Aesthetics of Transformation

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Chapter 1

Aesthetics of Transformation

Cinema a child of twentieth century, has by now achieved the significance

that is its due. There was a time when cinema was looked down upon as low form of

mechanical reproduction of reality. However matters have changed over the years,

with masters of the medium creating poems on celluloid, thus helping to break

prejudices and broaden the critical vision. It is acknowledged today that cinema is a

unique art with room enough to incorporate other art forms like music, dance, and

literature.

As a popular medium of communication and entertainment, cinema has

acquired enormous significance these days. Critical theories have sprouted up to

support it and film studies has been recognized as a major discipline. It has

influenced the cultural, sociological and political changes taking place all over the

globe. The role of films in filling the voids caused by lack of interaction between

cultures and in imparting ideas and ideals is now acknowledged. The growth of

cinema into a serious medium of artistic expression and the rapid proliferation of

theories about film aesthetics is indeed amazing. Major achievements of the film

world are now granted the same respectability as similar feats in the spheres of

literature and art, and are subjected to critical scrutiny using similar tools of

analysis. In short, the aesthetics of cinema has now come to the limelight of

attention of theoreticians and critics.


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The visual dimension of film has associations with painting; its dependence

on movement links it with dance and its ability to produce kinetic and emotive

effects equate it with music. As it involves the performance of artists and needs

spectators its relation to theatre is explicit. Above all, film is an art based on science

and technology. But the art with which narrative film has most in common is

literaturein its use of plot, characters, setting, dialogue and imagery, its strategies

of expression, its tendency to manipulate space and time.

An artistic adaptation is a work in a particular medium that derives it impulse

as well as a number of its constituent elements from a work in a different medium. It

is caught up in the web of intertexual transformations, of texts generating other texts

in an endless process of recycling, transmutation and transcreation. In adaptation, an

already proven work of art is transformed into another. To quote Julia Sanders,

Adaptation is frequently a specific process involving the transition from one genre

to another: novels into film; drama into musical; dramatization of prose narrative

and prose fiction; or the inverse movement of making drama into prose narrative

(9).

There is a long established tradition of film adaptations of literary sources

starting with the cinematic adaptations of the Bible. By 1910, adaptations of the

established literary canon had become a marketing ploy by which producers and

exhibitors could legitimize cinema going as a venue of taste and thus attract the

middle class to the cinema. Literary adaptations gave films the respectable cachet of

entertainment as art. Besides, literary adaptations have also been seen to have


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pedagogical valuein teaching a nation about its classics and its literary heritage.

Adaptation of a literary work into film might involve quite a few theoretical

concerns. There is a whole range of equivalences between film and literature. These

relate not merely to shared themes and content, but to common narrative strategies

and formal preoccupations as well. While these would naturally encourage a

summary alignment of film with the narrative dramatic genres of literature, there

have been attempts even to approximate film to the sub genres of lyrical poetry.

In the late fifties and early sixties, with the development of Italian Neo-

realism and French New Wave, there evolved the complex, challenging, even

puzzling genre that came to be enigmatically called art film. This attempted to

show that the language of the film was in no way inferior to or more simplistic than

that of literature. In an effort to establish cinema as a distinct form of art, film

scholars initiated a number of revolutionary changes. They developed an

audiovisual vocabulary with all the undercurrents of metaphor, symbol, allegory,

ambiguity and paradox. The cinematic images almost rivaled those of poetry in

combining emotional and intellectual complexity. The language of film and the

language of literature share the same crucial ability to address both intellect and

emotions, to evoke feeling and thought, and sometimes engage both faculties at

once.

The shift from artistic independence to artistic interdependence has

become a unique and essential feature of aesthetic development in the


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twentieth century. Of various genres of literature, the novel has a special kind

of intimate relationship with film. Even while undergoing revolutionary

changes in the process of evolution to the complex mlange of twentieth

century art, these two disciplines have followed the trend of artistic exchange

rather than purity.

Both film and fiction are linguistic phenomena, being founded on the

basic concept of the sign. Both use signifiers to connote a world of meanings,

the signified. The word and the frame, signifiers in literature and film

respectively, are both visualthey are perceived with the eye. When a word

is read, it refers to or creates a mental image or concept that signifies

meaning. When a frame is watched, the effect is more immediatehere the

image that signifies meaning is not mental but directly presented to the eye.

Thus, it might be said that the filmmakers task is easier. It could also in one

sense narrow the scope of the medium, if the signifier in the film was too

explicit to unravel further possibilities of signified.

