Luc Besson's Analysis of Dracula

Contents:

• Dracula's Journey: His Arrival in Paris for the Exhibition
• Besson's Path to Creating His Unique "Dracula"
• An Updated Interpretation of the Vampire Novel: What's New?

On September 11, 2025, the premiere of Luc Besson's new film "Dracula" will take place in Russia. The renowned director behind such cult films as "Leon" and "The Fifth Element" offers his own take on Bram Stoker's gothic novel. This version bears hallmarks of Besson's style, both positive and negative. We'll tell you about the final product in our review.

Dracula's Journey: His Arrival in Paris for an Exhibition

At the end of the 15th century, Romanian ruler Vlad Dracula (played by Caleb Landry Jones) enjoys life with his beloved wife, Elisabeta (Zoe Blue). They enjoy shooting arquebuses, having pillow fights, and playing games of throwing food at each other. However, in the midst of this revelry, the prince's vassals suddenly appear, brutally seize Vlad, dress him in armor, and lead him off to war against the Turks, who are already approaching the walls of his castle. "I can't live without you!"—that's all the lovers manage to whisper as they part. How it happened: Elizabeta finds herself trapped, and the prince rushes to her rescue, but ends up accidentally killing his wife. Vlad feels deeply hurt: he defended the Christian faith, and the Almighty took his beloved from him. As a result, Dracula renounces God and gains a terrible immortality. Over the next centuries, the prince wanders the world, attacks random passers-by and yearns for his lost wife.

Four centuries later, in the last decades of the 19th century, Dracula discovers that the wife of lawyer Jonathan Harker, named Mina, is an exact copy of his late wife Elizabeta. Wasting no time, he heads to Paris to capture Mina, and the only one who can stop him is the Vatican exorcist Van Helsing, played by Christoph Waltz.

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Besson's Path to Creating His Unique "Dracula"

Luc Besson frankly admits: "I don't like horror films. And I'm not a fan of Dracula." It all started not with the concept, but with the choice of actor.

The director first collaborated with Caleb Landry Jones during the making of his previous film, "Dogman," which tells the story of a strange criminal who prefers dogs to people. At that time, the young actor already had some fame thanks to his Teen Choice Award nomination for his performance as the mutant Banshee in "X-Men: First Class," as well as thanks to his notable appearances in such films as "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri," "Get Out," "Breaking Bad," and "Twin Peaks." For his performance as a mass murderer in Nitram, Jones won the Best Actor award at the Cannes Film Festival.

Critics panned Dogman, calling it strange and even absurd, but for Luc Besson, the most important thing was that he found a new actor who became a source of inspiration. The director had plans for a follow-up project entirely focused on Caleb. “We worked so harmoniously together on Dogman that I’ve only dreamed of making another film with him since then. Caleb has an astonishing talent. I haven’t seen anything like it since I worked with Gary Oldman,” Besson recalled of his longtime favorite actor, who starred in films such as Leon and The Fifth Element.

Most likely a connection with the example of Dracula, who was embodied by Gary Oldman in the magnificent adaptation of Francis Ford Coppola 1992, inspired Besson to create his new film.

"Caleb and I were just talking about different roles that might suit him. I said, 'You'd be great as Dracula.' Then it occurred to me, 'Why not write a script?'"

Luc Besson for The Industry.

Indeed, audiences have had no shortage of Dracula images lately. Just a year ago, Robert Eggers presented his gothic interpretation of Nosferatu. Previously, in Chris McKay's Renfield, Nicolas Cage played the Count as a typical aggressor. And in "The Last Voyage of the Demeter," director André Øvredal showed Dracula traveling to London aboard a ship. Besson certainly decided to add his own twist to the traditional vampire storyline, bringing his own vision. "There are many wonderful film adaptations, but I always felt one important aspect was missing from the original book," he noted. And there's no need to guess: the director himself expressed his thought, identifying the fifth and most significant element as love. "For me, this is the greatest romantic saga: a man who waits four centuries to meet his wife... Of course, the story includes blood, monsters, and other elements, but at the center of it all is the love story."

