Critics reviews

It commits one of the worst sins of movies: most of it is shockingly un-cinematic... The director, the talented Tod Browning, reportedly didn't have his heart in it, leaving his DP to take over for much of the shoot. So, despite some strong, atmospheric art direction near the beginning, the result is largely a lot of silly characters standing around saying silly things.

No weak links per se (even the bats don't look too plastic) but the creaky rhythm eventually wears it down, even at this length, and Browning isn't really ideal for the job: his trademark (and strength) has always been sympathy for freaks and outcasts, most of them played by Lon Chaney - but Dracula doesn't get or require sympathy, he operates as threat (and sexual transgression), which is probably why the more vulnerable Renfield emerges as the film's major triumph.

Rewatching this iconic, wonderfully musty version of the Bram Stoker story, I am reminded that this is the earliest talkie that most moviegoers have any familiarity with (save some early Marx Brothers, perhaps). Dracula is striking not only for the sensuous movements of its charismatic Hungarian lead actor but also for its elegantly primitive cinematic qualities.

The product of a deep collaboration with Karl Freund, perhaps the greatest cinematographer ever to live, DRACULA is a beautiful and disturbing film, one of the great financial successes in Universal's history, and a high-point in any consideration of the genre. The film's oneiric pacing and logic defy summary: nothing makes any sense at all, and yet feels so utterly and terrifyingly inevitable.