Dracula 2000
Encyclopedia
Dracula 2000, also known internationally as Dracula 2001, is a 2000 horror film
Horror film
Horror films seek to elicit a negative emotional reaction from viewers by playing on the audience's most primal fears. They often feature scenes that startle the viewer through the means of macabre and the supernatural, thus frequently overlapping with the fantasy and science fiction genres...

 written and directed by Patrick Lussier
Patrick Lussier
Patrick Lussier is a Canadian horror and thriller genre writer, editor and director.- Career :Lussier has worked as a film editor on most of Wes Craven's latter films, including Wes Craven's New Nightmare, Vampire in Brooklyn, Scream and Red Eye and has directed films including Dracula 2000, The...

. The film stars Gerard Butler
Gerard Butler
Gerard James Butler is a Scottish actor who has appeared on film, stage, and television. A trained lawyer, Butler turned to acting in the mid-1990s with small roles in productions such as the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies , which he followed with steady work on television, most notably in...

, Christopher Plummer
Christopher Plummer
Arthur Christopher Orne Plummer, CC is a Canadian theatre, film and television actor. He made his film debut in 1957's Stage Struck, and notable early film performances include Night of the Generals, The Return of the Pink Panther and The Man Who Would Be King.In a career that spans over five...

, Jonny Lee Miller
Jonny Lee Miller
Jonathan "Jonny" Lee Miller is an English actor. During the initial days he was best known for his roles in the 1996 films Trainspotting and Hackers...

, Justine Waddell
Justine Waddell
Justine Waddell is a South African born, British actress. Her roles include playing Estella in the 1999 BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations and her dual role in 2006 feature film The Fall...

, Omar Epps
Omar Epps
Omar Hashim Epps is an American actor, singer, songwriter, and record producer. His film roles include Major League II, Juice, Higher Learning, Scream 2, The Wood, In Too Deep, and Love and Basketball. Epps' television work includes the role of Dr. Dennis Gant on the US medical drama series ER,...

, Colleen Fitzpatrick
Vitamin C (artist)
Colleen Ann Fitzpatrick is an American pop music singer, songwriter, dancer, and actress better known by her stage name, Vitamin C. Her singles include "Graduation ", "As Long As You're Loving Me", "The Itch", and her most successful hit the Top 20 Gold certified "Smile"...

, Jeri Ryan
Jeri Ryan
Jeri Lynn Zimmermann Ryan is an American actress best known for her roles as the liberated Borg, Seven of Nine, on Star Trek: Voyager; Tara Cole on Leverage; and Veronica "Ronnie" Cooke on Boston Public. She was also a regular on the science fiction show Dark Skies and the legal drama series...

, and Jennifer Esposito
Jennifer Esposito
Jennifer Esposito is an American actress, dancer and model, known for her appearances in films such as I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, Summer of Sam and Crash and in television series such as Spin City, The Looney Tunes Show and Samantha Who?.-Early life:Esposito, an Italian-American, was...

.

Dracula 2000, the promotional title of which is Wes Craven Presents: Dracula 2000, builds upon Bram Stoker
Bram Stoker
Abraham "Bram" Stoker was an Irish novelist and short story writer, best known today for his 1897 Gothic novel Dracula...

's 1897 novel Dracula
Dracula
Dracula is an 1897 novel by Irish author Bram Stoker.Famous for introducing the character of the vampire Count Dracula, the novel tells the story of Dracula's attempt to relocate from Transylvania to England, and the battle between Dracula and a small group of men and women led by Professor...

, with Count Dracula resurrected in the year 2000. The movie was a critical and commercial disappointment, though it gained a cult following
Cult following
A cult following is a group of fans who are highly dedicated to a specific area of pop culture. A film, book, band, or video game, among other things, will be said to have a cult following when it has a small but very passionate fan base...

 which resulted in two direct-to-video sequels.

Plot

Matthew Van Helsing (Plummer), the alleged descendant of the famed 19th century Dutch medical doctor, Abraham Van Helsing
Abraham Van Helsing
Professor Abraham van Helsing is a protagonist from Bram Stoker's 1897 novel, Dracula.Van Helsing is a Dutch doctor with a wide range of interests and accomplishments, partly attested by the string of letters that follows his name: "M.D., D.Ph., D.Litt., etc." The character is best known as a...

