As we come to the end of the first 50 films, we end with five titles where their reputation far exceeds my personal opinion of them. #51 will start another run with titles from the very top of my personal list and that will complete the Top 100. 1931’s Dracula has the iconic performance by Bela Lugosi, that set the template for how the Count should look and sound for decades to come. Everything moves too slowly, but it oozes with spooky, gothic atmosphere.
The images and iconic moments are lingered on. There’s the feeling Tod Browning is showing you something unholy, with long shots staring right into the face of Bela Lugosi or images of spiders, bats, wolves, fog and large empty castles that are the DNA of Horror. Too stagy to work on its own terms, with not enough of the Count and too much of the people trying to figure out this mysterious foreigner. Coppola’s hyper, blood-soaked version is the polar opposite of this, but it’s my preferred version and I look forward to writing about it in a couple of months.
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