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When Universal Pictures picked up the movie rights to a Broadway adaptation of Dracula, they felt secure in handing the property over to the sinister team of actor Lon Chaney and director Tod Browning. But Chaney died of cancer, and Universal hired the Hungarian who had scored a success in the stage play: Béla Lugosi. The resulting film launched both Lugosi's baroque career and the horror-movie cycle of the 1930s. It gets off to an atmospheric start, as we meet Count Dracula in his shadowy castle in Transylvania, superbly captured by the great cinematographer Karl Freund. Eventually Dracula and his blood-sucking devotee (Dwight Frye, in one of the cinema's truly mad performances) meet their match in a vampire-hunter called Van Helsing (Edward Van Sloan). If the later sections of the film are undeniably stage bound and a tad creaky, Dracula nevertheless casts a spell, thanks to Lugosi's creepily lugubrious manner and the eerie silences of Browning's directing style. (After a mood-enhancing snippet of Swan Lake under the opening titles, there is no music in the film.) Frankenstein, which was released a few months later, confirmed the horror craze, and Universal has been making money (and countless spin-off projects) from its twin titans of terror ever since. Certainly the role left a lasting impression on the increasingly addled and drug-addicted Lugosi, who was never quite able to distance himself from the part that made him a star. He was buried, at his request, in his black vampire cape.-- Robert Horton

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Cast: Edward Van Sloan, Dwight Frye, Béla Lugosi, David Manners, Helen Chandler
Director: Tod Browning
Genre: Horror
Release Date: February 12, 1931
MPAA Rating: Unrated
Screen Writer: Garrett Fort
DVD Release Date: 1999, 2004, 2006
Runtime: 75 minutes
Studio: Universal Studios

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18 Ratings: +3.7

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More Dracula (1931 film) reviews

Quick Tip by Count_Orlok_22. September 30, 2009

posted in The Vampire Historians

A Quick Tip by Count_Orlok_22

Still, the greatest film Dracula (at least of all the films bearing that name). Bela Lugosi and Tod Browning's greatest masterpiece!!! ):-=

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review by MichaelN. May 13, 2009

posted in The Vampire Historians

Timeless!

Don't look for special effects in this film. The eerieness is created by the black and white and actor facial expressions, especially at the beginning at Dracula's castle. Excellent performances by Bela Lugosi and Dwight Frye. The same actor who played Dr. Waldman in Frankenstein, plays Van Helsing. The main confrontation between Van Helsing and Dracula is not as spectacular as some of the later versions of the film though. The ultimate destruction of Dracula is done off-screen and loses dramatic … more

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review by MichaelN. November 14, 2003

posted in Movie Hype

Worth Seeing

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see all Dracula (1931 film) reviews (4)

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