“It’s all in the programming, baby.”

Justin’s rating: Zero bazonkas out of minus zero bazonkas

Justin’s review: Do you ever get the suspicion that some movies function as time-outs for actors who did something bad and deserve punishment? I don’t know what sins Coolio (Batman and Robin), Casper Van Dien (Starship Troopers), and Erika Eleniak (Under Siege) did to fall from ’90s grace, but by 2004, they were slumming it on a spaceship with Dracula, so it must’ve been pretty bad.

Best case scenario, this would result in a Jason X outcome where a famous horror figure got the “in spaaaaace” treatment to cheesy-but-fun effect. Worst case, this would be a Dracula movie starring Coolio on a blatantly fake spaceship.*

Whoops, guess I found out which one it was.

It’s the future, if you didn’t get that from the “3000” in the title, and a salvage ship piloted by sigh Captain Abraham Van Helsing (Van Dien) stumbles upon a ghost ship called Demeter. The ship is deserted, save for a notorious vampire who’s been hanging out there for 50 years or so, and so the six members of the salvage team are in for a most unpleasant work day.

That this movie tries to pay homage to Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel by transplanting names into a scifi setting does very little to convince me that this is a sincere effort to honor the original. Instead, we get Casper Van Dien in a puffy vest without sleeves, Coolio smoking his rider, some very bland spaceship CGI, and interiors that looks suspiciously like the utility tunnels of a sewage treatment plant where the director’s brother worked as a security guard.

Coolio cuts his hand opening all of the coffins left on this ship** (where did they get so many wooden coffins in space?) and activates a dull Dracula for the new generation. This Dracula is from Planet Transylvania (seriously), a place that apparently has a Spirit Halloween on every corner, because this vamp is sporting a very cheap cape-and-cowl.

What ensues is nothing surprising nor new. Dracula either makes the crew his thralls or drains them, all while threatening to come to earth and do the same for our entire population. It’s mostly a lame excuse to have characters slowly explore corridors, have conversations in corridors, run down corridors, and be frightened in corridors.

We do get a lot of bizarre developments that go nowhere, such as the “vice captain” turning out to be some sort of former sex android-slash-cop, their salvage ship being remote controlled by nothing in particular so that it would leave them stranded, Dracula losing an arm because someone shuts a door, Coolio becoming the goofiest prancing vampire thrall, and Udo Kier literally phoning in his performance.

Dracula 3000 has an off-brand feel, partially due to the fact that this is a joint German and South African venture, which are two countries I didn’t see getting into a movie bed together. It’s a crudely made film, loaded with silly zooms, over-the-top characters, Dutch angles, and Casper Van Dien’s scruffy beard doing a lot of heavy lifting.

Public domain or no, Dracula isn’t worthy of a film treatment these days, nevermind the — eh eh eh — countless iterations that the Count’s received over the years. It’s not that sending him to space was even that novel. I’m so tired of Space Vampires™, because — Lifeforce aside — I think we’ve realized by now that none of them ever pull off the scares or thrills or fresh angles. This film didn’t change that trend.

Dracula 3000 is of such abysmally low quality that even the Syfy channel would look at this and elect for another Sharknado. Honestly, I’d be more down for the sharks than this dorky space odyssey.

*The spaceship in question was actually lifted from 1993’s Space Rangers TV series.

**He’s looking for weed. In coffins. Because getting high is the totality of his character. Was Snoop Dog unavailable?

Intermission!

• These opening credits are really in love with a dripping blood effect
• This is also called Dracula 3000: Infinite Darkness just to sound way more emo
• Udo Kier, making a cameo and getting the hell out of this movie
• Nothing like kicking off a film with lots of exposition and a character biography card parade to tell you that this is going to suuuuuck
• I didn’t mean to make a vampire pun. Sorry.
• Just send your navigator alone to explore a ghost ship, why not
• Dracula likes passing quickly between corridors to be extra-mysterious
• These are the worst face masks for acting
• Random sexual harassment in the workplace
• “All right, Captain Buzzkill. Hang ten!”
• Apparently vampires are scared of math symbols and nobody knows about God in 3000 AD
• That giant spaceship is only worth 15 million?
• Don’t leave anyone on your salvage ship so that when it mysteriously undocks, y’all are stranded on the ghost ship. Was Dracula mind-controlling the other ship?
• Well he found the craft room with all the lame crosses
• Guy has a protruding bone? eh just lift him and carry him like a bride, no biggie
• This ship is not wheelchair-friendly in the least. Also, this is the year 3000, don’t you think we could do better than a metal wheelchair with wheels for the disabled?
• This movie loves to zoom in and focus on that bloody bone
• Vampires have no problem standing on a fully broken leg bone
• How do you know that weapons on a wall are even loaded?
• She doesn’t look that tied up. More like someone draped a few scarves over her arms.
• So if Dracula was from earth — which this movie confirms — how is he also from Planet Transylvania?
• Dude, WHY would you open the door to such an obvious ruse?
• That ending is so “what the what?” weird that it’s about the only notable thing in this film
• Dracula is a big baby when he gets his arm cut off