I really liked Dracula Untold. I liked how it retold the story of Dracula as a family man desperate to save his kingdom. I liked how it made him seem more human and showed why he felt he had to give up his humanity. I also liked how the film dabbled with the lore around vampires.
I may be in the minority. After all, the film bombed at the box office. The reasons could be the rushed story, loss of interest in classic horror characters (though, this is hard to believe) or, (and this is my reasoning) the film wanted to keep a lower age restriction and was too tame.
Besides all of that, the film was good mostly because of Luke Evans’ portrayal of Dracula. Seeing his gradual descent into becoming Dracula was entertaining as he tried to fight those urges for human blood. It was also quite cool how they linked the Vlad the Impaler with Dracula, seeing as though he is the man who inspired the character.
The film is by no means ground-breaking but it told a decent story with a good lead actor. Besides the fast pace of the movie, I do take issue with how tame it was. I’ve been noticing a stronger demand for films more mature than the age restrictions film studios are willing to dish out. Deadpool is an example of why some movies do better with a higher age restriction. Dracula Untold could have done with that higher age restriction as well.
The film also spent a lot of time building up a sequel instead of bringing some sort of conclusion to its own plots. As now it ends with a cliff hanger and no follow up to fill that void.
However, despite these issues, Dracula Untold is still a good film. Though, I will always prefer Van Helsing when it comes to these macabre action movies, Dracula Untold is a good second.
