And the fun shall continue

Ok folks, and this time by folks, I mean Kathy, and maybe Mike if he gets these updates...
Now, at the request of Kathy, I'm going to continue this tom foolery on a limited basis, but on one condition:
When writing for class, I always had an angle, a purpose, a keyword, something for each movie that I could generate a coherent thought about. From now on, I will require someone to provide me with such a starting block. Feel free to get creative, I just need something to talk about.
This week, however, is a freeby.

Bram Stoker's Dracula
and a word of inspiration...... legend.
Yes yes, that'll do nicely.
For what is Dracula if not a legend?
I'm relatively new to any serious inquiry into vampire lore, but from what I've seen, they're creepy and awesome.

Some Common Vampire Legends C/O the FVZA (Federal Vampire and Zombie Agency....seriously I'm not makin this shit up... www.fvza.org... no foolin)

1. Vampires sleep in coffins
- probably not true, a vampire would sleep wherever it feels safe
probably arose from the fact that when people were infected with whatever various and sundry disease was believed to be vampirism at the time, they were interred before they died, I guess to save time or something.

2.Vampires can be repelled by garlic
- while vampires have heightened senses to compliment their superhuman strength and durability, garlic serves only as a particularly pungent odor, and is really just a temporary distraction. I.E. garlic is to a vampire in bloodlust as the lingering stank of my last turd loaf is to me en route to my next.

3. Sunlight causes vampires to burst into flames
-according to the good folks at the FVZA, vampires have hyperdilated irises, therefore sunlight blinds them. Also, for some reason, the neural connections in a vampire's brain go haywire when sunlight hit's their skin? I dunno if I'm buyin this anymore. Your tellin me vampires COULD walk in the day if they were middle eastern women with sunglasses?, or bought snuggies? Kinda makes em seem a little lazy.

OK, enough of that nonesense, back to the movie.

Gary Oldman (commissioner gordon in the new batman movies) is a bad-ass extreme in this one. Old man, young man, monster, bat-thing, werewolf, fog, creeper, you name it, he does it. I hope the vocal work is all natural, because that was friggin sweet, I suspect some heavy tampering with his voice though.

Anthony Hopkins is Abraham Van Helsing, a crazy old doctor in this rendition. Often fun to watch, but more often a WTF kinda guy. Guy's crazy as a rat in a tin shit house.

Other secondary characters were also believeable if not spectacular: Cary Elwes as Arthur, Bill Campbell as.... Jesus, I can't do this anymore

KEANU REEVES AND WINONA RYDER?
What the holy crap was he thinking?
it's like Pauly Shore bailed on being dracula, and Coppola said "shit, now I actually gotta make a serious movie"
I don't know if I've ever heard worse british accents than my mom doing an Austin Powers impersonation after a round of Jack Daniels, but Keanu is close.
In all fairness, there were boobs..... quite a few boobs. And Tom Waites, who I didn't know acted, that was a pleasant surprise.

Ok rant over. This was actually a solid find, It's very true to Stoker's original, the visual effects are elegant and very effective (except that blue flame shit, what's that all about?)
The shape transitions were cool, but probably a little over-used. The whole movie was a fairly creepy affair, but I loved the way the sets used for the castle seemed just that much creepier.
This is a story that might take a few viewings to fully appreciate, but I'm down with that.

That's what I got for now folks. Maybe more to come on this one, but it's bedtime right now.