Dracula (1979) - directed by John Badham

Jonathan Harker is a drip. Kate Nelligan's Lucy Seward(whose character has been effectively swapped with that of Mina from the novel) thinks she can do better than the tedious little men in her seaside town - all of whom seem content to go around mansplaining. Her father is Dr Seward (a glorious Donald Pleasance - the anti-Loomis) who lords over one of those Edwardian asylums where treatment impact appears spotty at best. As we bathe in John Badham's (Saturday Night Fever) smooth, assured gothic canvas - in his desaturated revised version  - as grey as the grave and as pallid as, well, a vampire. 

So Lucy's life is dull - enter Count Dracula (Frank Langella). Langella, hot off his acclaimed 1977 stage performance as the Count, leans into Dracula as lover - capable of both loneliness and passion. He is, despite being a blood-drinking killer, at times, more sympathetic than those pursuing him. And in the vivacious Lucy - he finds a willfull match - a partner of spirit. To Lucy he is an escape - you get the sense when it comes to her his hypnosis is largely unneeded.




Their relationship culminates in a hot splash of colour - an impressionistic love scene gorgeous and seemingly designed to make Ken Russell jealous. Gilbert Taylor's (Star Wars, Dr Strangelove, A Hard Day's Night) composition  makes it one more example of the film's breathtaking romantic vision.



Towering and sweeping throughout, John Williams' lush, and at times, playful, score gives the proceedings an added heft that makes them appear even more larger than life.  

W.D. Richter(Buckaroo Banzai, Big Trouble in Little China) effectively condenses and adapts both Bram Stoker's classic and the 1924 stage adaptation by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston. His script's smartest and most concise move is begin with the wreck of the Demeter, the ship carrying Dracula to England, where the entire rest of the film is set. By eliminating Transylvania and setting everything in the seaside town of Whitby (a location that inspired Stoker in real-life), Richter effectively puts all the major players closer together, which, in turn, turns up the heat, leading to a stunning conclusion.

Add Sir Laurence Olivier's performance as a grave and determined Professor Van Helsing, John Badham's "Dracula" is a visual feast that cannot be missed.