However, it has been argued that a cinematic frame can provide far

more information than the more ambiguous word. A film speaks through its

frames just as fiction speaks through words. Besides, in film, each angle,

each cut, would make a different signification. .Juxtaposing shots makes

them collide and it is from the collision that meaning is produced.The

meaning produced through montage is further enriched by devices like music


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and acting.Verbal signs work conceptually whereas cinematic signs work

directly, sensuously and perceptually. Films are generally divided by critics

into four major classes for practical and pedagogical purposes:( a) narrative

film equated with fictional story telling (b) documentary films (non-fictional

or factual), (c) experimental films (pertaining to the avante garde) and (d)

animation. Like a novel a narrative film is narrative fiction,controlled by a

narrative voice, a teller (the camera lens) that lets us see what it wishes.And

like a novel, a film is capable of leaping in time and space,a common feature

of narrative fiction.The various components of cinematographic form,

namely visual emphasis,shifting points of view, adventitiousness, lack of

depth, montage, spatialization of time and space, and the use of the camera

eye, are amply illustrated in modern fiction.

Most of the writers of fiction after the advent of film were greatly

influenced by the medium, the writings of most of the modern novelists of

twentieth century were cinematic as they were naturally excited by the

discoveries of the cinema and attemted to borrow from, and even rival these

in their own medium.William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway are two such

writers of the twentieth century. Practically every resource of modern film

the close up, the medium shot, the long shot, the moving camera, parallel

editing, referential cross cutting, colour, and even sound recording can be

seen in their work.


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Being a visual medium, film employs a multiplicity of techniques, but

its greatest impact on the novel is perhaps in this very visual aspect.Though

present in earlier writing, too, the emphasis on the visual gained a greater

impetus in the early years of the twentieth century, especially with

Impressionistic writers like Virginia Woolf and James Joyce. The primary

distinction between novel and the cinema arises from the fact that the former

is a verbal medium ,whereas film is essentially visual.A good novelist writes

scenes that are memorable, for his visual imagination and powers of

description are directed by the keen impulse to record fully and accurately a

specific moment of perception. He uses verbal descriptions as a film maker

uses the lens of his camera to select, to highlight, to distort and to enhance

in short, to create a visualized world that is both recognizable and more

vivid, intense, and dramatically charged than actuality.A good film director is

likewise sensitive to an artistic use of camera and often creates unforgettable

scenes in his films.The traffic is indeed two-way.

Pont of view is an issue that concerns fiction and film. Problems

relating to point of view have existed since the dawn of narration. Stated

simply, point of view in fiction determines the relationship between the

narrative material and the narrator through whose eyes the events of the story

are viewed. In other words, the ideas and incidents are sifted through the

consciousness and the language of the storyteller, who may or may not be a


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reliable guide for the reader to follow. To put it somewhat simplistically,

among the four basic types of point of view, (first person, omniscient, third

person, and objective), it is seen that the objective or impersonal mode is

naturally superior to any other that allows for direct appearance by the author

or his reliable spokesman.

In a movie, on the other hand, point of view tends to be less rigorous

than in fiction, giving the director the freedom to adjust his camera lens at his

will. The camera, like an eye, functions in a special way for a special

purpose, seeing what the spectator could see if he were himself present at the

scene. Thus it can be said that a novelist who strives for the appearance of

objectivity is actually attempting an approximation of the cameras view of

things. Moreover, the director can focus his camera upon subjective details,

rejecting the inessential. This use of shifting points of view in the filmic

mode shares several similarities with the way in which multiple points of

view are handled in fiction, bringing the novel closer to the cinematographic

form. The fictional world is not directly represented to the reader; rather it is

signified by the narrators words. Unlike fiction, film works by directly

showing the fictional world to the spectator. In his perceptive account of the

history of cinema, Louis Gianetti writes about the basic differences between

novel and film. In fiction, the distinction between the narrator and the reader

is clear: it is as though the reader was listening to a friend telling a story. In


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film, however, the viewer identifies himself with the lens, and thus tends to

fuse with the narrator:

In literature, the first person and the omniscient voice are mutually

exclusive, for if a first person character tells us his own thoughts

directly, he cant also tell uswith certaintythe thoughts of others.

But in movies, the combination of first person and omniscient

narration is common. Each time the director moves his cameraeither

within a shot or between shotswe are offered a new point of view

from which to evaluate the scene. He can easily cut from a subjective

point-of-view shot (first person) to a variety of objective shots. He

can concentrate on a single reaction (close-up) or the simultaneous

reactions of social characters (long shot). (370-71)

Cinematic devices such as fast-motion, flips, freeze-frames, and exaggerated

performances may serve as comparable equivalents to the novels literary

tropes, namely irony, mock-heroism, parody, compression and cutting, and

the mutation of the narrative into the dramaticall these are essential to the

process of adaptation. Another parallel between film and fiction is setting,

an essential element of any narrative. It can add to a storys credibility and

serve as an essential clue to characterization. In both film and literature

setting gives a sense of mood and atmosphere.


