Dracula 2000

I was expecting “Dracula 2000” to be a giant disaster of a film, but was pleasantly surprised by it. This film doesn’t have the ambition of, say, “Bram Stoker’s Dracula,” but it still takes the genre seriously and does right by it.

In many ways, the movie is extremely faithful to the original book, just presupposing that Dracula wasn’t able to be killed at the end of Stoker’s story, and was just sealed away instead, waiting for some idiot to free him from his imprisonment …

I don’t want to say more, but vampire fans will find a lot to like in this. There’s some nastiness with leeches that is even cooler when explained, nice dream sequences, excellent stuff with Dracula’s three new “brides,” solid acting by all involved (although no one in the cast is going to be up for an Oscar, they act to the best of their ability, and Vitamin C is surprisingly good — those interested in seeing the film for her might want to know that she’s the star of the film’s brief nude scene) and some good stunts and action sequences. There’s also a nifty Biblical origin given for vampires that I quite liked.

There’s one or two goofy bits — are we expected to believe streets in New Orleans’ French Quarter are EVER totally empty during Mardi Gras, any time of the day or night? — but overall, it was a nice lightweight vampire flick. Nothing brilliant, but not maddening in its stupidity like “John Carpenter’s Vampires.”

I’d rate it better than “John Carpenter’s Vampires,” but below just below “Fright Night” and a littler further below “Lost Boys” and “From Dusk Til Dawn” in terms of lightweight vampire flicks. A solid rental choice.

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