The director was inspired and, unexpectedly, came to the songs of Billie Eilish, in particular her latest album, Hit Me Hard and Soft. "I just repeat it when I listen to it—it's exactly the feeling I need to make the film," he shared. However, he did not include Eilish's music in the soundtrack. The composer for the film was Danny Elfman, who had previously created music for Tim Burton's Gothic films.

It seems that Besson was a little confused by the new genre and tried to imitate a more experienced colleague. His version of Dracula's castle looks like a typical Burton project—a peculiar combination of a Gothic cathedral and elements of Disneyland. Originally, it was planned to place it in the Jura Mountains, but due to the lack of snow required for the plot, the decision was changed. As a result, a 4,000-square-meter polystyrene fortress was built in Finland, near the town of Kuhmo.

The director happily led journalists through the castle's halls, showing them the chapel, the bedroom with its four-poster bed, the dining room, and even the torture chamber, joking, "This is for interviews." For fans of the genre, an interesting detail was added: a gallery that appeared to depict the Count's ancestors. In reality, these were portraits of the actors who played Dracula on screen, including Gary Oldman, Christopher Lee, and Max Schreck.

Production designer Hugues Tissandier, who has collaborated with Luc Besson on more than twenty films, was responsible for the creation of the castle. As for the armor, British armorer Terry English, who previously worked on the film "Joan of Arc" more than 25 years ago, was responsible for developing it for the scenes set in the Middle Ages.

Scenes generally considered "modern" were moved from London, as Stoker did, to Paris. However, the weather conditions here too were unfavorable: during a mass shoot at the Palais Royal, it began to rain, and a scene involving 350 extras had to be urgently recorded in 15 minutes between downpours. "We had just finished it, and the rain started again, a real nightmare," Besson recalled.

Obviously, the implementation of such a vast project required significant financial investments, but the film's exact budget remains a mystery. What is known is that the costs of "Dracula" were lower than those of Luc Besson's ambitious but failed project, "Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets," which had a budget of $233 million. Nevertheless, "Dracula" still won the title of the most expensive French film of 2025.

The most challenging part of the filming process, after working in the castle, was working with Caleb Landry Jones. The actor had to lose significant weight, master a Romanian accent, get used to platform shoes to add height, and endure long hours in the makeup room. To reflect Dracula's centuries-long wanderings across the globe, a variety of costumes, hairstyles, and wigs were created for his character. As a result, Jones essentially embodies twenty different interpretations of Dracula on screen. "He's like a real chameleon," Besson notes with admiration.

In his ambitious project, Luc Besson, in addition to the famous Jones, attracted mainly less recognizable actors. The main role of Mina-Elisabeth was played by aspiring actress Zoe Blue, who is the daughter of Rosanna Arquette, who once appeared in Besson's film "The Big Blue". The role of her friend, who falls victim to Dracula's bite, went to Italian actress Matilda De Angelis, known for her role in the HBO series "The Undoing" with Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant.

The only notable exception was the renowned actor Christoph Waltz, who played a key role in Quentin Tarantino's films. In this case, he appeared as Van Helsing, Dracula's adversary. Perhaps Waltz's German roots were the reason that his character was made Bavarian, although in the original version of Bram Stoker, the hero's surname is more consistent with Dutch origin.

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An updated interpretation of the vampire novel: what's new?

To be honest, it's difficult to say whether Luc Besson is familiar with Stoker's work, because his interpretation differs significantly from the source text. However, it is safe to say that he has watched Coppola's version more than once, since certain episodes clearly repeat elements of the 1992 film. For example, in the scene with the reception in the castle, where Mina's husband arrives, the image of Caleb Jones was created almost identically to the image of Gary Oldman.

The complex robe, the pale, hairless face and the snow-white hair gathered in a strange hairstyle - such blatant borrowing sometimes makes one feel uncomfortable. But this is not so important; perhaps Besson considers this an interesting hint for his fans. However, the main intrigue was certainly borrowed from Coppola.

