Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary

Did You Know?

• Work on the film deepened but ended Maddin's collaboration with Deco Dawson, who was credited as editor and associate director.
• The film was released theatrically in 2003 due to outstanding critical reception.
• The film is included on the DVD boxed set 'The Quintessential Guy Maddin: 5 Films from the Heart of Winnipeg'.

Plot

In 1897, Count Dracula arrives in London and is invited into the home of Lucy Westenra. She is bitten and taken by his curse, becoming erratic and biting her fiancé Arthur Holmwood. Dr. Abraham Van Helsing places Lucy under care, performs blood tests, declares vampyre, and puts her to bed with garlic. That night, mental patient R. M. Renfield escapes from the asylum next door, and demons break into Lucy's house.

Lucy's mother awakens, panics, opens the door, and inadvertently re-invites Dracula. Both Lucy and her mother are killed, and a funeral procession occurs. Renfield is recaptured and confesses that Dracula has brought Lucy back from the dead as a bloofer lady murdering infants. Van Helsing and Lucy's suitors go to the graveyard, spy Dracula and the undead Lucy embracing.

Van Helsing declares they must destroy the false Lucy. When he opens her coffin, Lucy attacks; she is subdued by Quincy Morris's wooden stakes and Van Helsing's decapitation with a shovel. They learn from Renfield that Dracula plans to attack Mina Murray. Mina, in a convent, aids her injured fiancé Jonathan Harker, who journeyed to Castle Dracula, was ravaged by three Brides, finalized a land deal, and escaped.

Mina finds Harker's diary, learns of his pleasures with the Brides, becomes sexually aggressive, and Harker flees. Mina follows but is kidnapped by Dracula and taken to Castle Dracula.

Critical reception

The film received critical acclaim, with a Metacritic score of 84 based on 19 reviews and an 87% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes from 60 reviews. Variety noted the camerawork showed a will to reinvent silent film conventions rather than blindly adopt them. Film Threat wrote that Maddin's achievement should inspire risk-taking and challenging audiences. Jonathan Rosenbaum praised Maddin's oeuvre, stating his work testifies that the past knows more than the present and that silent cinema is richer and dreamier. Matt Brunson wrote that not since Francis Coppola's take on Dracula had there been a vampire flick as deliriously off the wall. Horror.com's Staci Layne called it a fresh and surreally beautiful balletic interpretation unlike anything she had seen.