The quintessential Vampire movie

Still one of my favorite films despite so many acting inconsistencies.

Gary Oldman is the one and only Dracula for me. His sensuous, sexy, sensational performance as the Prince of Darkness is performance for the ages. How he did not get a single acting nomination for this still baffles me. It is his greatest work as far as I am concerned.

As for the rest of the cast the casting director should have been fired. Hopkins, who is normally fantastic, hams it up so much in this film that I couldn't figure out if he thought he was starring in a comedy or one of those trashy seventies Dracula flicks. Considering we are firmly in period drama here, with brief elements of Gothic horror, I am not entirely sure what was going through his mind. I find his performance very distracting.

Winona Ryder and Keanu Reeves, both terrible actors, don't do much to redeem themselves either and why they were chosen is still a contentious point for me. I suppose some Hollywood exec said we needed the fresh young faces of the time to bring in the audiences. I would have preferred to see a leading lady who could have held a proper English accent. Ryder is all over the place

The less said about Keanu the better. I have never seen a star more uncomfortable in a role than Keanu as Jonathan Harker. You'd think being in the same room with Mr. Oldman and Sir Hopkins, that he would have caught a kernel of their magical acting dust!Unfortunately no dust caught.

Still this is the quintessential Dracula movie. It's a real feast for the eyes filled with such incredible cinematography and artistic shots.