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Manipulation of time is another important fact that should be

considered in any study of novel and film. Film has only the present at its

disposal whereas fiction has the present, the past and the future. However it

could be argued that as one experiences every thing seen on screen as

happening in the present, so it is in the case of literature too. As one

deciphers a passage in a novel about an incident that took place years ago, a

mental image is created in which the action takes place in the present tense.

Time in film is shortened or stretched using techniques like slow and fast

cutting, repetition of shots, and so on. Eisenstien and Alfred Hitchcock were

experts in time manipulation in film. In a work of fiction, the task is

comparatively simpler, for it can easily be achieved by narrating a story from

two vantage points simultaneously.

Fiction relates especially to one of the sensesthe eye from the

readers or spectators point of view as well, fiction and film provide two

distinct kind of experience, essentially the private experience of an

individual. Fiction excites the imagination of the reader, encouraging him to

reflect on what he reads. A film, on the other hand, is a multi-sensory

experience, typically enjoyed in the company of others. Hence the responses

of a spectator to a film may be immediate and spontaneous, often conditioned

by the responses of other viewers. The two forms are equally capable of

summarizingliterature does it with a studied choice of words in which


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meaning is condensed, while the film compresses meaning into sensory

experiences. Film can summarize events extending over years into a matter

of few moments through a montage of several scenes.

Ever since Edwin S.Porter made the first story-telling film, The Great

Train Robbery, in 1903, critical opinion maintained that the film is

essentially a form of a literature. This, however, is not exactly true. While

film and literature both aim to express concrete situations involving the

development of a plot and the exposition of character and environment, the

medium through which they seek to accomplish these ends are entirely

different. Film depicts concrete situations involving plot development and

characterization, setting and environment, emotional reactions and

philosophic attitudes and concepts, by means of a series of plastic images

visual representations projected upon a screen in a darkened room before an

audience. It is seen and heard by its audience and secures its characteristic

form and rhythm by the purely filmic process of editing. The medium of

literature however makes use of words for all its purposes. The novelist

originally creates words or sentences in order to achieve the maximum

literary power to stir the thoughts and emotions of the readers. In spite of

such basic differences of form and style, filmmakers naturally turned to

literature, especially novels, for the essential ingredient on which their

narration is based, namely, the story.


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The controversy about the relationship between the novel and the film

is perhaps a hundred years old, starting from the first days of

cinematographic history. Though ideally the novel and the film should be

regarded as independent entities, several critics still harp upon the question

of narrativity and fidelity to the text. Geoffrey Wagner, for example, has

divided film adaptation into three modes: the transposition, in which a

novel is directly given on the screen with a minimum of apparent

interference; the commentary, where an original story is taken and is either

purposely or inadvertently altered in some respect; and the analogy, which

must represent a considerable departure for the sake of making another work

of art. Some patterns of transposition are Peter Bogdanovitchs adaptation of

Henry James Daisy Miller (1974), and James Ivorys adaptation of E

M.Forsters Howards End (1992). Orson Welles Chimes at Midnight

(1966) is a commentary on three Shakespearean plays. Francis Ford

Coppolas Vietnam film Apocalypse Now (1979), which is loosely based on

Joseph Conrads tale of nineteenth century colonial enterprise in Congo,

Heart of Darkness, is an example of analogy

The adaptation of an art work from one medium to another seems to rests on

a supposition that there exists a content to be transferredtransformed

from one form of expression to another. The same assumption comes to play

while discussing adaptation from novel to film. As stated by Somdatta


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Mandal in Fiction and Film: Word to Image, in art, the content, if the word

must be used does not exist apart from its form. A change in form results in

another content(46). This implies that adaptation from novel to film is a

different form of expression.

An adaptation of a novel into film always brings forth the issue of

fidelity to the source text. The familiarity of the novel to the audience

influences their judgment unlike a film made from an independent story.

Whatever be the mode of adaptation followed by the filmmaker

transposition, commentary, or analogyit is perhaps through infidelity that

the most creative acts of adaptation take place. Such creative efforts by some

veteran artists have resulted in the making of film classics. It is interesting to

note that some inferior novels when adapted have become classics of film.

Likewise, film versions of many celebrated novels have resulted in mediocre

films.D.W Griffiths Birth of a Nation (1915), one of the gems of cinema,

was made from of a low-rated novel by Thomas Dixon, The Clansman.

Alfred Hitchcock is known for adapting films in his own unique way with

creative interpolations and craft. However, when a viewer goes to see a film

made from a famous novel or short story, s/he would generally expect a

literal transcription to follow, and when his/her expectations are not met,

which is quite often, s/he is left with a sense of betrayal.


