Count Dracula

Wonder why we don't already have a thread about what some argue is the best television adaptation of the Bram Stoker classic, "Dracula" ever made.

I am speaking of course of the 1977 BBC television adaptation starring Frank Finlay as the definitive Abraham Van Helsing, and Louis Jourdan as the titular Count.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Count_Dracula_(1977_film)

I watched it when it first came on and I had nightmares for weeks. Anyone else watch it and have similar experiences?

I only found it about a year ago and definitely agree that it is the best adaptation I've seen. Louis Jourdan is amazing as Dracula, having a refined air and being quite seductive, while at the same time absolutely terrifying when in vampire mode. The early scenes in his castle are really creepy.

Yep. His voice, man. His voice. The one cool French accented person outside of Gerard Depardieu and Jean Reno that I have ever heard speak.

Finlay was a match in terms of acting skill and presence though.

As a fan of the book who had been wondering if a faithful adaptation even existed, I need to watch this.

Well, it isn't a one hundred percent completely faithful adaptation of the novel - it is a bit too short for that to be possible. There are a few changes, to tone and characterization and so on, which are set out in the wikipedia page, here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Count_Dracula_(1977_film) The biggest ones being Quincy Morris and Arthur Holmwood's characters being turned into a composite character and Dracula not being stabbed with a bowie knife and having his throat cut with a kukhri as in the novel but meeting the adopted-as-canon method of dealing with vampires which is staking through the heart. (which, funnily enough, would have made your average Rumanian peasant who knew about how to deal with vampires physically wet himself laughing. Stakes were only used to pin the vampire down in the coffin so that they could be decapitated and then burned.)

It is available on amazon.com as the BBC Video DVD release.

http://www.amazon.com/Count-Dracula-Mini-Series-Louis-Jourdan/dp/B000R7I48G/

The thing is, nothing else on television or cinema comes closer to actually managing the near-miracle of having a faithful adaptation of Stoker's original novel.

Still sounds good. Quincey dying never made much sense to me, anyway.

I don't mind a lot of the changes here because they successfully compress the story without adding in silly stuff as most adaptations are wont to do. For example, one bit I love was how they changed the first time Harker sees Dracula in London, because it really would be terrifying to find that the creature you thought you had just managed to escape from was driving your cab!

I don't remember Van Helsing in this one that much as he didn't seem to stand out to me. He does feature in my favourite scene though, which is the confrontation with Dracula when they are searching the houses.

That cab driving by Dracula was a call-back to the earlier part of the show where Dracula is the coachman who takes Harker to the Castle, unless I am mistaken.

Pretty smart one, if I am right.