Dracula is one of the tales most often told and changed through various film adaptations and movies.  This version of the Dracula legend mostly takes place 100 years after Dracula (Luke Roberts) became a vampire in DRACULA: THE DARK PRINCE.  He is convinced young beautiful crusader (for the light) Alina (Kelly Wenham) is the reincarnation of his long-dead love after she is taken prisoner by his undead soldiers.  Leonardo Van Helsing (JonVoight) comes to the rescue with a young woman, a thief, and one other as they plan to rescue Alina and destroy Dracula with the magical weapon known as the Light Bringer.

DRACULA: THE DARK PRINCE is a fun fantasy adventure which brings a new take on Dracula while exploring one element of Cain and Abel that has been explored before in the UNDERWORLD films (for example).  The costume design and set design are top notch as Pearry Teo makes the best movie he can out of the budget given to him.  I do wish the beginning sequence was full live action and not a combination of animation and live action.  The big evil knight reminds of me of Blaster from MAD MAX FROM THUNDERDOME while Stephen Hogan is very sinister as Renfield and Jon Voight is playing Van Helsing like a father figure.  This latest Dracula movie feels like it would have been better served as a TV series and yet it captures the feeling of the movies you would see from Full Moon Entertainment.   It is an enjoyable fantasy adventure which isn’t quite a horror movie, but DRACULA: THE DARK PRINCE isn’t as great as Pearry Teo’s first two films (THE GENE GENERATION and NECROMENTIA) and superior to the hack job known as THE EVIL INSIDE (which the producer took away from the director and made it being a boring Pearry Teo movie due to the editing).

AUDIO/ Subtitles:  The Audio track isn’t the best 5.1 mix which seems very quiet compared to other 5.1 mixes for DVD.  The DVD also has no subtitles or English close captioning which is also unfortunate, but the lack of subtitles may be a result of rushing this one out as a Walmart exclusive. 

SPECIAL FEATURES:

Almost eight minutes of interviews with the cast and a look at the concept to VFX process is shown in the very short BUILDING THE CASTLE featurette are among the extras.

Feature audio commentary with director Pearry Teo

FINAL ANALYSIS:   DRACULA: THE DARK PRINCE is an enjoyable fantasy action adventure that works for the most part and not as god as Pearry Teo’s first two movies 9which are both highly recommended if you haven’t seen them).

This review is (c)10-16-2013 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission.  Send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com

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