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Brian Mcfarlane in his book, Novel to film, briefly summarizes that

adaptation is replacing one illusion of reality for another (21). He looks

into how one illusion replaces another and what elements play a role in the

shape of the end result of adaptation. Mcfarlane divides the elements that

make up a novel into two distinct categories of which he calls transfer and

adaptation proper. Transfer is concerned with those elements, which can be

taken almost directly from the novel and transferred to the film, while

adaptation proper is concerned with those elements which need to be

reinterpreted for the film. Under transfer, Mcfarlane enumerates the elements

of story/plot distinction. While story is the simple basic succession of events,

the raw material, the plot is the way in which the story is creatively

deformed. While the novel and film share the same story, the plot strategies

are different.

Roland Barthes in his Introduction to the structural Analysis of

Narratives (1966) distinguishes two main groups of narrative functions;

distributional and integrational functions (89). Though Barthes is not

concerned with cinema in this discussion, this distinction is valuable in

sorting out what maybe transferred (ie.from novel to film) from that which

may only be adapted. To distributional functions, Barthes gives the name of

functions proper; integrational functions he calls indices. The distributional

functions are those which are related to a narratives actions and events, and


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are often easier to transfer than integrational functions, which are related to

those narrative elements that are more diffuse, and are prone to adaptation

proper than transfer. The functions are again subdivided to include cardinal

functions and catalysers.

Cardinal functions are the hinge points of narrative: that is, the

actions they refer to open up alternatives of consequence to the

development of the storyThe linking of cardinal functions

provides the irreducible bare bones of the narrative. ( Mcfarlane, 13-

14)

Mcfarlane points out the identification of character functions as the

next important step of adaptation process. Character function is the part

played by the characters in the plot. Adaptation study includes isolation of

chief character functions and analyzing how they are represented in the film

version. The elements mentioned above are those elements that can or should

be implemented into a film directly from the novel with out changing them or

with out having them to adapt to a different medium. However, there are

elements that have to be adapted because of the difference between the two

media. This is what Mcfarlane calls adaptation proper, which requires the

adapters interpretation.

Some of the impact of the film adaptation depends upon the

audiences awareness of its relationship with the source texts. In anticipation


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of this most formal adaptations carry the same title as their source text. For

some adaptations this is not necessary. For example, West Side Story (1961)

is a modern day adaptation of Romeo and Juliet, set in the New York City of

the1950s. This is also the case with Francis Ford Coppolas Apocalypse Now

(1979), a loose adaptation of Joseph Conrads Heart of Darkness. In such

works the real interest lies not in the source text, but in the film. There are

many film adaptations that have successfully cashed in on the time when the

popularity of the novel was at its peak. David O.Selznicks film adaptation of

Margaret Mitchells Gone with the Wind (1939) was made when the novel

was at the height of its popularity.

If adaptation has supporters, it also has detractors. George Bluestone

holds that despite superficial similarities, the movie and the novel are

essentially antithetical forms [] a film adaptation will, even at its very best,

be a lesser work of art than its source (62). According to Virginia Woolf,

the alliance between film and literature is unnatural and disastrous to both

forms. An examination of the arguments against adaptation would show that

in their desperate strugglein the case of film, for status and legitimacy, and

in literature, for mere survivalboth overstate their case. The apprehension

of an adaptation devouring or destroying its literary source need not be taken

as valid, as it can be seen that the literal survival of the work is never at

stake. If adaptation is not destructive to literature, it is even more difficult to


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imagine it being detrimental to film. The mere fact that a film derives from a

literary work does not actually undermine the mediums uniqueness or

versatility.

In an adaptation the originality of the work is always in question.

Since the material was born out of another artists imagination, it is often

said that the work is not authentic. The concept of originality does not affect

the medium of film as such. What is important is the way in which the

original material has been recreated. The treatment of the original source in

its transposition from one medium to another is what counts. Considering the

novel versus film debate with special focus on the problems of adaptation,

one can only accept the fact that as long as popular novels or literary

masterpieces continue to be adapted to the screen, these problems will persist

and critics will continue to harp on the sanctity of the literary text. It might

be appropriate to quote Joy Gould Boyum:

In assessing an adaptation, we are never really comparing book with

film, but an interpretation with an interpretationthe novel that we

ourselves have recreated in our imaginations, out of which we have

constructed our own individualized movie, and the novel on which

the film maker has worked a parallel transformation. For just as we

are readers, so implicitly is the filmmaker, offering us, through his

work, his perceptions, his visions, his particular insight into his


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source. An adaptation is always, whatever else it may be, an

interpretation. (61-62)


