The Many Faces of Count Dracul

A detailed Summary of The Many Faces of Count Dracul

Throughout the past century, many movies were made based on the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker. These versions not only tell different series of events from the novel, but also describe a Count Dracula different in appearance, his animal morphism, and even in the way he dies.

In the novel Dracula, the Count's appearance when we first meet him is that of "a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white moustache, and clad in black from head to foot" (Stoker 25). Jonathan Harker, upon shaking Dracula's hand, notices that the hand "seemed like ice- more like the hand of a dead than a living man" (Stoker 25). However, the best description that is given of the old Count is when Harker finally gets a chance to really look at the old man:

His face was a strong- very strong- aquiline, with high- bridge of the thin nose and peculiarly arched nostrils; with

lofty domed forehead, and hair growing scantily round the

temples but perfusely elsewhere. His eyebrows were very mas-

sive, almost meeting over his nose, and with bushy hair that

to curl in its own perfusion. The mouth, so far as I could

see it under the heavy moustache, was fixed and rather cruel-

Similarly, each one of versions of Dracula has different abilities to change into different animals, and either changes in front of other characters or changes of screen or page. In the original novel, none of the characters can really say whether they saw Dracula change. At times they believe that they were dreaming. Before Lucy dies, she talks about the air "full of specs, floating and circling in the draught from the window" and the lights burning "blue and dim"(Stoker 152). This is not Lucy going crazy; it is Dracula coming to change her into a vampire. Other times the darkness or other obstacles block the sight of the transformation. Case in point: when Mina hides under her bed, a thick mist comes in through her door joists. Admist this mist are two red eyes, the same red eyes of the Count. Throughout the novel, the characters believe that Dracula can change into a wolf, a bat, and the mist. Although there are no real sightings, the coincidences of these strange happenings lets the characters and the reader conclude what Dracula has changed into.

The decision in the different forms of Dracula in the movies comes down to the choices of the director. In the older versions, the budget was probably what stood in the way of the numerous animal versions of Dracula. In the 1992 version, the big budget and the special effects let Copolla do pretty much whatever he wanted to do with Dracula. Clearly the money factor was major in the decision making.

In the movie Bram Stoker's Dracula, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, Count Dracula also appears to be old in the beginning. However, this Dracula, played by Gary Oldman, looks different than the description in the novel. Instead of being dressed all in black, the Count is now dressed in a long red flowing robe. His skin is wrinkled with the signs of age. His eyes are a deep, fiery red. He has no mustache and has a long mane of braided white hair. He is still pale, and his hands are the same: the pale thin fingers, the long pointed nails, and the hair on the palms. His teeth, though, are not sharp and pointed, but like that of a regular human. The ears were not pointed either, and his eyebrows were not bushy like that of the novel.

There

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Approximate Word count = 1487
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: English