy, he put on amateur plays in his backyard. He was fascinated by the circus and carnival life, and at the age of 16 he ran away from his well-to-do family to become a performer.

Changing his name to “Tod”, he traveled extensively with sideshows, carnivals, and circuses. His jobs included working as a talker (barker, as the term is also known, isn’t correct) for the Wild Man of Borneo, performing a live… read more

Original

Karl Freund

Karl W. Freund, A.S.C. (January 16, 1890-May 3, 1969) was an Oscar-winning German cinematographer and film director.

Born in Königinhof, Bohemia, his career began in 1905 when, at age 15, he got a job as an assistant projectionist for a film company in Berlin.

He worked as a cinematographer on over 100 films, including the German Expressionist films The Golem (1920), The Last Laugh (1924) and Metropolis (1927). Freund emigrated to the United States in 1929 where he continued to shoot well-remembered films such as Dracula (1931) and Key Largo (1948). He won an Academy Award for Best Cinematography for The Good Earth (1937). In 1937, he went to Germany to bring his only daughter, Gerda Maria Freund, back to the United States, saving her from almost certain death in the concentration camps. Karl’s ex-wife, Susette Freund, remained in Germany where she was interned at the Ravensbrück and eventually taken in March, 1942… read more

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atpgaga

26May12

Anyone see Phillip Glass conducting the score? Amazing

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AKFilmFan

19Feb12

While it typcasted poor Legosi his entire life, this iconic breakout role of his borrows many elements from Nosferatu and is one of the best vampire films in history.

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Gonzalo Caride

3Dec11

As much as I love Tod Browning's work, I must say this movie disappointed me. I've been looking forward to watch this film for a very long time, but maybe that was my mistake. Everything what I love about Freaks, was not in this movie. The performances where way too old school, it looked all the time like a theatre piece, almost no camera movements... And of course Lugosi helps, but... Such a disappointment.

Andreea Veronica and eye like this

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Black Irish

17Sep11

Perhaps not as 'accomplished' as Vampyr; but like it, it's strength is reliance on it's being a chamber drama-horror hybrid. Along with the players, the film exhibits paralysis of movement & action. Confined to limited settings and heightening the character's inability to contend with the events. Causing them to 'react' rather than 'act', with a seriousness as though it'd been subtitled 'Mina Gets a Headcold.'

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Reviews

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Universal Dracula Similar to Other Original Universal Monster Movies

By Byron Brubake​r on November 9, 2010

From the special features on the Legacy Collection set I learned that because of budget constraints this was based more on the Broadway play in which Bela Lugosi had starred than a lavish and long…  read review

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By Jonuk Who on September 26, 2009

I am happy to say this is one of my all time favorites, and one of a handful of jewels in universal studios golden age of monster films. To me this stagy, corny, mostly silent early horror work is…  read review

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