Years ago when I was producing weekends up in Detroit, the VMAs were on and to kill time, we all kind of watched it. I had made the comment that I had no idea who these people were and had never heard of any of their songs. One of my coworkers then said to me, "I'll bet you're one of those guys who can't wait to get old."
Naturally, I disagreed. She countered by saying, "Oh yeah, what is playing in your car right now?"
After a few seconds, I told her, "The Dracula audiobook."
I think about that a lot and I don't know what that says about me, but I think she may have got me. And that segues nicely to today's movie, which is...
The Last Voyage of the Demeter (2023)
In case you were unfamiliar, this movie is based on a subplot in a short chapter from Bram Stoker's iconic novel Dracula. The novel was good, but that chapter is the best part. It is so wonderfully unsettling. It may be my favorite bit of horror writing I've ever read. It's just a captain keeping a log of the goings-on as things keep getting worse as his crew disappears one by one. You can feel everyone slowly start to lose their minds stuck in storms and fog with some THING hiding below deck. I stopped to re-read it just minutes ago and it's as good as I remembered!
Now, imagine my excitement to learn they were making a movie out of this chapter. Not only that, but it starred Javier Botet as Dracula and Liam Cunningham as the captain. Even though the chapter is short, to me, this section always seemed like the easiest part to make into a movie. As evidenced by all the movies that all have wildly different takes on the book.
Here's the story; the crew of the Demeter are transporting some cargo to Britain and they'll get a bonus if it gets there on time. They stop at a port to pick up some hands to help them on their journey. During the recruitment, a surgeon is rebuffed for some more obvious choices. While they're loading up the containers, one of the recruits recognizes a dragon insignia and just says, "Nope!" and ducks right out of there. Thankfully the surgeon is there to step up and away they go! Unfortunately for our plucky band of sailors, Dracula is stowed away in one of those crates and he is not pleased that they came across Anna, a young woman that Dracula planned to use as a snack for when he gets hungry.
Things start good for the group, but then we learn that this is going to be the captain's last voyage before he retires. If you didn't know by then, you know now, things are not going to end well. Dracula stalks around the ship, starting small; he kills the dog and then the livestock before moving on to bigger targets. Each person gets picked off in different ways one by one until they decide to fight back.
This movie is a mixed bag with things I liked and things I didn't. I liked how Dracula hunted. When the first human gets a good look at him, he looks emaciated and weak, almost like he collapsed out of an overturned box. The sailor just stares at the creature as it pathetically starts to rise and then in an instant, it covers the 20 or so feet and rips the guy apart. I wasn't expecting him to move that fast and it made me jump, it's a cool scene and gives you our first look at one of history's most famous monsters. I like how Dracula lured him in by appearing so grotesque and sickly only to strike like a snake. It does, however, lead me to a point that I didn't like, but I'll get more to that later.
I loved the Dracula stuff on the boat. The way he looks and moves is incredibly effective. He's also smart too. He doesn't speak much but when he does it's full of menace and spite that it's wonderful. Looking at this creature and seeing how it hunts, it's not a stretch that this thing could live for centuries and rule his village with an iron fist. Going up against this monster isn't smart because it has perfected staying alive for hundreds of years. Omar once said you come at the king, you best not miss, and by watching Dracula, it's easy to see that a whole lot of people have missed when trying to bring him down.
There were also things I didn't care for. The movie changes up the lore a little too much for my liking. I know most vampire stories have the baddies getting killed by sunlight, but that's not how it worked in the novel. Dracula could come and go as he pleased in the daylight, he was just weaker. He also couldn't shapeshift in the daytime. So if he were a wolf, bat or fog by the time the sun rose, he'd be stuck in that form until sundown. In this movie, it's sunlight that kills vampires. If this were any other story, I wouldn't mind, but it's a direct adaptation of a section of the book! Even in the 90s movie with Gary Oldman, he walked around in the sun. It kind of felt cheap to me to adapt the storyline and then make such a big change.
A couple of other things bugged me, and I understand it only bothers me because I read the book, but crosses did nothing to Dracula. In the book, the captain ties himself to the helm and uses a cross to ward off the vampire until he eventually dies. In this one, the captain does the same thing and pulls out a cross and Dracula just kind of stares at him before he ties the captain against the wheel like he's Jesus on the cross. It bugged me because Dracula's aversion to crosses is a pretty big plot point in the book. The captain's death was a noble sacrifice fighting until his last breath, to not be food for the creature. But in the movie, the captain comes off as a deranged street preacher waving a pistol with a BANG flag hanging out of the barrel in front of a slightly amused monster. But, I digress.
Another thing I was disappointed in because it's one of my favorite sections in the book, was the first mate meeting up with Dracula. In the novel, he is close to the last one left and he's losing it. He searches everywhere for "the thin man onboard the ship" and he eventually gets the drop on Dracula leaning over the edge. The mate goes to stab him in the back but Dracula immediately vanishes into wisps of fog. I love that. Dracula is so sure of himself that he just hangs out, showing his back to his prey, and then disappears at the last second. Sadly, there's nothing like that in the movie.
The last thing that bugged me was something that I overall enjoyed. His appearance. He looks cool when he's attacking them or skulking around the ship, but his appearance never changes. Dracula had a social life in London, he was able to pass as a human and charm the ladies. Even when you see Dracula at the end, there's nobody that's going to mistake him for a normal dude. In this movie, his appearance is way more monster than man. The final scene is an awesome callback and shows how petty and powerful Dracula is, but like, come on. There's no way someone that looks like THAT isn't going to draw attention. I don't care if you put a suit and hat on him.
Overall though, I liked it. Dracula is cool and I love how fast he moves. He's a very powerful creature that has hundreds of years of experience, so you have to make him very formidable. I love the way he zooms around the ship, brutally attacking whomever he pleases. Before I go, there's one more thing I have to mention and it made me so uncomfortable in the best ways. I've seen many vampire movies, so I've seen people get bit in the neck a lot. This was the first time I was ever disturbed by it. The first victim is trying to get away, even when Dracula is biting on him, so Dracula slams his head on the deck and then bites down hard. It's difficult to watch because the camera is stuck on the dude's face, but that's not the worst of it. It's the sound. Dracula gulps loudly on the guy's neck and it's so rough to listen to. Imagine being that guy, not only do you feel the pain, your blood leaving, your life draining, but being able to hear it so clearly? That's horrifying.
It's a solid movie, I would have liked it more if it didn't play so loose with the Dracula lore, but it's worth a watch, mainly because Javier Botet's Dracula is awesome and terrifying.
7 Dr. Chainsaws!
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