Producer: Luc Besson   Director: Luc Besson   Screenplay: Luc Besson   Cast:  Caleb Landry Jones, Christoph Waltz, Zoë Bleu, Matilda De Angelis, Ewens Abid, David Shields, Guillaume de Tonquédec, Raphael Luce, Bertrand-Xavier Corbi, Haymon Maria Buttinger and Jassem Mougari   Distributor: Vertical

Grade: C

The old saw that you can’t keep a good man down certainly applies to the seminal vampire of Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel, even if few of the many movies about him deserve any adjective relating to excellence.

Luc Besson’s very loose adaptation, which follows close on Robert Eggers’ “Nosferatu,” has considerable virtues, most in the visual departments (Hugues Tissandier’s production design, Corinne Bruand’s costumes, Colin Wandersman’s cinematography, and the work of the makeup team and hairstylist Guilaine Tortereau), and musical accompaniment (Danny Elfman’s score).  And one must admit that it adds some wild twists to the book’s narrative, even as it’s indebted to Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 version in some important respects, especially early on.  But it wallows in lushness and Gothic romanticism, and as paced by Besson and edited by Lucas “Kub” Fabiani, it ends up rather turgid, more goofy than scary.

It begins in 1480 Romania, with a scene of extravagant lovemaking between Prince Vlad of Wallachia (Caleb Landry Jones) and his wife Elisabeta (Zoë Bleu).  Their evening is interrupted by Vlad’s soldiers, who literally drag him away to do battle against Ottoman invaders.  After being blessed by the cardinal (Haymon Maria Buttinger), whom he enjoins to protect Elisabeta in his absence, Vlad leads a successful counterattack. (With a nod to Vlad the Impaler, he and his men happily wield spikes to which the heads of the enemy soldiers have been affixed.)

Meanwhile Elisabeta attempts to escape a Muslim raiding party on horseback over a frosty field infested with animal traps. When her steed collapses the pursuers capture her, and Vlad arrives only in time to have her die in his arms.  The distraught husband then kills the cardinal and renounces God.  He’s cursed with immortality and becomes Dracula.

The plot then cuts to 1889 Paris, where a mysterious priest (Christoph Waltz) appears at an asylum to investigate the case of a madwoman named Maria (Matilda De Angelis).  He diagnoses her as a vampire to the amazement of Dr. Dumont (Guillaume de Tonquédec) and his assistant Simon (Raphael Luce).  In investigating her past he contacts her concerned fiancé Henry Spencer (David Shields) and discovers in her old room a sketch of Elisabeta.

Meanwhile lawyer Jonathan Harker (Ewens Abid) has come to the castle of the aged Dracula with an offer to purchase a dilapidated abbey the count owns, which could be refurbished to house tourists arriving for the centenary of the French Revolution.  Harker becomes Dracula’s prisoner, but he manages to postpone death by exsanguination by asking the old man to recount his history.

In what amounts to a lengthy flashback Dracula explains that for four centuries he has been searching for the reincarnation of his beloved princess—a mission that involved traipsing all over the world.  That’s a workable premise, except that Besson goes bonkers in devising the mechanism the count chose to do so.  After years of trial-and-error he found a Florentine perfumer (Nicola Puleo) who was able to confect a fragrance to make him irresistible to women.  Its effectiveness is, for some reason, proven in a montage of synchronized dance sequences of high-born crowds swaying in unison as Dracula dabs the perfume onto his neck.  When that device failed to find the new Elisabeta, he attended an open house at Versailles and attacked the noble crowd, chomping on female necks to create an army of acolytes to do his searching for him.  Maria was among them.

As it turns out, all that effort was for naught, since a locket Dracula takes from Harker reveals that his fiancée Mina Murray (also played by Bleu) is the hoped-for reincarnation of Elisabeta.  Rejuvenating himself in a thoroughly gonzo Bessonian fashion—in a frantic scene, he sucks the blood from a whole convent of nuns, including their Mother Superior (Alex Andréa)—the count regains his youthful form and is off to Paris, where he employs Maria as a means of connecting with Mina.  He then romances the woman by, among other things, taking her to a centennial amusement park where they visit an exhibit featuring a terrifying mermaid (Luc’s own daughter Sateen, resplendent with gleaming tail).

But while Dracula is seducing Mina and persuading her to return with him to his homeland, Van Helsing—sorry, the unnamed priest—is tracking him down.  Eventually they all (as well as a contingent of soldiers, complete with cannons) convene at Dracula’s castle, where a mighty battle ensues, in which the CGI gargoyles that serve as the count’s servants play a major role.  (Presumably VFX supervisor Laurent Creusot intended them to look as cheesy as they do.)  Amidst the mayhem Dracula and the priest have a confrontation that ends rather differently than you might expect.  Besson, it turns out, is not just an inveterate romantic, but sort of an idealist to boot; so is his Dracula.

There’s a loony grandeur to Besson’s take on Stoker’s tale—certainly “inspired by” rather than “adapted from” it.  The result is hardly good in any objective sense, but it holds one’s interest even over the longueurs by its very outrageousness.  Landry throws himself into all the different Draculas on display, from dashing prince to desiccated ancient and renewed dandy, while Waltz periodically arches an eyebrow to indicate how ludicrous he knows the whole business is.  The supporting cast do their best not to roll their eyes, though De Angelis chews the scenery merciless as Maria, both when incarcerated or on the loose.

While Besson’s movie is certainly not faithful to its source, his wacky reimagining of the old story is at least different.