‘Dracula’ or ‘Dracula: A Love Tale’ [Review]

There is no vampire name more famous than Dracula, and the number of films and television series he has appeared in reflects that legacy. There’s a chance some people are tired of seeing Dracula.

Luckily for me, that’s not the case. I’ll take as many Draculas as I can get — especially good ones — and the Dracula in Dracula: A Love Tale (2025) is a great Dracula.

Of course, that’s subjective. But Luc Besson’s dreamy vampiric romance delivers exactly my favorite kind of vampire. This Dracula is a loverboy first and foremost, and the entire film seeps with the strength of his yearning.

Dracula: A Love Tale (or simply Dracula), Besson’s sweeping take on Bram Stoker’s immortal figure, arrived in U.S. theaters February 6, 2026. The film stars Caleb Landry Jones as Dracula, Christoph Waltz as a mysterious priest, and Zoë Bleu in the dual roles of Elisabeta and Mina Murray.

And right from the start, the film makes its priorities clear: this is a love story.

The opening takes place in 1480 Wallachia — in what is now modern Romania — during war against the Ottomans. Prince Vladimir (Jones) has more pressing concerns than battle strategy. He’s wrapped up entirely in his wife, Elisabeta (Bleu). Their introduction is erotic, playful, and intimate, showcasing a relationship built on attraction and devotion. From dancing together in a silly, informal way, to feeding each other messily, to making love right on a table, Vladimir’s focus is unmistakable — love her.

Even as stewards burst into the bedchamber to prepare him for war, ripping them apart mid-embrace, he keeps returning to her arms. Before they part for their final time, Elisabeta tells him she cannot survive without him. He, feeling that statement in his own bones, seeks a priest’s blessing before battle, asking God only one thing: protect his wife. Without her, life has no meaning.

The battle itself is brief but effective, culminating in a gruesome victory reminiscent of the Vlad the Impaler legend — heads of Ottoman soldiers presented on pikes. But triumph is short-lived. Elisabeta, fleeing an ambush, is pursued through snow-covered wilderness. The sequence is strikingly beautiful despite its brutality, as her veil streaks across white expanses, as horses collapse into bear traps hidden beneath the snow, and as, finally, Elisabeta herself is caught and wounded.

Vladimir arrives too late.

She dies in his arms under bright sunlight reflecting off snow and blood. And in his grief, he confronts the priest and kills him with a crucifix, declaring, “Tell your God that until he brings me back my wife, my life no longer belongs to him.” Lightning cracks, thunder roars, and blood tears roll down the face of Christ on the wall. And that’s the moment that seals his vampiric curse.

Four hundred years pass.

By 1880, the story settles largely in Paris. A doctor summons a priest (Christoph Waltz — clearly enjoying another Gothic literary adaptation after appearing in Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein late last year) to examine a disturbing case: a woman chained in an asylum basement, feral with bloodlust, and still wearing her wedding dress. The priest instantly recognizes what she is — a vampire — and the first one captured alive.

From there we return to Romania, where Jonathan Harker (Ewins Abid) journeys toward Dracula’s castle. Harker’s obliviousness is comedic gold as he shoos wolves away like they’re merely puppies, and his meeting with the Count reveals a Dracula — once known as Prince Vladimir — visually reminiscent of Gary Oldman’s 1992 portrayal with an elaborate white-blond wig, aged makeup, pale skin, and eccentric regality.

Harker’s lack of awareness continues as Dracula telekinetically removes a crucifix from his belongings or drains a mouse into a wineglass in a moment reminiscent of Lestat de Lioncourt in the 1994 film adaptation of Interview with the Vampire (“It gets cold so quickly,” Lestat says sadly about the rat blood. I wonder if our count here feels the same). 

Warned not to leave his room, Harker does anyway — because why on earth would he stay put in a dark, ancient castle with a strange Count, wolves stalking the perimeter, and no other people in sight? — and is immediately captured by the living gargoyles inhabiting the castle. Their CGI presence leans slightly into Disney’s Beauty and the Beast (1991) or The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), and they are unnecessary, perhaps, but honestly kind of enjoyable (until the end, that is).

Through Harker’s captivity, Dracula recounts his centuries-long wait for Elisabeta’s reincarnation. What follows is unexpectedly comedic and camp in places — and I love it. Dracula lying motionless atop her grave as snow piles on his body; repeated, increasingly ridiculous suicide attempts that he simply walks away from; wandering through royal courts in lavish costumes, dancing as women flock to him; traveling the world and aging forwards and backwards.

