Like Lucio Fulci in the last decade of his career, Dario Argento is a talent in free fall, a formerly respected filmmaker who has acquired a brown thumb - everything he touches becomes a coiled and steaming mess. Each offering from the Italian maestro poses the same question: how bad will this one be?
This first hint that Dracula 3D might be Dario's cheapest-looking, silliest movie to date comes from Giovanni Paolucci's credit as prouducer. If you're unfamiliar with Paolucci, he also produced (and co-wrote) Bruno Mattei's Zombies: The Beginning (2007), the crummiest, funniest, most inexpensive zombie flick this side of House of the Dead.
Crummy is a pretty fair description of this umpteenth rehashing of Stoker's tale.
Funny we'll have to think about.
Dario's been to the well of literary adaptations before, of course, and none too successfully. His Phantom of the Opera (also starring his daughter Asia) was so listless it made you want to lean on the fast-forward button, but his take on The Black Cat (from Two Evil Eyes) had something going for it, if only because it was slightly better than George Romero's Facts In The Case Of M Valdemar. Shot by Tenebrae's Luciano Tovoli, scored by Claudio Simonetti and starring Thomas Kretschmann in the title role, Dracula 3D should have plenty in its favour but the level of tedium means they all come to nought. Even the more baffling moments (such as an attack by a giant grasshopper) can't match Mother Of Tears for unintentional laughs.
For all the talent on board, the opening setpiece of a quick-to-disrobe Nineteenth Century village girl (who you wouldn't expect to have silicone enhancements, but still) being slain looks no different from Do You Like Hitchcock?, Dario's film for Italian television, or any cheesy DTV production from the last five years. There's a lot of DTV-level CGI here, plenty of unconvincing wall-crawling bloodsuckers and other creatures, which together with some blah performances and staging suggests a quickie that lucked out with a theatrical release. Dario hasn't done us too many favours of late, but if you want to see him hit rock bottom, help yourself.
On the other hand, he's made a movie that exists for no reason other than to make Dracula 3000 look good. Coolio is appreciative, we're sure.
Full movie on FFilms
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