Dracula 3D

"Hey Dad!", says daughter Asia to father Dario - "I'd love to be in a "Dracula" movie." "Oh, ok then", he retorts. "I can arrange that. Even better - why not do it in 3D?". A few friendly phone calls later and we end up with this cringeworthy television-style movie that purports to be sexy but is actually a rather sleazy and uninspired remake of a story that has already been, quite literally, done to death. The wooden and uncharismatic Unax Ugalde is the "Jonathan Harker" character who travels to visit the eponymous Count (a completely non-menacing Thomas Kretschmann) in his remote castle and that is where they all ought to have stayed. The rest of this follows the standard format as his wife "Mina" (Marta Gastini) becomes the object of the insatiable desire of his blood sucking host. Panic stricken, he turns to the clearly down-on-his luck Rutger Hauer ("Van Helsing") to step in and try to save the day, and the young couple, before they, too, become creatures of the night. The whole thing makes Hammer look like Fellini. The make up and effects are straight out of a toothpaste tube (or ketchup bottle), the dialogue is as flat as a pancake and the entire enterprise has an almost risible sterility to it that starts off mildly amusing but ends up hammy and nigh-on unwatchable. Even for the most ardent fans of the "Dracula" stories, this is will be a struggle and maybe one to just avoid.