His attempt to engineer attraction through perfume — clearly nodding toward Perfume: The Story of a Murderer — didn’t work as well for me. A scent drawing every woman toward him feels impractical, even if it leads to a memorable Versailles sequence under Louis XVI in which Dracula turns countless women into vampires (stand-ins for his brides in the novel) and tasks them with finding Elisabeta reborn. One of them is Maria (Matilda de Angelis), later revealed as the asylum captive.

It just feels like there were better choices he could have made. This is an immortal being, and the best idea he lands on is a fragrance that attracts all women? I don’t know — it doesn’t exactly scream centuries of planning and scheming. Still, I forgive it, because the sequences that come out of it are genuinely incredible and incredibly fun within the film.

After centuries of loneliness, however, Dracula finds hope when he sees Mina — Elisabeta reincarnated — in Harker’s locket. The recognition, the transformation, is immediate. Dracula suddenly looks alive again as he screams for his gargoyles to prepare the carriage, prepare the castle, to make him beautiful once more.

His rejuvenation sequence is bizarre in the best possible way. Using the perfume to send nuns into a psychedelic haze while they form a strange tower of bodies, leaving him perched atop them as they clamor for his bite is weird, bold, and memorable. And, again, I love it.

In Paris, the longing returns to center stage. What follows is a love story written the way only vampires seem capable of writing it. Maria, taken from the asylum in the night by Dracula, brings Mina to him, and the moment is beautiful in its yearning. It feels like a vampiric staple at this point, visually echoing Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992) and mirrored again in the 2022 television adaptation of Interview with the Vampire, when Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid) first lays eyes on the love of his life, Louis de Pointe du Lac (Jacob Anderson), in New Orleans. Both Draculas and Lestat wear big hats, their beloveds moving (mostly) unaware through the world, watched as though they hold the answer to meaning itself within their grasps.

We watch that yearning unfold at close range over the next several minutes as Dracula politely, lovingly, obsessively trails Mina and Maria through the French celebration, his gaze tethered to her every movement as though drawn by gravity itself. Memory stirs within her at nearly every interaction, beginning when he first lifts her hand to his lips in greeting, and again when he guides her grip on a carnival rifle, the touch awakening a vision of another room, another lifetime — their bedroom in 1480 Wallachia — where he once did the same.

But it’s the moments before the firework celebration that everything shifts. Dracula produces a music box to show Mina, one that belonged to his wife and that she played to summon him to her.  And as its melody sings around them, Mina falters. The tune coils around her memory, unsettling and intimate, pulling recognition from somewhere buried deep. Fear and curiosity mingle in her expression; she is shaken yet drawn forward, longing for something she cannot name, something she feels rather than understands. And still, he does not press her.

Ever the gentleman, Dracula escorts Mina back to her lodging in Paris, only for her betrothed, a badly injured Jonathan Harker who barely escaped Dracula’s castle, and the crew of doctors and the priest studying Maria, to bombard her with impossible information: that the man who had walked her back with such quiet, careful devotion is a vampire.

She scarcely has a moment to dwell on this revelation before retreating to her room to rest, to gather herself — and there he is.

Their exchange begins with comedic interaction with her protest at the impropriety of a man unchaperoned in her bedroom, his bemused politeness in reply. But the humor fades quickly as their undeniable connection blooms, awareness building in tandem with the truth of what he is. And in these stolen, suspended moments, the truth quietly comes closer until it can no longer wait.

With her identity fully revealed, she takes the lead, initiating their first kiss in centuries — a kiss that proclaims her acceptance, her desire, her identity as his princess.

The final stretch of the film moves quickly after that. 

Dracula flees with Mina, returning to their castle to live out their lives together. On their heels, the priest and doctors dispatch Maria in a darkly comedic sequence — the priest’s legs flailing in the air, Maria’s head sliced off and twitching — before setting off in pursuit of Dracula and Mina, determined to rescue her and end the reign of the vampire once and for all.

Adorably, we watch Dracula and Mina arrive at the castle in his coffin together (there is nothing more romantic than coffin-sharing, trust me), greeted warmly by the strange, living gargoyles. The couple dances, reveling in the joy of reunion — for all of about five minutes.