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Chapter 2

Horror films and fiction

Film adaptations of diverse sub genres of fiction have almost always been

received with great enthusiasm. Some of the sub genres of fiction most frequently

adapted for movies are Westerns, Espionage, Horror and Science fiction. Whatever

be the critical reception, most of these films proved immensely popular with the

audience. Films belonging to these categories were produced within a very short

time after the dawn of the new medium. By the end of the first twenty-five years of

film history, there were at least a handful of such films, namely, TheGreat Train

Robbery (1903) in the genre of Westerns, Nosferatu (1922) and The Cabinet of

Dr.Caligari (1919) in Horror films and Fritz Langs Metropolis (1926) in science

fiction. Many of these films and their source novels grew in popularity and became

part of the popular culture. The characters of these films and novels became icons

and the actors became stars. Thus we have Frankenstein and Dracula as modern

myths in popular imagination, with Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff as stars. This

chapter proposes to examine film adaptations of horror fiction with special emphasis

on Bram StokersDracula.

At one time, many academicians and critics were less than enthusiastic about

popular genres, and considered them low art. The distinction between popular art

and real art gained strength in the early years of the twentieth century. The

detective stories and the macabre fiction in vogue at that time were not conferred


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with literary merit on account of their sensational nature. However, with the

theoretical approach to literature, this has changed and these once-marginalized

genres have gained acknowledgement. Serious studies into the latent significations

of these genres have helped to demarcate a place for them in literary history. An

important work that was thus brought out of obscurity into the limelight of attention

was Bram Stokers sensationalDracula (1897).

The sub genre of fiction to which Dracula belongs, the Gothic novel, had its

origin in England in the eighteenth century, with the publication of Horace

Walpoles The Castle of Otranto: A Gothic Story, and flourished in the early

nineteenth century. Following Walpoles example, writers of such novels set their

stories in the medieval period, often in a gloomy castle furnished with dungeons,

subterranean passages and sliding panels, focusing on the sufferings imposed on an

innocent heroine by a cruel villain. Ghosts, mysterious disappearances, and other

sensational and supernatural occurrences were characteristic features of such novels.

Their main aim was to evoke chilling terror through mystery and a variety of

horrors. Some of the best works of this kind opened up to fiction the realm of the

irrational and of the perverse impulses and the nightmarish terrors that lie beneath

the orderly surface of the civilized mind. Ann Radcliffes The Mysteries of

Udolpho (1794) and Mathew Gregory Lewis The Monk (1796) can be classed

among the best novels of the gothic genre.

The term has also been extended to refer to a type of fiction which may lack

the medieval setting but develops a brooding atmosphere of gloom and terror, and


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represents events which are uncanny or macabre or melodramatically violent, and

often deals with aberrant psychological states. Mary Shellys Frankenstein (1818)

was among the most remarkable and influential of such works. In America, Edgar

Allen Poe was the major contributor to the field, with works such as Tales of

Mystery and Imagination. The 1880s saw the revival of the Gothic as a powerful

literary form allied to fin de siecle decadence. Classic works of this period include

Robert Louis Stevensons Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), Oscar Wilde's The

Picture of the Dorian Gray (1891) and Henry James's The Turn of the Screw (1898)

.In 1897 little known Irishman, Bram Stoker, published Dracula, which as soon

came to be regarded on an equal footing with Frankenstein andDr. Jekyll and Mr.

Hyde.

Abraham Stoker was born in 1847 near Dublin. Until the age of eight, he

suffered from a debilitating disease which left him largely confined to his bed.

Echoes of this can, perhaps, be found in Draculas attachment to his coffin. The fact

that his mother used to tell him ghost stories may also have helped. However, like

many a child confined to bed, Bram Stoker also occupied himself in voracious

reading. Doctors baffled by the exact nature of his illness would have been

surprised by the fact that when Bram Stoker did finally escape from bed, he did so

with vigour and determination enough to be regarded the best athlete in Trinity

College, Dublin. Bram graduated from Trinity at the age of 20. He wanted to be a

writer, but his civil servant father persuaded him to follow in his footsteps. Thus


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Stoker began a stint at Dublin Castle, where he wrote Duties of Clerks of Petty

Sessions in Ireland(1879), a work far less lurid than his later fictions.

He wrote a great deal in his eight years in the civil service, and soon began to

be published. The Crystal Cup (1872) was published by the London Society, and in

1875 The Chain of Destiny was printed in The Shamrock. Probably more

important than these were his unpaid theatrical reviews for Dublins Evening Mail

and The Irish Echo. These allowed him to cultivate a friendship with the famous

English actor Sir Henry Irving. Irving offered Bram the post of manager of the

Lyceum theatre, London, in 1878. This allowed Stoker to leave the civil service and

to marry Florence Balcombe. As Irvings manager he had occasion to rub shoulders

with some of the most prominent people of the day, among them Walt Whitman, the

artist Whistler, Mark Twain, George Eliot and four American presidents.

