I saw it for only the second time tonight on Svengoolie. So cool...

I noticed it was newly very tightly edited, and seemingly somewhat rearranged at times, for tonight's airing. I was surprised by that, as I've never seen this film proceed at such a brisk pace.

I thought the first time I saw it was on Svengoolie but I can't find a listing for it on this Svengoolie episode list.

http://www.imdb.com/seen/tt0414777/?ref_=bd_tv

No surprise as I don't think that list gets a lot of attention.

It did seem that it was missing some parts but I couldn't remember what.

Cal, I do suspect you no doubt previously saw this on an earlier Svengoolie airing, as I know I've seen it air there at least a couple times since I've been getting MeTV on my cable lineup during the last roughly 3-4 or so years. This movie seems to air on a Svengoolie broadcast a time or so per year.

Although I love Svengoolie, great classics like this need to be seen first on TCM or something where they are complete and with no commercials. After you know a movie well, it's fun to watch Sven make fun of them. :)

gen, I'm sure you are right. I know it has been on Sven before.

And jann, I think I actually rented it as a DvD from Netflix about 10 years ago. I'm really late to the classic horror film genre. But nothing has been as cool to me as Faust (1926) and Nosferatu (1922). Those both just blew me away. But considering how Dracula was like 2 years after the advent of sound shows how quickly sound blossomed in movie making. I was not familiar with Swan Lake (2nd movement?) until watching Dracula. I know I had heard it somewhere because it was instantly familiar. And how hauntingly it works!

Universal used Swan Lake for many of their movies in those days. But to me, it is "the Dracula theme" and any version that's got different music in the opening just isn't the same!

Another thing about early sound movies. Did you ever notice that the earliest ones tend to use no background music at all? I think that's because it took them awhile to realize that they should replace the music that in silents was played live in theaters. As a result, the early talkie horror movies, in particular, have an eerie silence surrounding them. Accompanied by the pops and ticks of the old film. It becomes a thing that you start to appreciate as it adds to the eeriness of it all.

First of all, welcome to TMDb, Cal!

I totally agree with you, Jann, that particularly where classic films are concerned, because of the huge eras difference, then to now, it really can make a difference in perception and appreciation of the film not to, on one's first viewing, see it interrupted, and perhaps significantly cut. Until just the other year, I owned the DVD of the restoration of this film, so I was able to readily notice numerous instances of obvious pruning cuts, and some rearranging, when I watched the Svengoolie airing the other night. The edits for the Svengoolie broadcast were done in an alright sort of way, I think, as admittedly the full "as is" version of this film always has been something that would benefit from a significant amount of thoughtful tightening, because of the full version featuring an excess of dead-air space between spoken lines, or certain visual scenes continuing on overly long (to the point of being draggy); many have commented, throughout the years, about the film's overly light editing being a shortcoming of this classic. I entirely agree.

One of the things about this movie that is really impressive is the amazing cinematography. It's truly first rate all the way.

Cal, you may want to consider also giving the 1925 Silent The Phantom of the Opera, and/or 1934's The Black Cat (which co-stars Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff), a look as a couple of very good other early "horror" type options - though neither is an actual "monster" sort of movie, instead are about creepy outcast characters and horror situations. A little further from the horror genre, but very closely aligned with it, is the excellent 1924 Silent The Hands of Orlac. It's psychologically creepy and intense, and much of the time conveys a feeling of the supernatural. A more oblique, but also really good, early option is 1921's Silent The Phantom Carriage, about the phantom of death who collects dead bodies. I have each of the aforementioned films in my personal DVDs collection and am a huge fan of each one.

Fun trivia fact: The terrific prima ballerina who performs in the extended opening ballet sequence of 1925's The Phantom of the Opera is none other than one and the same Carla Laemmle who portrays the nerdy looking girl who speaks the first line, while riding in the moving carriage, in Dracula. Miss Laemmle died just three years ago, aged an impressive 104 years! (I may be misremembering, but am near certain that what she dances to in The Phantom of the Opera is the very same movement of "Swan Lake" you hear in Dracula's opening.)

Following is the link to an informative TCM.com article that I think anyone who's a fan of this movie will find interesting:

http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/73563/Dracula/articles.html

Jann, the first time or 2 I saw Dracula, I thought how perfect a score someone had written for a very early sound film! I would agree it is definitive even without seeing it without Swan Lake. I think it would be pretty disappointing with some other piece, no matter how good it was otherwise.

I couldn't put my finger on it but you said it. We are so used hearing something continuously the silence is very eerie. Funny but where I first noticed the eerie silence was in Nosferatu and Faust. But I noticed it again in Dracula and yet I hadn't figured out what connected the 3.

When I was in college, I took about 13 hours of broadcasting and film, one on the auteur theory and watched many Hitchcock films. But made interesting spiritual but bad financial choices that really kept me from really pursuing my love of film. I didn't even own my own tv until I was 35. But even then I had to spend so much time working 2 jobs. But things greatly improved for me when I started my Netflix subscription. 11 years later I still only do the DVD, no streaming. Like I have a very basic cable package, otherwise I would never stop watching. So, like I said, I little behind the game, not only in classic horror, but on a host of other genre. But classic horror, and even 50s, 60s and up to about the early 1970's are my favorites. I must confess, I am not into that much horror after that. Maybe I am a lightweight but I also don't eat any Mexican food hotter than mild. So I am a little behind but you can't accelerate your appreciation too much. I find I have to watch a classic, watch a bunch of other stuff especially from the same era and/or genre and then re-watch it later. I think this makes you appreciate it all the more and that's what has happened with me watching Dracula.

gen, I've seen The Black Cat 1934 (and 1941) and I think it proves the point of best to see them first commercial and spoofed free. I will have to rent it next time. Hands of Orlac sounds cool. Sounds familiar. But I know I haven't seen it. I must have heard someone talk about it. It could also be that it makes me think of The Man Who Laughs 1928. That one was disturbing, a real spine tingler. Haven't heard of Phantom Carriage but it sounds promising.

For a while I was kind of mystified in my interest in horror given as a teenager I refused to go to haunted houses and assiduously avoided newly-released horror films (and still do). But then I remember as a very young child my family watched a werewolf film shown on tv where the werewolf is killed with an hatchet to the forehead? and then I was amazed to see him turn back into a man. I saw it again on some channel about 10 years ago but I can't remember it's name. We also watched another one where people fell into the vat of acid and then the skeletons walked out. Sounds pretty funny now but it really excited me then. In both of those I couldn't have been older than 6.

And that Carla, who was her famous father?

Carl Laemmle was a producer and one of the founders of Universal Studios.

Just a word about The Phantom Carriage. I would call it a drama much more than a horror, though there is a supernatural element to it.

My very favorite silent horror/drama/thriller is "The Unknown" starring Lon Chaney and a very young (and almost unrecognizable) Joan Crawford. Directed by Tod Browning, who of course, also directed Dracula.

I agree, that The Phantom Carriage is for the most part a drama. Sort of psychological partially supernatural drama. Very dark and often eerie. It's one of those type films that's in a strange category all its own.

Yes: Carl Laemmle was centenarian Carla's uncle. Here's the Wikipedia article about Miss Laemmle: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carla_Laemmle

Horror isn't, with just few exceptions, my "thing". The horror films I do like are old ones that aren't at all about shock and gore, instead are more a state of mind and overall effect sort of horror, creepiness, or eeriness. I guess you could call it "genteel" horror - like the kind of way that Dracula or Nosferatu are.