Dracula (1931):
“I am Dracula”–Bela Lugosi’s iconic introduction as the vampire Count Dracula
Browning’s Dracula initiated the modern horror genre. Today the picture stands as the first of Browning’s two sound era masterpieces, alongside with Freaks (1932), one of te scariest films I have ever seen.
The picture marked the beginning of Universal studio’s highly impressive production of vampire and monster movies during the 1930s.
Browning approached Universal’s Carl Laemmle Jr. in 1930 to ,ake a version of Bram Stoker’s 1897 gothic horror novel “Dracula,” previously adapted to film by director F. W. Murnau in 1922.
In order to avoid copyright infringement lawsuits, Universal based the film on Hamilton Deane’s and Louis Bromfield’s stage version of “Dracula” (1924), rather than Stoker’s novel.
Actor Lon Chaney, then completing his first sound film with director Jack Conway in a remake of Browning’s silent The Unholy Three (1925), was cast as Count Dracula.
Terminally ill from lung cancer, Chaney withdrew from the project, a significant personal and professional loss to long-time collaborator Browning; the actor died during the filming of Dracula.
Bela Lugosi
Hungarian expatriate and actor Bela Ferenc Deszo Blasco, appearing under the stage name Bela Lugosi, had successfully performed the role of Count Dracula in the American productions of the play for three years.
Browning’s attitude toward these undead poses a particularly intriguing problem. The vampires depend upon the infirm and innocent elements of society the Browning scorns. They sustain themselves through the blood of the weak…but they are vulnerable to those with the determination to resist them.
Browning was criticized by some for failing to provide adequate “montage or shot-reverse shots,” the “incoherence of the narrative” and his putative poor handling of the “implausible dialogue” reminiscent of “filmed theatre.”
Bronfen notes critic’s complaints that Browning failed to visually record the iconic vampiric catalog: puncture wounds on a victims necks, the imbibing of fresh blood, a stake penetrating the heart of Count Dracula. Moreover, no “transformation scenes” are visualized in which the undead or vampires morph into wolves or bats.
Film critics have attributed these “alleged faults” to Browning’s lack of enthusiasm for the project.
Helen Chandler, who plays Dracula’s mistress, Mina Seward, commented that Browning seemed disengaged during shooting, and left the direction to cinematographer Karl Freund.
Bronfen emphasizes the “financial constraints” imposed by Universal, strictly limiting authorization for special effects or complex technical shots, and favoring a static camera requiring Browning to “shoot in sequence” in order to improve efficiency.
The scholar Bronfen suggests that Browning’s own thematic concerns may have prompted him—in this, ‘the first talkie horror picture’—to privilege the spoken word over visual tricks.”:
Browning’s concern was always with the bizarre desires of those on the social and cultural margins. It is enough for him to render their fantasies as scenic fragments, which require neither a coherent, nor a sensational story line.”
The scenario follows Count Dracula to England where he preys upon members of the British upper-middle class, but is confronted by nemesis Professor Van Helsing, (Edward Van Sloan) who possesses sufficient will power and knowledge of vampirism to defeat Count Dracula.
The dramatic and sinister opening sequence in which the young solicitor Renfield (Dwight Frye) is conveyed in a coach to Count Dracula’s Transylvanian castle is one of the most praised of the picture. Ace cinematographer Karl Freund’s Expressionistic style is largely credited with its success.
Browning employs “favorite device” with an animal montage early in the film to establish a metaphoric equivalence between the emergence of the vampires from their crypts and the small parasitic vermin that infest the castle: spiders, wasps and rats.
Unlike Browning’s previous films, Dracula is not a “long series of [illusionist] tricks, performed and explained” but rather an application of cinematic effects “presenting vampirism as scientifically verified ‘reality’.”
Despite Universal executives editing out portions of Browning’s film, Dracula was enormously successful.
Opening at New York City’s Roxy Theatre, Dracula earned $50,000 in 48 hours, and it became Universal’s most lucrative film of the Depression Era. Five years after its initial release, it had grossed over $1 million worldwide.
