Wes Craven präsentiert Dracula

Gerad butler as Dracula was a surprise for me after not seeing this movie in years I completely forgot about how good it is, yes a certain "actor" might not have aged well (coughs) Danny Masterson But the rest if this movies great the camera qualitys pretty dope after all these years also.

An interesting take on Dracula--You might get a kick out of the end when you find out Dracula's true origin.

It struck me as two movies in one. There was a very passionate vampire story going on, covered up by a high-tech monster movie (think Bram Stoker's Dracula coated with a layer of Underworld or League of Extraordinary Gentlemen).

Considering the double tone of this film, I'm not surprised to see Christopher Plummer co-starring along some very fresh-faced young actors. Any fellow Canadians will notice a few Canucks besides Plummer in this one.

Because of the inconsistent flow of the movie, some silliness, and the disappointing death of one of the main characters, I gave this film a 6/10.

So...the title is a bit dodgy. "Dracula 2000". Ick. Nevertheless, I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the film. To begin with, an interesting cast. Christopher Plummer has, previously, suffered from what I call "Michael Caine" syndrome; making any film that will write him a cheque, Johnny Lee Miller was amusing in "Trainspotting" and, let's not kid each other, there is no mystery as to why Jennifer Esposito and Jeri Ryan were cast. Round it out with some second and third tier young "Actors du jour" and you probably haven't spent too much money.

Now...the most irritating aspect of the film is the almost surreal amount of flagrant Virgin Records placement. Seriously....Mary works in one of the stores which means we get prominent t-shirt coverage....not to mention the gawdy neon sign, the truck in the garage etc.....however, Dracula needs virgins, right?

By far the most interesting part of this film was the story behind the creation of Dracula. Taking the myth back to the time of the crucifixion, with Judas Iscariot suffering some fairly serious guilt issues leading to his suicide and eventual "re-birth"....good angle: it helped to explain the vampires aversion to all things holy and dislike of silver (as in 30 pieces of...). Still don't get the mirror-phobia but hey....

Someone on the creative team of this film has a sweet little visual gag in store. Check out the scene in the Laffayette Cemetery...there is a crypt bearing the name "Spencer Hepburn". Nice one.

The ending is a little rushed and it seems that Miller might have left the set early that day, since he apparently vanishes. It also leaves blatant amounts of room for a sequel, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

That I even considered seeing this film was primarily due to Wes Craven's participation. However, I found it to be an imaginative and fairly tasteful modernisation of one of the all-time cinematic horror legends.

I saw this on cable the other night. C'mon give the movie a break, it wasn't that bad. This is not Shakespeare; it's a Vampire movie, for Pete's sake. It's not after the Oscar, its entertainment. Sometimes a lot of the User commentators lose sight of what some movies are about.

An example of this is a review of Santa Clause 2, where one guy wrote `The North Pole was a very distracting, annoying place to be. It seemed so far from reality'. Well I don't want to spoil his Xmas but Santa isn't reality. It was a MOVIE!

Dracula 2000 was a lot better than the old Hammer movies or in fact a lot better than a lot of other Vampire moves. If you could ever do an original story on Vampires, this was close. I mean, what is in a Vampire script. Spooky guy/girl gets out of coffin, kills people (usually girls with great bodies) another guy/girl tries to kill them before they kill again. Oh and I forgot the part about the heroine is a reincarnation of the Vamps long lost love. (See Blacula, Fright Night, Dracula 1992 etc etc)

Dracula 2000 was more original. At least he had a real reason for wanting the Heroine (his blood, her blood) and his origin was an interesting concept, better than Coppola's, which I still find confusing. This was never going to be An Interview with a Vampire, but it was a hell of a lot better than Queen of the Damned. If you like Vampire movies this should be on your viewing list.

I've got to admit that it was a lot less awful than I expected. Still not very good though, but I've seen greater disasters under the `Wes Craven Presents'-label…70 years after Bela Lugosi made him immortal, new blood is running through the veins of the horror icon Dracula (which is a pretty ironic statement to itself…). The year is 2000 and the location is Great Britain. Abraham Van Helsing kept himself alive somehow and he still stands guard over the coffin that holds the remainders of Dracula. The vacuum-closed coffin gets stolen and – surprise surprise – Dracula escapes….with a mission, because he's after Van Helsing's daughter in America. Since Abraham used Dracula's blood to keep alive, the exact same powers are to find in her. All of a sudden, this version comes up with a whole new historical background for Dracula…He's portrayed like a real ladies-man and director Lussier even suggests that his wrath against humanity goes all the way back to the Biblical beginning…I'm not quite sure what to think of this whole character-twist. It gives a slight bit of originality and ingeniousness to the franchise, but it's also illogical, extremely far-fetched and it might even be considered as being a little offensive. My biggest fear regarding this film, however, was that it would be a boisterous and computerized update of the legendary myth. I'm glad to say that the visuals in Dracula 2000 are well used and not too exaggerated. Some good old-fashioned gore as well with a couple of nice decapitations and slaughtering. The script is rather weak and contains silly humorist-lines such as: ` Never ever mess with an antique dealer'…and a lot of variants on the `vampires suck'-joke! Gerard Butler is pretty weak as the bloodsucking vampire and he hasn't exactly got the charisma and appearance to play him…Of course, he can't be blamed for that entirely as it's as good as impossible to follow into the footsteps of brilliant actors like Bela Lugosi, Christopher Lee or Gary Oldman who gave image to Dracula before him.

Other than Butler, there is a good diversity in the cast. We receive some quality acting by Christopher Plummer as Prof. Van Helsing and even Omar Epps is remarkable in his role. Lots of eye-candy is provided by Jennifer Esposito (I never saw her this pretty), Jeri Ryan (cleavage-queen) and Colleen Fitzpatrick (she's the modern version of Lucy). I'm rather late with my first viewing on this film. Since I never wanted to spend money on it, I patiently waited for it to come on TV. You're not missing anything in case you don't ever see it, but there are much worse ways to spend your time. It's overall well-made and light-headed entertainment. Not planning on seeing the sequels, though.