Dracula Untold

At one point in the film Dracula Untold, Prince Vlad (Luke Evans), having just taken his final step on his journey toward becoming the legendary figure of Dracula, whispers, “I’ve seen Hell, so I know there’s a Heaven.” His lament, aside from feeling somewhat uninspired, hints at a return within cinema to the religious roots that have grown deep into the vampire narrative within popular culture, a narrative that deals with issues of the soul, the hope for a life hereafter, and the potential of forces beyond our control to deface or even destroy that hope. The focus of the soul in vampire narratives is the most prescient clue as to the religious nature of the vampire and the mythos surrounding it, and this is abundantly the case within Dracula Untold.

      
As the Turkish Empire demands the unthinkable of the army-less Transylvanian territory, Prince Vlad seeks the power to protect his people and lay waste to the invading militaries of Mehmed (Dominic Cooper), the Sultan of Turkey. This leads Vlad into the mountain cave of a powerful vampire (the former Roman Emperor Caligula played by Charles Dance) who offers him the substantial powers of darkness. The vampire tells him that he smells fear on all who enter his cave, but on Vlad he smells hope and determination. In the face of assured destruction at the hands of his enemies, the future Count Dracula refuses to give in to despair, willing to sacrifice his very soul to liberate his family and people.

      
The vampire as agent of spiritual and physical liberation is a motif I write about extensively in my book Such a Dark Thing, and Vlad the Impaler, at least within the world of Dracula Untold, emerges as a figure of resistance against the organized and corporate oppression that seeks to subjugate and marginalize the masses. In response to such systematic injustice, liberative ethics embeds its ideology within the distress and suppression of peoples and cultures that have been abused, starved out, and forgotten, with an eschatological perspective that seeks to transform the very structure of society and reversing or eradicating the oppressive invasion of whatever dominant hierarchy exists.

      
Of course, the theory of the undead in popular culture serving as an agent of liberation certainly has its share of flaws, as the vampire, in order to survive, must subjugate others, clearly demonstrated at the conclusion of Dracula Untold as the titular character creates an army of vengeful vampires to help him destroy the Turks, an army he subsequently destroys to suit his own parental predilections.

      
Dracula’s aforementioned lament of Heaven and Hell makes clear that his tale is undoubtedly a theological one, as he, Job-like, willingly embraces the powers of chaos and darkness, admitting toward the end of the movie that he has transformed from a Christian prince into the son of the Devil, ultimately embodying the troubling theological dilemma of theodicy. For Dracula, his plight as the embodiment of evil in some manner gives him hope for redemption; if Hell and damnation has become his reality, then Heaven and forgiveness must also endure, serving as a type of inverted apologetic for the existence of the Divine and thus eternal optimism.

      

It is also notable that the symbol of the crucifix makes a surprising return to a mainstream vampire film by way of Dracula Untold, having previously been thought extinct, as the more secular representation of the undead figure has, with few exceptions, devoured any overt religious symbolism within the narratives for the last two decades. However, the grand reintroduction of the cross of Christ into the vampire mythos leaves the audience less with the impression of the authority of Christianity and more the impotency of a faith that seemingly fails in the face of evil, necessitating the use of physical violence over religious belief to achieve victory (blatantly illustrated in Prince Vlad admonishing his people for praying and demanding they fight). And yet, its inclusion is important and noteworthy nonetheless, as the theological undercurrents of the vampire narrative once again are unearthed for popular consumption.

      
Ultimately, the movie itself is a missed opportunity. Much has been made over the last several months of trailers for the film evoking less a feeling of the emergence of one of the greatest horror icons in literary and cinematic history and more so the start of a new superhero franchise, à la Man of Steel. Unfortunately, this proves to be the case, with the dark powers of Dracula being played more as a young Kal-El adjusting to his role as Superman (e.g. learning to fly, extreme sensory enhancement, incredible strength, etc.) than a chaos monster inverting the natural and sacred order. Dracula even has his kryptonite in silver, the final battle of the film taking place against Lex Luthor (aka Mehmed) in a ridiculously prodigious pile of it.

      
Neither frightening as an exercise in horror nor particularly exciting with regard to its formulaic action sequences, the creators behind Dracula Untold might have served the material better by seeking to connect it with the foreboding darkness of the source material, eschewing the trend of super powered heroes and embracing the monster that is the vampire. Instead, we are left with an uneventful, though mildly entertaining, film that feels more akin to Underworld than Bram Stoker’s literary masterpiece.

      
Reports seem to indicate that Dracula Untold is to serve as the launching pad of an interconnected series of films (think Marvel) featuring the Universal Monsters and Van Helsing. However, judging from its paltry $23 million take over the weekend, those plans could very well be delayed or quashed entirely.