A Film Directed by André Øvredal

It’s about as far away from the overall vibe of “spooky season” one can get without wearing a Santa hat, but leave it to Hollywood execs to make baffling decisions like releasing a full slate of horror films months too early. A few weeks back, Disney released their new Haunted Mansion film, based on their theme park ride of the same name, to a notably tepid response. Today, I am talking about another film, this time by DreamWorks, that could suffer the same fate. I mean, August 11th is definitely NOT the time I would release a movie based on the 1897 book that changed horror fiction forever, Bram Stoker’s Dracula, but here we are! Hopefully word-of-mouth keeps The Last Voyage of the Demeter from drifting into the box office like a ghost ship devoid of any life, because it might just be one of my surprise hits of the summer.

“Based on a single chilling chapter from Bram Stoker’s classic novel Dracula, The Last Voyage of the Demeter tells the terrifying story of the merchant ship Demeter, which was chartered to carry private cargo–fifty unmarked wooden crates–from Carpathia to London. Strange events befall the doomed crew as they attempt to survive the ocean voyage, stalked each night by a merciless presence onboard the ship. When the Demeter finally arrives off the shores of England, it is a charred, derelict wreck. There is no trace of the crew.”

Directed by Norwegian filmmaker André Øvredal, The Last Voyage of the Demeter takes an obscure portion of Bram Stoker’s Dracula and fleshes it out into a full narrative. This section of the original novel, usually dubbed “The Captains Log”, is generally not dwelled on too much in most of the film and TV iterations of Dracula, so I’d imagine many fans are not too familiar with what transpires. In fact, the 1922 German Dracula copycat film, Nosferatu, is one of the few adaptations that I can think of that shows the sea voyage for a long extent. This “hole” in the narrative is a playground for whatever the production staff wants to do, and that is exactly what happened here. As long as we get some of the bullet points represented here and there and the ship ends up crashed on the beach near Whitby, it’s somewhat free game.

Speaking of Nosferatu, I am a huge fan, and was slightly annoyed that 2022 came and went without any sort of 100th anniversary film celebrating it. Even though The Last Voyage of the Demeter is NOT a full-on adaptation, it has a LOT in common with that German knock-off, and filled that void for me. First of all, “Conde Drácula”, as played by Spanish Actor Javier Botet, is not some sort of debonair heartthrob making young women’s hearts flutter, he is an animalistic monstrosity with sharp teeth that feeds on whatever he can get his hands on. The film also has plot points such as vampires and their thralls bursting into flames from sunlight, a fate not featured in any way in the original 1897 novel, as it was an invention for Nosferatu.

It is said that Drácula’s former country is now “barren of peoples,” presumably due to his feeding and enthralling the masses. England is what he sees as an all-you-can-eat buffet, and a possible new area to add to his empire. Facilitating a one-way voyage to London with the promise of a hefty reward for whatever sailors he can trap is a surefire way to get what he wants. It’s unclear if the monster planned to kill everyone aboard or not, but in doing so the character “shapeshifts “evolves” from a weakened creature scurrying around on all fours, to a winged demon hell-bent on massacring everyone he sees.

One of the more interesting character additions to the story was one that Drácula brought on his voyage as his own “sack lunch”, a girl named Anna. One the verge of death and packed into a box of dirt, she is a young Roma girl that acts as a way to fill in The Creature’s backstory. She is a survivor of his Carpathian conquests and speaks of Drácula as an ancient folkloric beast that has preyed on her people for ages. This version of vampires, taking cues from the “revenant” creature of Eastern European mythology, is something I love and wish more vampire fiction would embrace instead of trying to go the opposite direction, we’ve had Dracula in space, for example, so a back-to-basics approach is somehow refreshing.

The main character, Clemens (as played by Corey Hawkins), is also a solid addition to the story, and shines here. He is a young man that joins the crew of the Demeter as a way to get back to England, but has prior ship experience and was practically raised on a boat. After travelling to Eastern Europe for a spot as a court doctor, he was sadly rejected by the King of Romania due to his appearance. As a black man that was able to graduate from Cambridge University, Clemens is a uniquely educated man for a ship’s crew, but suffers the fate of racism in a world that is not too far divorced from the trans-Atlantic slave trade being commonplace. We learn that he has experience with many fields, including navigation through astronomy, but he largely acts as a doctor aboard The Demeter. The cast is rounded out with solid roles by Aisling Franciosi, Liam Cunningham, and David Dastmalchian.

The biggest strength (for me) in this film, is that it has plenty of practical effects in a world of over-used questionable CGI shortcuts. The “gore hounds” should be happy because there are some real grizzly kills here, and the creature make-up for Dracula is pretty great. When the movie does use computer effects, they are done tastefully and with great composition – such as any time one of The Vampire’s thralls bursts into flames. Add this to some pretty strong acting for a horror film, and some impressive set design, and it rivals many “serious” period dramas.

I really enjoyed André Øvredal’s The Last Voyage of the Demeter, and hope it ends up doing well. This film sets up a sequel (aside from the rest of Dracula, obviously) that I hope gets made, wherein a lone survivor (not spoiling much) vows to destroy Dracula. Who knows if a sequel would include the likes of Abraham Van Helsing, John Seward, Arthur Holmwood, and Quincey Morris, or if this is the beginning of an alternate take on the story, but I am excited to hopefully find out. The baffling release window worries me, and if this fails, the executives can only blame themselves. If you want to get in the mood for Halloween a bit early, I’d definitely recommend “sinking your teeth into” The Last Voyage of the Demeter, a film that proves a “back to basics” approach to classic monster movies is the way to go.