Dracula Starring Bela Lugosi (1931)
The Film
The 1931 film version of Dracula starring Bela Lugosi and directed by Tod Browning "is one of the earliest classic American horror films" produced by Carl Laemmle's Universal Pictures. Lugosi, after being the face of the iconic Dracula stage play, went on to play a role in the 1931 adaptation of Dracula as the count himself. The plot for this film was adapted from Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula, and everything went soaring from here. This single adaptation made way for many other horror films to come from this studio. One of these films just so happened to be another classic that we all must know, Frankenstein. This film was directed by the mind of Karl Freund.(Dirks)
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| Movie poster for Dracula(1931) |
Believe it or not some parts of the film had to be removed overseas due to the graphic imagery including the depiction of Renfield begging to eat bugs and the images of Dracula's Vampiric "wives". Much of the film was pure and not full of unnecessary dramatic music and jump scares unlike movies of today. The dialogue and imagery was enough for this film crew to feel satisfied with their creation. As Oates says in her in depth conversation on this movie, "the film has no musical score, no distractions from its spare, poetic, highly charged dialogue". This is a very interesting concept to me that there was no dramatic music or eerie feeling to start off the movie. The producers were really thinking of mainly dialogue and imagery here to send everything home. Silent films at the time needed music to keep things interesting but the fact that Dracula offered such dialogue that there was no need for music must say something about this incredible adaptation of Bram Stoker's novel.
Lugosi The legend
Bela Lugosi was no doubt an icon and set the scene for all Draculas that followed in his footsteps. With his thick Hungarian accent and his slicked back hair there is no doubt that he was an incredible vampire figure from the beginning. An accurate description of this man was best put by Eugene Smith as he said, "He was stagy, stylized, elegant, Continental, of sonorous deliberate line delivery with significant pauses, with great carriage and stately demeanor, a natural to play the lead in the dramatization of Bram Stoker's novel 'of the Carpathian Mountains nobleman who drinks the blood not solely because he wants to but because he must". Lugosi presented himself in such a manner that he was perfect for this role of becoming a vampire.
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| Bela Lugosi, main actor in Dracula(1931) |
Before Lugosi became the count, he played many other roles in different plays and operas. This guy was all over the place. When he was thirty eight, Lugosi headed for New York where he knew stage opportunities would be waiting for him. This was his chance to shine. Smith Describes some of Lugosi's accomplishments by stating "He sang in operettas for provincial Hungarian companies, performed baritone parts in operas, was Jesus in a passion play, Laertes in Hamlet, Lucentio in The Taming of the Shrew, Cassio in Othello, Clarence in Richard III, and in Szeged, his country's second city after Budapest, rose to a Romeo of whom a critic wrote, "Beautifully fiery, passionately loving and dying!"." But when given the chance to play Frankenstein, Lugosi declined and instead Boris Karloff took the role. Overall these accomplishments that Bela Lugosi has made make him truly iconic and very memorable as a character.
Works Cited:
Oates, Joyce Carol. “Dracula (Tod Browning, 1931).” Southwest Review, vol. 76, no. 4, Sept. 1991, p. 498. EBSCOhost, proxy-bloomu.klnpa.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=9609190215&site=eds-live&scope=site.
Smith, Eugene R. “The Count: Bela Lugosi Began by Playing Laertes and Romeo, Only to Become Forever Trapped in Very Different Roles. (Film Actor Who Played the Role of the Vampire Dracula).” American Heritage, no. n7, 1998, p. p110. EBSCOhost, proxy-bloomu.klnpa.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edscpi&AN=edscpi.A21280978&site=eds-live&scope=site.
Dirks, Tim. “Dracula(1931).” Dracula (1931), www.filmsite.org/drac2.html.
I really enjoyed reading your blog as this is more how I pictured Dracula when reading the novel instead of the Hammer Film's production of it. He looks foreign yet spooky and it fits the role of Dracula just right. I'm intrigued by the lack of music and focus on just the dialogue. I wonder if it gives the story more emphasis because of no music or if it is even scary without sounds effects. It is also neat he played Dracula for many years in the stage production but also in the film for stage actors rarely enter cinema. Overall you have a really solid, well thought-out, informational blog that was really nice to read.
ReplyDeleteI really liked how in depth you went with the film. Particularly the music. I love listening to movie scores and soundtracks, I'm always intrigued why they were written or composed in a certain way. Why they placed "x" at a certain point, etc. So I really liked how you elaborated on why the music was the way it was. I also really liked how you touched on Lugosi's past, before he was ever Dracula.
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