Stokers first book, Under the Sunset(1882), was a collection of fairy tales

for children. This was followed in 1890 by his first novel, The Snakes Pass. He

published two more novels in 1895: The Watters Mou and The Shoulder of Shasta.

At this time, Bram Stoker was doing research on vampires, and discovered the

history of Vlad Dracula (more popularly known as Vlad the Impaler), a

Wallachian prince famous for executing hundreds of people by impaling them on

spikes. This gave Bram Stoker the germ for his most famous character and the

novel: Dracula (1897). The publication of Dracula was destined to remain the high

point of Stokers literary career. Many other novels met with failure and were of


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mediocre quality. The Jewel of Seven Stars (1903) is generally considered to be the

book that comes closest to recapturing the magic of Dracula. His last effort before

he died in 1912 was The Lair of White Worm (1911)

Dracula was favorably received by critics of the time despite its moderate

success. Christian World called it the "one of the most enthralling and unique

romances ever written" and as "the most blood-curdling novel of the paralysed

century" (Dalby, 423) and the theme of good triumphing over evil struck a chord

everywhere. Other reviewers made flattering comparisons of Dracula to the novels

of Wilkie Collins. Again, good reviews appeared when the book was published in

the USA in 1899. The review in The Daily Mailof 1 June 1897 hailed it a classic of

Gothic horror:

In seeking a parallel to this weird, powerful, and horrorful story our mind

reverts to such tales as The Mysteries of Udolpho, Frankenstein, Wuthering

Heights, The Fall of the House of Usher...butDracula is even more appalling

in its gloomy fascination than any one of these. ( Auerbach and Skal 363-4 )

Dracula has been claimed by many literary genres such as, horror fiction, the gothic

novel and invasion literature. Throughout the 1880s and 1890s, authors such as H.

Rider Haggard, Rudyard Kipling, Robert Louis Stevenson, Arthur Conan Doyle,

and H.G. Wells wrote many tales in which fantastic creatures threatened the British

Empire. Invasion literature was at its peak, and Stoker's


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formula of an invasion of England by continental European influences was, by

1897, very familiar to readers of fantastic adventure stories.

Structurally, Dracula is a novel in the epistolary tradition arranged in the

form of a collection of diary entries, telegrams, and letters written by the characters,

as well as fictitious clippings from the Whitby and London newspapers, and

transcripts of phonograph cylinders. This literary style, first made famous by

Wilkiie Collinss The Woman in White (1860), one of the most popular novels of the

19th century, was considered rather old-fashioned by the time of the publication of

Dracula, but it adds a sense of realism to the novel and provides the reader with the

perspective of most of the major characters.

Literary critics have examined many of the themes of the novel, such as the

role of women in Victorian culture, conventional and repressed sexuality,

immigration, post-colonialism and folklore .Before writing Dracula, Stoker spent

seven years researching European folklore and stories of vampires, influenced

especially by Emily Gerard's 1885 essay "Transylvania Superstitions", and a

discussion with Arminius Vambery on Balkan superstitions. Though the most

famous vampire novel ever, Dracula was not the first of its kind. It was preceded

and partly inspired by Sheridan Le Fanu's Carmilla (1871), about a lesbian vampire

who preyed on a lonely young woman. The image of a vampire portrayed as an

aristocratic man, like the character of Dracula, was created by John Polidori in The

Vampyre (1819). Another influence on Dracula was the Irish folk tales that captured

Stokers imagination when he was a child. The novel acquired its iconic legend


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status and wide popularity in the twentieth century, mainly on account of film and

theatrical adaptations.

Not many novels have achieved quite as much popularity and critical

acclaim after its film adaptation as Dracula. German Expressionism had by then

found expression in horror films with the making ofThe Cabinet of Dr.Caligari

(1920) by Robert Wiene, andNosferatu (1922) by F.W.Murnau.The latter film was

the (unofficial) first adaptation of Bram Stokers Dracula, and is still regarded as a

masterpiece of German expressionist cinema and one of the most critically

acclaimed horror films.As Murnau did not have the literary rights to Bram Stoker's

Dracula, he changed the locale, altered the plot slightly and changed the vampire's

name to Count Orlock, who was played by Max Schreck, an eerie looking German

actor. However, Stokers widow filed a suit against the production, and the court

ordered the film to be destroyed. However, thanks to the phenomenon of video

piracy, this masterpiece still exists.