, owns an antique shop in early 21st century London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

. One night with Van Helsing upstairs, his secretary, Solina (Jennifer Esposito
Jennifer Esposito
Jennifer Esposito is an American actress, dancer and model, known for her appearances in films such as I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, Summer of Sam and Crash and in television series such as Spin City, The Looney Tunes Show and Samantha Who?.-Early life:Esposito, an Italian-American, was...

), allows a group of thieves, led by her boyfriend, Marcus (Omar Epps
Omar Epps
Omar Hashim Epps is an American actor, singer, songwriter, and record producer. His film roles include Major League II, Juice, Higher Learning, Scream 2, The Wood, In Too Deep, and Love and Basketball. Epps' television work includes the role of Dr. Dennis Gant on the US medical drama series ER,...

), into the shop. The thieves infiltrate the shop's underground high-security vault and find a sealed silver coffin protected by a deadly defense system. Based on the level of security surrounding the coffin, Solina and Marcus decide that the coffin’s contents must be valuable, so they escape with it and flee to New Orleans, Louisiana
Louisiana
Louisiana is a state located in the southern region of the United States of America. Its capital is Baton Rouge and largest city is New Orleans. Louisiana is the only state in the U.S. with political subdivisions termed parishes, which are local governments equivalent to counties...

. When Van Helsing discovers that the coffin has been stolen, he boards a plane to America, telling his apprentice, Simon Sheppard (Jonny Lee Miller), to remain in London. Simon does not follow his mentor’s orders and travels to Louisiana as well.

Aboard the plane, one of the thieves manages to open the coffin, revealing the dormant body of Count Dracula (Butler). Dracula awakens and attacks the thieves, causing the plane to crash in the Louisiana swamps. Dracula survives the crash and travels to New Orleans where college students Mary Heller (Waddell) and Lucy Westerman (Fitzpatrick) are living. Mary is estranged from her family and has recently been plagued by dreams of a strange, terrifying man.

Van Helsing and Simon arrive in New Orleans and destroy the newly turned vampires left in Dracula’s wake. After the battle, Van Helsing reveals to Simon that he is in fact the original Abraham Van Helsing who defeated Dracula in 1897. Because he was unable to destroy Dracula permanently, Van Helsing hid Dracula's body and prolonged his own life with regular injections of Dracula's blood until, one day, he could discover a way to kill Dracula for good. Simon is intrigued by Dracula's hatred of all things Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

 and wonders why Dracula is also particularly vulnerable to silver.

Van Helsing also tells Simon about his daughter, Mary, who was taken from England by her mother after the truth about his identity came to light. Since Mary was conceived after Van Helsing began his injections, she shares blood and a telepathic link with Dracula. Van Helsing knows that Dracula senses Mary's existence and is in New Orleans to find her.

Van Helsing and Simon try to reach Mary before Dracula does, but fail to do so before Dracula turns Lucy into a vampire. Dracula and his three new brides, Solina, Lucy, and Valerie, corner Van Helsing and kill him. Simon and Mary escape, only to be captured by Dracula shortly thereafter.

Dracula takes Mary to a rooftop and reveals his secret: He is none other than Judas Iscariot
Judas Iscariot
Judas Iscariot was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve disciples of Jesus. He is best known for his betrayal of Jesus to the hands of the chief priests for 30 pieces of silver.-Etymology:...

, the one who betrayed Jesus
Jesus
Jesus of Nazareth , commonly referred to as Jesus Christ or simply as Jesus or Christ, is the central figure of Christianity...

 for a bribe of thirty pieces of silver. But as he went to hang himself, the rope snapped and as punishment he was cursed and had to live for two thousand years as a vampire. The three brides appear with Simon, and Dracula tells Mary to bite him. She fakes the bite and together Mary and Simon kill the three brides. Angered, Dracula tried to throw her from the rooftop. Mary wraps some cable from a large crucifix around Dracula's neck and they both fall from the roof. Dracula hangs as he attempted to do two thousand years before. But this time the rope does not break; and he burns in the first sunlight.

