Hey 3.5 readers.
This is going to be a quick, basic review because this is a quick, basic movie.
Perhaps you horror buffs will remember that in the novel, Dracula, there is some mention of how the titular villain shipped himself to England from Transylvania aboard the ship the Demeter in a box of dirt, said vessel was found run a ground off the coast of England a wreck, the crew all dead and no Dracula to be found.
This is the story of how that happened, how the crew discovered that their cargo was noneother that the world’s most infamous vampire and how they fought bravely (spoiler alert to no avail) to keep him from reaching shore).
All you aspiring writers out there be inspired by public domain fiction for there are all sorts of little tidbits like this to build on.
Liam Cunningham of Game of Thrones fame, David Dastmalchian and Corey Hawkins lead a crew of ne’er-do-wells against the Drac attack. Unfortunately, if you’re familiar with the novel then you already know the ending going into it, and the story is largely confined to the ship. There’s not a lot of room for character development, growth, romance or what have you. They set sail. They discover a vamp in a box. They fight it. They lose. The end.
Still worth a watch. If you feel like the trip to the cinema you could do worse than this but otherwise I’d wait to stream.
STATUS: Shelf-worthy. Some movies are steaks and some movies are moldy tuna fish sandwiches. This is a solid peanut butter and jelly sammy that will get you through but you’ll forget it tomorrow.
Bookshelf Battle 