'' is a
1931 Horror Film produced by
Universal Pictures Co. Inc. and based on the novel ''
Dracula '' by
Bram Stoker .
''Dracula'' was
Directed by
Tod Browning , with a
Screenplay based on the stage play by
John L. Balderston . The title role was played by
Bela Lugosi . Also starring in the film were
David Manners as Jonathan Harker,
Helen Chandler as Mina Seward and
Dwight Frye as Renfield.
The onset on the
Great Depression caused a drastic reduction in the budget for the film, and several grand scenes that closely followed the Stoker storyline, had to be abandoned. It was considered less expensive to stage the film using Balderston's stage play as its basis. Lugosi's portrayal became the one by which he was most remembered and despite his earlier stage successes in a variety of roles, typecast him. The eerie speech pattern of Lugosi's "Dracula" was said to have resulted from the fact that Lugosi did not speak
English , and therefore had to learn and speak his lines
Phonetically . This, however, is urban legend; Lugosi spoke English as well as he ever would by the time the film was made. Lugosi however was not the first choice to play the role. It had been intended as a vehicle for
Lon Chaney but Chaney died before the project began.
The film was a great success, and newspapers reported that members of the audiences fainted in shock at the horror onscreen. This publicity, shrewdly orchestrated by the film studio, helped ensure people came to see the film, if for no other reason than curiosity.
It was one of the three films (with ''
Frankenstein '' and ''
The Wolf Man '') that formed the bedrock of
Universal Studios '
Horror Movie series of the
1930s and
1940s .
A box office success in its day, which has come to be regarded as a classic of the era and of its genre, it has been selected for preservation by the
National Film Registry .
cover for the film shows Lugosi in the role which would type-cast him for the rest of his career.]]
Five years after the release of the film, Universal released '''', 1945's ''
House Of Dracula '' and 1948's ''
Abbott And Costello Meet Frankenstein ''. Only in this final film did Lugosi finally play the role of Count Dracula on screen a second time.
Due to the short lived limitations of adding a musical score to a film's soundtrack, during
1930 and
1931 , no score had ever been composed specifically for the film. In
1998 minimalist composer
Philip Glass was commissioned to compose an original score for the classic film. The score was performed by the
Kronos Quartet under direction of
Michael Riesman .
Of the project, Glass said:
:''"The film is considered a classic. I felt the score needed to evoke the feeling of the world of the 19th century — for that reason I decided a string quartet would be the most evocative and effective. I wanted to stay away from the obvious effects associated with horror films. With
Kronos Quartet we were able to add depth to the emotional layers of the film."
The film, with this new score, was released by
Universal Studios Home Video in
1999 in the
VHS format. The current
DVD release allows the viewer to chose between the original, unscored, release or this version.
A
Spanish Language version of '' was made by director
George Melford who simultaneously filmed the movie using the same sets at night. Melford used a different crew and cast that featured
Carlos Villarías , who played the title role, and
Eduardo Arozamena who portrayed Van Helsing.
Carl Laemmle Jr. was the producer of both versions.
In recent years this version has become more highly praised by some than the English language version. The Spanish crew had the advantage of watching the
Dailies from the English crew's version when they came in for the evening. They would work out better camera angles and more effective use of lighting. With the film being intended for a Mexican audience, they didn't have to adhere to the
Hays Code , as was the case for the English-language version. As a result, this version's supporters consider it to be much more artistically effective.
- David Manners (John Harker) never watched the film once in the remaining 67 years of his life.
- EOFFTV - The Universal Dracula series