Cast

  • Gerard Butler
    Gerard Butler
    Gerard James Butler is a Scottish actor who has appeared on film, stage, and television. A trained lawyer, Butler turned to acting in the mid-1990s with small roles in productions such as the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies , which he followed with steady work on television, most notably in...

     as Count Dracula
    Count Dracula
    Count Dracula is a fictional character, the titular antagonist of Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic horror novel Dracula and archetypal vampire. Some aspects of his character have been inspired by the 15th century Romanian general and Wallachian Prince Vlad III the Impaler...

     (Judas Iscariot
    Judas Iscariot
    Judas Iscariot was, according to the New Testament, one of the twelve disciples of Jesus. He is best known for his betrayal of Jesus to the hands of the chief priests for 30 pieces of silver.-Etymology:...

    )
  • Christopher Plummer
    Christopher Plummer
    Arthur Christopher Orne Plummer, CC is a Canadian theatre, film and television actor. He made his film debut in 1957's Stage Struck, and notable early film performances include Night of the Generals, The Return of the Pink Panther and The Man Who Would Be King.In a career that spans over five...

     as Matthew/Abraham Van Helsing
    Abraham Van Helsing
    Professor Abraham van Helsing is a protagonist from Bram Stoker's 1897 novel, Dracula.Van Helsing is a Dutch doctor with a wide range of interests and accomplishments, partly attested by the string of letters that follows his name: "M.D., D.Ph., D.Litt., etc." The character is best known as a...

  • Jonny Lee Miller
    Jonny Lee Miller
    Jonathan "Jonny" Lee Miller is an English actor. During the initial days he was best known for his roles in the 1996 films Trainspotting and Hackers...

     as Simon Sheppard
  • Justine Waddell
    Justine Waddell
    Justine Waddell is a South African born, British actress. Her roles include playing Estella in the 1999 BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations and her dual role in 2006 feature film The Fall...

     as Mary Heller
  • Danny Masterson
    Danny Masterson
    Daniel Peter "Danny" Masterson is an American actor and DJ best known for his role as Steven Hyde in That '70s Show.-Early life:...

     as Nightshade
  • Jeri Ryan
    Jeri Ryan
    Jeri Lynn Zimmermann Ryan is an American actress best known for her roles as the liberated Borg, Seven of Nine, on Star Trek: Voyager; Tara Cole on Leverage; and Veronica "Ronnie" Cooke on Boston Public. She was also a regular on the science fiction show Dark Skies and the legal drama series...

     as Valerie Sharpe
  • Colleen Fitzpatrick
    Vitamin C (artist)
    Colleen Ann Fitzpatrick is an American pop music singer, songwriter, dancer, and actress better known by her stage name, Vitamin C. Her singles include "Graduation ", "As Long As You're Loving Me", "The Itch", and her most successful hit the Top 20 Gold certified "Smile"...

     as Lucy Westerman
  • Jennifer Esposito
    Jennifer Esposito
    Jennifer Esposito is an American actress, dancer and model, known for her appearances in films such as I Still Know What You Did Last Summer, Summer of Sam and Crash and in television series such as Spin City, The Looney Tunes Show and Samantha Who?.-Early life:Esposito, an Italian-American, was...

     as Solina
  • Lochlyn Munro
    Lochlyn Munro
    Richard Laughlain "Lochlyn" Munro is a Canadian actor.-Life and career:Munro was born in Lac La Hache, British Columbia. He started his acting career after a serious sports injury ended his dream of playing professional hockey. While playing music in various clubs around Vancouver, British...

     as Eddie
  • Sean Patrick Thomas
    Sean Patrick Thomas
    Sean Patrick Thomas is a Guyanese-American actor. He is perhaps best known for his co-starring role in the 2001 film Save the Last Dance, as well as his television role as Detective Temple Page in The District and also "Barber Shop".- Early life :Thomas is the son of immigrants from Guyana and was...

     as Trick
  • Omar Epps
    Omar Epps
    Omar Hashim Epps is an American actor, singer, songwriter, and record producer. His film roles include Major League II, Juice, Higher Learning, Scream 2, The Wood, In Too Deep, and Love and Basketball. Epps' television work includes the role of Dr. Dennis Gant on the US medical drama series ER,...

