Dracula Untold (2014)

Dracula Untold doesn't so much seek to tell the story of the real life historical figure Vlad the Impaler, upon home Count Dracula is based, but rather just to fictionalize Vlad differently then Bram Stoker did. Here the 15th century Prince of Wallachia (part of modern day Romania) is not the famously cruel tyrant of history, but as played by Luke Evans a generous, sensitive ruler. In fact Vlad loves his family and people so much, that it is for them that he risks his very soul to be transformed into a powerful vampire, this in order to better defend against heartless Ottoman Turks who seek to conscript the kingdoms children to fight in their armies. The movie is a weird blend of elements, and its hard to figure out what kind of movie the filmmakers really were going for. There's everything from The Lord of Rings, to Underworld, to The Book of Exodus in here. It's a less a traditional horror movie and more like a riff on Frank Millers 300. The main reason I even saw the movie was the presence of my latest film crush Sarah Gadon as the female lead, she was fine in this, but the part could have been played by most any pretty actress. Ironically the little coda at the end, which hints at a possible sequel, looks more interesting then this film was. Still with its limited 1 hour 32 minute running time Dracula Untold makes for passable, if at times perplexing, entertainment. **