An official adaptation of Dracula produced by Universal Studios, and

directed by Tod Browning, was brought out in 1931. The script for the film was not

based on Stoker's Dracula; instead it was based on a popular play by John

Balderston and Hamilton Deane. Its popularity is probably due to Bela Lugosi's

performance as Dracula, who, with his Hungarian accent and satanic appearance,

captured the popular imagination with his seemingly authentic depiction of a

vampire. This movie inaugurated a craze for horror films in Hollywood in the

1930s, withFrankenstein in 1931.The fifties saw the reproduction of the Universal


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horror film in colour by Hammer studios of Britain. Horror of Dracula directed by

Terence Tisher in 1957 in lush technicolor established Hammers reign which was

to last for the next two decades. Christopher Lee played the role of Dracula and this

resulted in type casting, with Lee being almost considered synonymous with

Dracula for the next two decades. Another version of Dracula produced by BBC in

1970 is now claimed by some critics to be the most faithful adaptation of the novel.

Two other important adaptations of Dracula were made by the celebrated German

director Werner Herzog, and by John Badham in 1979, before the making ofBram

Stokers Dracula by Francis Ford Coppola.

The cinematic interpretation of the novel by master film makers seems to

have altered the attitude of the critics towards it, and this could perhaps also account

for the publication of the novel in the World Classics Series by Oxford University

Press in 1980. An important and interesting feature in film adaptations ofDracula

down the decades is the effort on the part of the interpreters to read the story from

angles different from that of the author. Each of these films had some thing to add to

the mythology of Dracula, making possible a diverse number of readings. A unique

interpretation was that given by F.W Murnau inNosferatu(1922), where vampirism

is equated with plague and sexuality.The sexual innuendoes of the novel were

rightly identified by the directors, and were highlighted in the treatment of the

story.There were attempts to include the point of view of the villainous

protagonist .In the craftful hands of Werner Herzog, the Dracula becomes the

legend of a human being who is alienated from the society, while John Badham


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views Dracula as a Byronic hero or as a polished Heathcliff. So in the 1990s, when

Francis Ford Coppola attemptedDracula it is no wonder that it became an immortal

story of love and passion, even while claiming to be the faithful adaptation of the

novel by the very act of naming itBram Stokers Dracula.

Francis Ford Coppola, the veteran Hollywood film maker, who had The

Godfather(1972) andApocalypse Now (1979) to his credit, was at the height of his

powers when he considered filming Dracula in 1992. With his accurate camera eye

and mastery of the medium, Coppola was particularly interested in the adaptation of

novels into film, his Godfatherbeing a film version of Mario Puzos best selling

novel and Apocalpse Now a reworking of Joseph Conrads Heart ofDarkness.

These films established Coppolas fame as one of the master craftsmen of celluloid.

So, when the project ofDracula was announced, it was eagerly awaited by critics

and others. As a story told many times on screen it was a challenge to the director to

make his film different from previous versions, and the film is proof positive of the

success of his endeavour.

Born in Detroit, Michigan in 1939, Coppola belonged to an Italian-American

family which moved to New York after his birth. His father, Carmine Coppola was

a musician, whose musical scores Francis made use of in his movies .At the age of

ten, Coppola was affected by polio while on a Cub Scout trip and was paralyzed on

his left side. Bedridden for nine months, he watched TV continuously and turned to

making puppet shows for his own entertainment. Coppola was told he would never

walk again, but his father refused to accept this prognosis and hired a


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physiotherapist. Gradually Coppola recuperated and was able to return to school.

Later, he was admitted to the New York Military Academy at Cornwall-on-Hudson

on the basis of his proficiency in playing the tuba. He detested the schools

emphasis on sports and ran away to Manhattan after eighteen months. Returning to

high school, he continued to play the tuba and began writing plays. His aptitude as a

playwright gained him a scholarship to Hofstra University. As one of the Hofsta's

top students he earned a reputation as a loudmouth. He graduated from Hofstra with

a BA in Theater Arts in 1959 but still had no desire to be a director. His attitude

changed quickly when he saw Sergei Eisenstein's Ten Days That Shook the World

(1927). He later said of the film, "On Monday I was in the theater, and on Tuesday I

wanted to be a film-maker" (Bergan 16).

Coppola then entered UCLA Film School for a master's degree in the fall of

1960. While at UCLA, he met Roger Corman, an independent auteur and became

his right-hand man. Assisting Corman in the production of horror films, Coppola

became script editor, production assistant, associate producer, dialogue director,

sound recorder, and second unit-director. As an assistant he directed his first feature

filmDementia 13 (1963) a thriller about an axe-murderer. While shooting the film

in Ireland, he fell in love with Eleanor Neil, a graduate of the UCLA Art

Department. They were married in Las Vegas in 1963. Coppola directed his second

film, Youre A Big Boy Now (1966) as his thesis for the UCLA Master of Fine Arts.


