Dracula: Voyage Of The Demeter Dir: Andre Ovredal (Film Review)

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Dracula: Voyage Of The Demeter, or Bat Man Goes Sailing, charts the course of Dracula from Romania to England. Needless to say, there is a significant body count.

This film is based on a brief chapter of Bram Stoker’s 1895 novel  titled The Captain’s Log (where’s William Shatner I hear you ask) in which the deadly Vampire ups stakes and moves to  London.

Set in the mid to late 1890’s director Andre Ovredal (Trollhunter) paints a gothic, stylized picture of the ship, the crew and the monster.

The merchant ship, Demeter is carrying 50 unmarked crates from Carpathia to London…what could go wrong?

Plenty.

Dracula
(from left) Clemens (Corey Hawkins) and Anna (Aisling Franciosi) in The Last Voyage of the Demeter, directed by André Øvredal.

We meet Clemens, a black physician (a rare thing back in the 1890’s) who seems to be the only sensible man on the ship and is played handily by Cory Hawkins. Well, actually Captain Elliot (Liam Cunningham) is fairly competent, but its his last voyage as he is retiring (we know what that means).

In addition to the unwanted vampire on board, we discover young Anna, a stowaway with a Russian accent that sounds like her best friend could be named Boris.

She’s onto it, but ultimately she and much of the action and plot are stereotypes and clichés.

The film loses what little momentum it build up about halfway through…it’s 118 minute running time is about 30 minutes too long (where are the editors??)

The final third of the film gives a few good scares, the blood-sucking is suitable gory and Dracula is plenty frightening.

But from the beginning we know where this film is going…down to Davey Jones’ locker.

Marty Duda

Dracula: Voyage Of The Demeter Opens Today.

 

Marty Duda
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