The image of Dracula as a fatal lover has long been reimagined, but it was the film, released in 1992, that first introduced the concept of the Count losing his wife and, overcome with grief, turning into a vampire. He later found her reincarnation in the form of Mina. This idea was taken up by Besson, who, however, greatly enhanced it. In Stoker's original work, the Count embodied violence and vice, a source of fear for Puritan society: he ruthlessly dominated both women and men, without feeling any love. A hundred years later, Coppola brought elements of ambivalence to the vampire in his film: he remains a monster and a tyrant, but also suffers from true passion.

Besson has little interest in creating the image of Dracula as a monster. The Count does not use black magic and does not turn into a bat or a wolf. Instead of relying on his hypnotic powers, he has acquired a magnificent perfume that drives women crazy, reminiscent of the plot of Süskind's "Perfume." Nevertheless, Dracula remains devoted to his beloved, and if he bites women, it is only rarely and out of necessity.

His castle lacks another departure from the literary work—there's no trace of the three vampire brides. Instead, the Count is accompanied by charming, animated stone gargoyles, reminiscent of those seen in Disney's The Hunchback of Notre Dame. The Count is generally melancholy and utters tired phrases like, "Life without love is the greatest tragedy, my friend."

From time to time, Besson descends into a kind of farce, reminiscent of Mel Brooks's Dracula: Dead and Loving It. In the plot, the Count, wanting to end his life, repeatedly jumps out of a window, but miraculously survives each time. At his command, the entire city of Versailles begins to rejoice and dance. It is also worth noting that geography is presented here with an ironic slant: according to the road sign, France is adjacent to Romania.

You can Get a sense of the atmosphere: Besson relishes the process of creation. So it's no surprise that he chose to move the action from gloomy Victorian London to the bright and festive Paris of the Belle Époque, home to the World's Fairs.

For much of Dracula, Mina and Maria enjoy their time in the exhibition halls, eagerly exploring them. Mina happily flirts with the charming Count, completely unconcerned that her lawyer husband has gone missing. Her energetic vampire friend Maria, with a playful glint in her eyes, snorts cheerfully, revealing her sharp teeth, and laughs in a deep voice. Meanwhile, in the distance, sullen doctors and dull husbands anxiously discuss plans, trying to win back their wives, who have become enthralled with idle pastimes.

Christoph Waltz's hero brings a small note of variety to the one-sided picture of goodness. The actor seems unsure of the role, and as a result, we see something between the good-natured Schultz from Django and the cunning Hans Landa from Inglourious Basterds. His Van Helsing sips sacramental wine with relish and smirks as he remarks that heightened sexual attraction in women is not a sign of obsession, but, on the contrary, a sign of health. Clearly, he prefers the Count to all those sullen Englishmen. Thus, if we follow Besson's logic, it becomes absolutely obvious: vampires are the only truly joyful creatures in the world.

The main problem is The problem is that it's clearly not enough for a film. In fact, the context in which the project was created is more interesting than the end result itself. Luc Besson's idea to film Dracula, while openly admitting his dislike for the character and the genre in general, seems rather unusual.

Certainly, one can sincerely express admiration for director Caleb Jones. Indeed, when the actor appears on screen with his unusual pale face and graceful movements, reminiscent of a snake, it is difficult not to admire. However, perhaps it would have been wiser to simply show only Jones for two hours, adding the title "once upon a time there was an eagle-man." It would have been much less awkward.

It seems that Besson, carried away by his personal admiration for Jones, did not bother to conduct proper research and find out that the concept of a romantic Dracula has long been exhausted. Therefore, his claims about unaccounted aspects of Stoker's story appear rather superficial. In general, Besson tends to take a simplistic approach, and while this sometimes pays off, as in the case of The Fifth Element—a wonderful comic book film that relies primarily on visual aesthetics and the dynamic interactions with Milla Jovovich—in Dracula, the approach again falls short, as it sometimes does. Besson alternately attempts humor, creates moments of fear, and elicits tears in a melodramatic vein. However, upon closer examination, it becomes clear that everything boils down to one simple image: an older man tries to strike up conversations with young women because they remind him of the love he knew in his youth. In the end, it looks rather awkward.

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