Nadja **** (1994, Elina Löwensohn, Peter Fonda, Nic Ratner, Karl Geary, Jack Lotz) – Classic Movie Review 5572

Writer-director Michael Almereyda’s 1994 thriller is a rather splendid, low-budget modern-day vampire movie, filmed by Jim Denault in glowing black and white, with the statuesque Elina Löwensohn as the lovely Nadja, Dracula’s daughter, who steals her father’s body from a morgue in contemporary New York.

But, luckily for the living, Professor Van Helsing is alive and kicking, in the commendable shape of an impressively haunted-looking Peter Fonda, and he is desperate to stop the return of the undead. Fonda also plays Dracula.

This arty, but first-class chiller, designed to keep smart audiences on the edge of their seats, represents the best kind of independent American film-making in the Nineties. Some of the vampire-vision sequences, filmed in a grainy technique they call Pixelvision, have a startling impact.

Also in the cast are Nic Ratner, Karl Geary as Renfield, Jack Lotz, Galaxy Craze as Lucy, Isabel Gillies, José Zúñiga, Jeff Winner, Bernadette Jurkowski as Dracula’s Bride, Suzy Amis as Cassandra and Jared Harris as Edgar.

It is produced by David Lynch, Amy Hobby and Mary Sweeney, scored by Simon Fisher-Turner and set designed by Kurt Ossenfort. The producer Lynch appears as the Morgue Receptionist.

It is R rated for scenes of bizarre vampire sexuality and gore, and strong language.

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 5572

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com