There are always a few critics around who say that this version of Dracula is better than the famous Tod Browning film with Bela Lugosi. It was made at the same time, on the same sets, and with a Spanish translation of the same script. The gringos worked on their film during the day, while at night, director George Melford (who didn’t speak Spanish) and a cast of Mexican, Spanish and South American actors made their film. Some accounts say the Spanish production team regularly studied the daytime crew’s work, intending to improve on what Tod Browning and cinematographer Karl Freund were doing.
So, IS this the better Dracula? I say no. The pace of this is even slower than its counterpart. It is an interestingly odd experience though, if you’re already deeply familiar with the Tod Browning movie. Melford DOES stage several scenes here in exact contrast to Browning, sometimes with good results, sometimes not. The only fault with Carlos Villar’s performance as Dracula is that he’s not Bela and Pablo Álvarez Rubio’s great, maniacal showing as the Spanish-speaking Renfield suffers nothing in comparison to Dwight Frye.