"Dracula II: Ascension" review

Dracula II: Ascension (2003)

Directed by Patrick Lussier
Writing credits Joel Soisson Patrick Lussier

Jennifer Kroll.... Twins of Evil
Jason Scott Lee.... Father Uffizi
Craig Sheffer.... Lowell
Diane Neal.... Elizabeth Blaine

Dracula goes to med school. A bunch of college goofballs run across a corpse which may be a vampire. So of course the most logical thing to do is to sell it to the highest bidder. But being junior league scientists, they want to run some diagnostics on him. Eventually they discover he IS a vampire. Good thing too since the movie is called "Dracula II". I'd have felt ripped-off if he wasn't. Then the movie pauses for 40 minutes or so as Dracula studies for his doctorate at Vampire University. It picks up at the end with some cool bloodsucking fighting.

First of all, where do the filmmakers get the nerve to call this movie "Dracula II"? Let me point out the obvious by mentioning that there have been dozens of Dracula movies before this. "Dracula 56" sounds right. Why not just call it "Dracula 2003"? Then you could have a Dracula movie for every year. Also, I don't remember anybody in this movie actually calling the vampire Dracula.

Anyway, "Dracula II" (!!) putters along. It starts off on the right foot with a Blade-like priest doing his thing against some hot bloodsuckers. Then it pauses for a good portion as Dracula completes his medical degree in vampire hemoglobin. The movie finally comes to life in the last twenty minutes as the priest meets his immortal enemy. It had some good gore and some decent fights. I just wish Dracula had been more of a force of evil in this movie and less an undead specimen for science.

SCORE: 2 out of 4 medical schools for vampires