Dracula 3D

***Dracula 3D*** is a 2012 vampire horror film co-written and directed by Dario Argento and starring Thomas Kretschmann, Rutger Hauer, Marta Gastini, and Unax Ugalde. An Italian-Spanish-French co-production, the film is Argento's first 3D film. Kretschmann took the role of Dracula; he later played Abraham van Helsing in the Budapest-shot television series *Dracula*.

## Plot:

During the Walpurgis Night in the woods adjacent to the village of Passo Borgo, located at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains, a couple of young lovers, Tania and Milos, secretly meet and make love. After fighting, Tania removes the cross Milos had given her. On her way home, Tania is chased by a supernatural owl that kills her. Some time later, Jonathan Harker, a young librarian hired by Count Dracula, a nobleman from the area, arrives at the village. Tania's body mysteriously disappears from the cemetery. In the meantime Harker, before going to Count Dracula's castle, takes the opportunity to visit Lucy Kisslinger, his wife Mina's best friend as well as the daughter of the local mayor.

Upon arriving at the castle, Harker is greeted by Tania, reanimated as a vampire, who tries from the very beginning to seduce him; however they are interrupted by Dracula's entrance welcoming Harker. Dracula shows Harker the library he is to catalogue. The following night Tania, having burnt Harker's photo of his wife Mina, tries again to seduce and bite Harker, partially undressing in front of him, but a furious Dracula intervenes, throwing her across the room. Dracula bites Harker's neck, but allows him to live. Dracula meanwhile visits Renfield in his cell and frees him from his chains; Renfield acknowledges Dracula as "Master". That night Harker glimpses Dracula climbing unnaturally up the outside wall of the castle. The following day, a weakened but still conscious Harker attempts to escape, but as soon as he is outside the castle a large wolf with a white lock changes into Dracula, who savages him.

Meanwhile, Mina, Harker's wife, arrives in the village and is a guest for a few days at the home of her dearest friend Lucy Kisslinger, who also gets bitten and turned. The day after, Mina, worried about her husband, goes to Count Dracula's castle. Their encounter makes her forget what happened during her visit. She is completely under the count's influence; the count had orchestrated the events leading up to their encounter; in fact Mina looks exactly like his beloved Dolingen de Gratz, who died some centuries ago.

Returning to the Kisslinger house, Mina learns of the death of her dear friend Lucy. The sequence of such strange and dramatic events summons the aid of Van Helsing, vampire expert of the techniques used to eliminate them. Van Helsing, aware of the circumstances, decides to act swiftly and prepares the tools needed to combat vampires. He directs himself to the center of evil, Count Dracula's castle.

Meanwhile, Dracula goes to the village and kills Renfield and the inhabitants who betrayed him, while Van Helsing, inside the castle, is able to definitively kill Tania and a now-undead Harker. Dracula, intent on his desire to reunite with his beloved wife, leads Mina, completely hypnotized, to the castle where Van Helsing is waiting. He has decided to engage in a deadly fight with his evil foe. During the struggle Van Helsing

loses his gun loaded with a silver bullet, but Mina, shaking off Dracula's spell, picks up the gun and kills Dracula with it. The special silver bullet transforms Dracula into ashes and Mina limps out of the graveyard, Van Helsing along with her. After they leave, however, Dracula's spirit lifts the ashes into the air and, uniting, they shape into a large wolf that leaps forward.