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Coppola's first major recognition came in 1971 when he won an Oscar (along

with Edmund North) for the screenplay of Patton (1970). The film was a

tremendous success for Coppola and eventually gained him the opportunity of

writing the screenplay for The Great Gatsby (1974). The Godfather marked the

beginning of Coppola's rise to prominence in the year 1972.When Mario Puzos best

selling novel about the Italian crime family was selected for adaptation by

Paramount, they chose Coppola to direct the film because he was the only Italian

director in Hollywood. The film (and its sequels in the trilogy) tells the saga of the

Corleone family over many years and was originally titled Mafia. The film offers a

character study of Don Vito Corleone, the head of the family and of his son

Michael, and the history of other members of the Corleone family over the years.

Coppola agreed to write and direct the movie on condition that it would not be a

gangster movie but a family chronicle. Major stars like Marlon Brando and Al

Pacino collaborated with him and with Mario Puzo on the script and the film bagged

three Academy awards in1972, marking for Coppola his place on the map of

Hollywood.

Between The Godfatherand The Godfathert II, Coppola wrote and directed

The Conversation (1974), which was nominated for Academy awards for Best

Picture and Screenplay. AfterThe Conversation, he moved on to Apocalypse Now

(1979), Coppola's most daring and controversial film, loosely based on Joseph

Conrads 1922 novel,Heart of Darkness. The film was of epic proportions and the


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setting was changed from Congo in the novel to war-torn Vietnam in the film.

Apocalypse Now was nominated for eight Academy Awards and won awards for

Best Cinematography and Best Sound. Coppola entered it in the Cannes Film

Festival of 1979 and it was awarded the Golden Palm. At Cannes, Coppola said of

his film, "My movie is not about Vietnam... my movie is Vietnam"(Bergan 17).

In the 1980s Coppola suffered financial setbacks with the failure ofOne from

the Heart (1982), and had to struggle for existence till he made a tremendous

comeback withPeggy Sue Got Marriedin 1986.A light hearted comedy, this movie

introduced actors such as Nicholas Cage (Coppola's nephew), Helen Hunt, and Jim

Carrey. The movie turned struck box office gold, and gained Coppola greater

financial success than any other film he released in the 1980's. This, however, was

overshadowed by a family tragedy when his son Gio was killed in a boating

accident. Tucker: The Man and His Dream (1988) followed two years later.

Although it was entertaining, the film bombed at the box office. Coppola ended the

1980s on a bad note but good things were to come his way in the 1990s. The

Godfather III (1990) was Coppola's first project of the 1990s, followed by Bram

Stoker's Dracula (1992), which earned $82 million at the U.S. box office in its first

two months. The revenue from Dracula helped put Coppola back on his feet

financially. His two most recent films are Jack (1996), The Rainmaker (1997)

adapted from John Grisham's novel, and Youth Without Youth (2000).


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Coppola has produced and directed more failures than hit films, but the

awards he has won have helped to overshadow this. He received an Academy

Award nomination for Best Director for The Godfatherand finally won the Oscar

for The Godfather II. He also received Academy awards for Best Adapted

Screenplay for The Godfather and The Godfather II. The Conversation (1974)

received a Best Original Screenplay Academy Award nomination and won the

Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. He has also won a BAFTA Film Award

for Best Direction forApocalypse Now. Coppola has had an unusual but prodigious

film career over the last four decades, having made films over a broad range of

content and genre.

Coppola took on a considerable risk and challenge with the Dracula project,

as it is one of the most frequently adapted of novels. The interpretation of the novel

and the title character by Universal Studios in the 1930s and by Hammer Studios in

the 1960s had been enormously popular and most people had pre-conceived notions

about the way the theme should be handled. These studios had also churned out

sequels galore and had created their own methodology of horror theme

interpretation and vampire mythology. Coppola wanted his film to be unique in

every way by breaking all expectations of the critics and audience, leaving no room

for comparison with earlier films. Moreover, allegations were persistently made

that none of the earlier films had relied on the novel for the plot but had only been

dramatic adaptations, largely unfaithful to Stokers novel. When Coppola named his

filmBram Stokers Dracula, it established the closest of links with the novel and led


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the audience to anticipate a faithful adaptation of the novel, fidelity to the source

being a central issue in the evaluation of an adapted film.

As Julia Sanders has observed, it is usually at the very point of infidelity

that the most creative acts of adaptation and appropriation take place(20). So

Coppolas prime achievement in adapting Dracula was perhaps his claim of

remaining faithful to the source text even while effecting an audacious creative

departure from it without missing the spirit of the novel. Coppola renders an

interpretation of the familiar story in the legendary backdrop of its history; retaining

the aesthetics of apprehension associated with it, while also looking at it as a

poignant tale of love and salvation. The film is proof that adaptation can improve on

the source text by recreating the social locale more authentically than in the original,

thereby elucidating more precisely the implications of the novel.

Documents

Aesthetics of Transformation