     as Marcus
  • Tig Fong as Dax
  • Tony Munch
    Tony Munch
    Tony Munch is a Canadian actor. He is best known for his roles in Land of the Dead as Anchor and in the films Cube Zero, Shoot 'Em Up and .45.-Filmography:*Red Coat Justice as Cobb...

     as Charlie
  • Shane West
    Shane West
    Shane West is an American actor, musician and songwriter. West is best known for portraying Eli Sammler in Once and Again, Landon Carter with Mandy Moore in A Walk to Remember, Darby Crash in What We Do Is Secret, and Dr...

     as J.T.
  • Tom Kane
    Tom Kane
    Tom Kane is a prominent American voice actor with over 25 years of experience. He is most widely known for his animation work...

     as The Newscaster
  • Nathan Fillion
    Nathan Fillion
    Nathan Fillion is a Canadian actor, currently starring as Richard Castle on the ABC series Castle. He is also known for his portrayal of the lead role of Captain Malcolm Reynolds in the television series Firefly and its feature film continuation, Serenity.He has acted in traditionally distributed...

     as Father David
  • David J. Francis
    David J. Francis
    David J Francis is a Canadian actor, director, producer, editor and screenwriter.- Biography :Francis began his career 1999 as "Callum" in the Television serie Amazon and became his first minor role in the movie The Ladies Man as V.S.A. Member...

     as Jesus of Nazareth

Box office and reception

Dracula 2000 opened at #7 in its first week at the box office with $8.6 million. In its second week, the film had a 56.5% drop-off, but hung onto the #8 spot. The film grossed $33 million domestically and $47 million worldwide, on a $28 million budget. On its initial video release, it grossed an additional $32 million in the US and Canada and is still making money worldwide. Dracula 2000 was the sixth highest grossing film for Miramax/Dimension Films in 2000, exceeding the box office takes of such expensive Dimension Films releases like Reindeer Games
Reindeer Games
Reindeer Games is a 2000 American film, directed by John Frankenheimer and starring Ben Affleck, Gary Sinise, and Charlize Theron. It was Frankenheimer's final theatrically released film and received poor reviews.-Plot:...

and Impostor
Impostor (film)
Impostor is a 2002 American science fiction film based upon a short story of the same name, written by Philip K. Dick in 1953.-Plot:The movie takes place in the year 2079. Forty-five years earlier, Earth was attacked by a hostile alien civilization from Alpha Centauri...

, as well as the Miramax Film December opener for that year, All the Pretty Horses
All the Pretty Horses (film)
All the Pretty Horses is a 2000 American romance western film, directed by Billy Bob Thornton and based on the novel of the same title by author Cormac McCarthy. It stars Matt Damon and Penélope Cruz...

.

Critically, Dracula 2000 has earned a rating of 15% on Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...

 and 26 out of a 100 on Metacritic
Metacritic
Metacritic.com is a website that collates reviews of music albums, games, movies, TV shows and DVDs. For each product, a numerical score from each review is obtained and the total is averaged. An excerpt of each review is provided along with a hyperlink to the source. Three colour codes of Green,...

. Berge Garabedian of JoBlo offered a positive review, calling it "A fun vampire movie", "a novel adaptation of an old time legend", and "[good] for pretty much anyone looking for some enjoyable bloody fun." BeyondHollywood.com wrote, "Dracula 2000 is not the worst vampire movie I've seen, but it's definitely not the best either. There are some very good moments, most of them featuring the frail Van Helsing as he attempts to battle the fast and deadly vampires. Also, I appreciated the background given to Dracula's aversion to silver, crosses, and God, as well as Dracula's 'true' origins. Not bad work, but it could have been much better."