Because when I said the doctors and priests were on their heels, I meant it literally. The two barely have a moment in their home before the castle comes under siege. How exactly the attackers muster an army so quickly is largely unshown and unimportant because, in this film, they simply do.

As the attack begins with cannons firing and guns blazing, Dracula leaves Mina in the (sort of) safety of their bedroom and sets out to keep claim of what is his: his land, his castle, and, most importantly, his wife.

The ensuing action sequence is merciless. Dracula slaughters nearly every man storming his home, the fight unfolding in tight, claustrophobic spaces — hallways, stairwells, and narrow corridors — each strike brutal and each movement precise. It is, without question, the bloodiest sequence of the entire film, and among my favorite types of fight scenes.

But what stands out most amid the carnage is the conversation between Dracula and the priest. Blood covers the lower part of Dracula’s face — and it is, by far, his most handsome look in the entire film — and he is utterly unprepared to hear that the priest believes he can be saved. He is unprepared to hear that while Mina may be his “salvation,” he is also her damnation. He is unprepared for any of it.

And those words, they take hold. They stick with him. Deeply.

He rushes back to Mina, the priest’s words echoing in his mind, and she meets him with a kiss that lingers over his bloodied face. In that kiss, the weight of their separation, the ache of lost time, and the certainty of their love now are all undeniable. 

Yet he is ready to give her life back. With quiet resolve, he locks her safely in the room and allows the priest to stake his heart. He does it for her, to release her from the vampiric hold that has bound them both for centuries.

With his death, the castle itself changes. Its magic fades, walls and halls losing the life that had once thrummed through them, and Dracula turns to dust in Mina’s arms.

The reign of the vampire is over.

Do I have criticisms of this film? Absolutely. Most of my issues lie with the ending, which feels rushed compared to the rest of the story. The sudden appearance of a fully prepared army attacking the castle is a lot to absorb. But even more frustrating is that Dracula and Mina barely have more than a few minutes together before they are torn apart forever. Their separation feels unnecessary when done that quickly.

Yes, there is undeniable romance in his willingness to sacrifice himself to spare her damnation, but in this film, it doesn’t fully land. From what we witness, Mina is truly happy, wholly in love, remembering her past life and the depth of her bond with Dracula. His death feels devastating, not freeing. Even her betrothed, Jonathan Harker, seeing her grief, walks away somberly, understanding without words that she does not love him.

They should have had more time — time for the audience to feel, to decide, to witness whether they truly are each other’s salvation or damnation. But that chance never comes.

I also found the reveal of the gargoyles’ existence to be ridiculous. It simply doesn’t make sense within the established magic-lore of the film. Their existence and role feel arbitrary; why were they necessary at all, and why did the magic work exactly this way? It’s a moment that pulled me right out of the story.

But beyond the general ending, Dracula is a beautiful, surprisingly funny, dark, and dreamy Gothic romance well worth a watch.

No, it’s not like the book, the epistolary novel that meticulously documents the horrors of illness, madness, contagion, and Victorian anxieties about life, death, and everything in between. This is a loose adaptation, one that focuses instead on yearning, obsession, and the kind of love that grips every reader and viewer of dark romance. Dracula in this film is desired not only for who he is, but for everything he represents, and it comes across beautifully on screen.

Paired with compositions from the iconic Danny Elfman, Caleb Landry Jones is incredible as Dracula, capturing him at so many different stages of his life. Each incarnation feels distinct yet fully part of this centuries-old creature, who has been achingly lonely in his quest for love. Christoph Waltz may not get a ton of screen time, but he makes the most of every scene he’s in, bringing presence and weight to the priest. Zoë Bleu is wholly believable as a pure-of-heart beauty, compelling enough that I found myself rooting for her to recover her memories just as desperately as Dracula wants her to. And Matilda de Angelis, as Maria, is a wild, nearly manic joy, a vampire presence perfectly suited to her character’s chaotic energy.

Vampire romances are superior — always. If you’re looking for pure horror, this may not be the movie for you. If you want a faithful adaptation of Bram Stoker’s novel, this isn’t that either. But if you love darkness and desire, if you crave a story of obsession and love that stretches across centuries, or if you simply adore vampires in all their immortal glory, you should absolutely give this film a watch. It’s a sumptuous, dreamy, and unforgettable journey into Gothic romance.

Dracula is playing in theaters now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries