Dracula Lineair Scenario Sequens

Transcription

1 Dracula Lineair Scenario Sequens Onder de still's staan de beschrijvingen uit het scenario van de film - ter vergelijking staan rechts de romanfragmenten uit Chapter II van Dracula van Bram Stoker, Penguin Classics pages Om de verschillen en/of gelijkenissen zo duidelijk mogelijk te maken werden in de romanfragmenten de geluiden vet aangeduid, de persoonsbeschrijvingen rood, de dialoog cursief en de gewone beschrijvingen zwart. Vet = geluiden / Rood = persoonsbeschrijving / Cursief = dialogen / Zwart = beschrijving I heard a heavy step approaching behind the great door, and saw the gleam of a coming light. Then there was the sound of rattling chains and the clanking of massive bolts drawn back. A key was turned with the loud noise of long disuse, and the great door swung back. Within, stood a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white moustache, and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck of colour about him anywhere. He held in his hand an antique silver lamp, in which the flame burned, throwing long shadows as it flickered in the draught of the open door. The old man motioned me in with his right hand with a courtly gesture, saying in excellent English, but with a strange intonation: Dracula, elegantly dressed in a black tuxedo, slowly descends the massive staircase while holding a single candle. Rats and armadillos scurry across the dirtcovered stone floor. A giant spider web hangs from the ceiling above the staircase. When Renfield turns, he is startled to find Dracula walking through the large spider web without disturbing it. "Welcome to my house! Enter freely and of your own free will!" He made no motion of stepping to meet me, but stood like a statue. The instant, however, that I had stepped over the threshold, he moved impulsively forward, and holding out his hand grasped mine with a strength which made me wince, an effect which was not lessened by the fact that it seemed cold as ice, more like the hand of a dead than a living man. The strength of the handshake was so much akin to that which I had noticed in the driver, whose face I had not seen, that for a moment I doubted if it were not the same person to whom I was speaking. So to make sure, I said interrogatively, "Count Dracula?" Dracula glides toward him and memorably introduces himself in an immaculately delivered line (uttered with a Hungarian accent):

2 I am...drac-u-la...i bid you welcome. He bowed in a courtly way as he replied, "I am Dracula, and I bid you welcome, Mr. Harker, to my house. Come in, the night air is chill, and you must need to eat and rest." As he was speaking, he put the lamp on a bracket on the wall, and stepping out, took my luggage. He had carried it in before I could forestall him. Dracula plays the part of a refined, congenial host, a strange aristocratic nobleman in tailored evening dress. He motions for his guest to climb the castle's great stone staircase behind him, just as the sound of wolves can be heard off in the distance. To reassure the frightened man, Dracula smiles and chillingly describes the sounds, in a voice with a lilting, soothing tone:."listen to them. Children of the night. What mu-u-u-sic they make." When he follows Dracula up through the unbroken spider web that spans the width of the staircase,

3 he must use his cane to cut his way through. As the web's spider scurries off, Dracula ominously comments about the spider's prey: " The spider spinning his web for the unwary fly. The blood is the life, Mr. Renfield." I found supper already laid out. My host, who stood on one side of the great fireplace, leaning against the stonework, made a graceful wave of his hand to the table, and said, Renfield is invited into his "more inviting" medieval-looking guest room upstairs, where Dracula is outwardly charming.

4 "I pray you, be seated and sup how you please. You will, I trust, excuse me that I do not join you, but I have dined already, and I do not sup." There is a fire burning, a meal spread out on the table, and a dusty old bottle of wine. Dracula takes Renfield's coat and hat and leaves through a door that opens on its own. The Count himself came forward and took off the cover of a dish, an excellent roast chicken. This, with some cheese and a salad and a bottle of old Tokay, was my supper. During the time I was eating it the Count asked me many question as to my journey. When the host returns, Renfield assures the Count that he has kept his journey a secret - no one in England knows he has come: "I followed your instructions im-plicitly."

5 I had now an opportunity of observing him, and found him of a very marked physiognomy. His eyebrows were very massive, almost meeting over the nose. The Count s mouth, so far as I could see it under the heavy moustache, was fixed and rather cruel-looking, with peculiarly sharp white teeth. These protruded over the lips, whose remarkable ruddiness showed astonishing vitality in a man of his years. For the rest, his ears were pale, and at the tops extremely pointed. The chin was broad and strong, and the cheeks firm though thin. The general effect was one of extraordinary pallor. Renfield has been hired to arrange for Dracula's relocation to a neighborhood in England where he will lease a ruined and deserted English abbey named Carfax Abbey. Only the papers need to be signed to finalize the deal: "Everything is in order awaiting your signature." "I hope I've brought enough labels for your luggage," asks Renfield, anxious to please his client. Dracula describes his 'luggage' (of coffins): "I'm taking with me only three, uh, boxes." Dracula has chartered a ship to take them to England, "leaving tomorrow eve - n - ing." As Renfield handles the lease papers, he cuts his finger on a paper clip. [This is the sole depiction of blood on the screen in this film.]

6 The sinister host reacts eagerly to the sight of blood and reflexively moves closer with a ravenous, blood-maddened look. Before the Count can get closer, the crucifix falls from Renfield's neck into view and dangles over his hand, sending Dracula reeling backwards - he throws his arm over his eyes. As Renfield sucks the blood from his finger, commenting: "It's just a scratch," Dracula looks hungrily at him with an approving grin.

7 The vampire offers "very old wine" from a bottle and pours it into a glass for his guest. Renfield asks: "Aren't you drinking?" We were both silent for a while, and as I looked towards the window I saw the first dim streak of the coming dawn. There seemed a strange stillness over everything. But as I listened, I heard as if from down below in the valley the howling of many wolves. The Count's eyes gleamed, and he said: "Listen to them, the children of the night. What music they make!". Dracula replies with another well-remembered, mellifluous line that he never partakes: I never drink...wi-i-i-ne. Twee van de drie beroemdste zinnen ooit in een horrorfilm uitgesproken: I am Dracula, and I bid you welcome en Listen to them, the children of the night. What (SWEET) music they make! komen ook letterlijk uit de roman van Stoker. De derde staat niet in Stokers roman maar is een vondst van Hamilton Deane: I never drink.wine.