Owen Gleiberman
Owen Gleiberman
Owen Gleiberman is an American film critic for Entertainment Weekly, a position he has held since the magazine's launch in 1990. From 1981–89, he worked at the Boston Phoenix....

 of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a "C-" score, while James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli
James Berardinelli is an American online film critic.-Personal life:Berardinelli was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey and spent his early childhood in Morristown, New Jersey. At the age of nine years, he relocated to the township of Cherry Hill, New Jersey...

 of ReelViews panned the film, writing: "Of all the indignities to have been visited upon Dracula during the past century (including being the "inspiration" for a cereal and a Sesame Street
Sesame Street
Sesame Street has undergone significant changes in its history. According to writer Michael Davis, by the mid-1970s the show had become "an American institution". The cast and crew expanded during this time, including the hiring of women in the crew and additional minorities in the cast. The...

character
Count von Count
Count von Count, often known simply as "The Count", is one of the Muppet characters on Sesame Street, performed by Jerry Nelson. The Count is a vampire modeled after Bela Lugosi's interpretation of Count Dracula.-Description:...

, and being lampooned by Mel Brooks
Dracula: Dead and Loving It
Dracula: Dead and Loving It is a 1995 comedy film starring Leslie Nielsen, directed by Mel Brooks. It is a parody of the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker, and of some of the films it inspired....

), none is more unsettling than what has happened to the world's most famous vampire in Dracula 2000."

Soundtrack

The film's rock
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

 soundtrack includes Linkin Park
Linkin Park
Linkin Park is an American rock band from Agoura Hills, California. Formed in 1996, the band rose to international fame with their debut album, Hybrid Theory, which was certified Diamond by the RIAA in 2005 and multi-platinum in several other countries...

's song "One Step Closer
One Step Closer (Linkin Park song)
"One Step Closer" is a song by the American rock band Linkin Park. It was released as the first single and second track of their debut album, Hybrid Theory. This song is also featured in the game Rock Band 2....

", System of a Down
System of a Down
System of a Down, also known by the acronym SOAD and often shortened to System, is a rock band from Southern California. The band was formed in 1994. It consists of Serj Tankian , Daron Malakian , Shavo Odadjian and John Dolmayan...

's cover of Berlin
Berlin (band)
Berlin is an American New Wave/Synthpop band. The group was formed in Los Angeles in 1978 by John Crawford . The band contained Crawford, Terri Nunn , David Diamond , Ric Olsen , Matt Reid and Rod Learned . Learned left during the first EU tour and was replaced by Rob Brill...

's "The Metro
The Metro (song)
"The Metro" is a new wave song written by John Crawford for his band, Berlin. The song has been covered by a number of artists, including System of a Down, Alkaline Trio, John Frusciante and Hannah Fury...

", Slayer
Slayer
Slayer is an American thrash metal band formed in Huntington Park, California, in 1981 by guitarists Jeff Hanneman and Kerry King. Slayer rose to fame with their 1986 release, Reign in Blood, and is credited as one of the "Big Four" thrash metal acts, along with Metallica, Megadeth and...

's song "Bloodline" and Disturbed's song "A Welcome Burden". The original music score is composed by future Academy Award-nominee Marco Beltrami
Marco Beltrami
Marco Beltrami is an American film composer.-Life and career:Beltrami was born in Long Island, New York of Italian and Greek descent...

.

Sequels

Dracula 2000 was followed by two direct-to-video
Direct-to-video
Direct-to-video is a term used to describe a film that has been released to the public on home video formats without being released in film theaters or broadcast on television...

 sequels, Dracula II: Ascension
Dracula II: Ascension
Dracula II: Ascension is a 2003 horror film, directed by Patrick Lussier. It stars Jason Scott Lee, Stephen Billington, and Diane Neal. The film is the sequel to Dracula 2000. It was released direct-to-video on June 7, 2003...

in 2003 and Dracula III: Legacy
Dracula III: Legacy
Dracula III: Legacy is a 2005 horror film and the sequel to Dracula 2000 and Dracula II: Ascension. The film was directed by Patrick Lussier and stars Jason Scott Lee, Jason London, Roy Scheider, and Diane Neal...

in 2005. Patrick Lussier
Patrick Lussier
Patrick Lussier is a Canadian horror and thriller genre writer, editor and director.- Career :Lussier has worked as a film editor on most of Wes Craven's latter films, including Wes Craven's New Nightmare, Vampire in Brooklyn, Scream and Red Eye and has directed films including Dracula 2000, The...

and Joel Soisson, who directed and wrote all three films, created a plot for a fourth film and discussed releasing it theatrically, but no film has yet been produced.
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