The Last Voyage of the Demeter
If we must have yet another Dracula movie, it’s probably a good idea to have a change of venue. Rather than revisit castles, and London, and every other setting we’ve seen ad nauseam in previous movies, why not put Dracula aboard a cargo ship enroute to England? After all, that is the setting of chapter 7 in Bram Stoker’s novel. As for the captain and crew stuck on the ship with the vampire: talk about a captive audience.
Alas, The Last Voyage of the Demeter was just … so-so. You might expect that with such an inherently dangerous, eerie setting, the atmospheric possibilities for a horror movie would be delicious. Instead, the ship was kind of cool, but not that cool; Dracula himself was kind of cool, but not that cool; and the ominous sea was mostly missing in action.
I suspect the mediocrity of the film is due to the triumph of computerized effects over practical effects. Had Voyage been filmed in 1975 in a giant water tank on a soundstage, I think it would have been a better movie. Release: 2023 Grade: C+
Would I watch it again? Not likely.
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