Cinema: Stuffy Nonsense

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Even the work of the director. John Badham, has a slightly restive air, as if he would like to unleash some of the drive and sexual energy that marked his work in Saturday Night Fever. He is technical ly very competent: there is a smooth, pro fessional quality to every shot. But since the script and the entire design of the pro duction are aimed at stressing the roman tic at the expense of the passionate and obsessive elements in this tale, he gets to do only the odd clutching-hand scare shot and a few nicely staged chases. There is evidence— a dinner Dracula gives Lucy that is lit by thousands of candles, for example—that he is capable of much stronger mood and atmosphere. But it is as if someone decreed that this was to be a Dracula for adults, forgetting that the sto ry has always been for adults regressing to adolescence, with its hopeless loves and wild fantasies. There is no point in retelling this tale if you are going to be stuffy about it- Richard

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