The Curse of Dracular

Claymation artist Jack Paterson found a story that his father had written for a school assignment in 1974, when he was only nine years old. If you recall that time, the Hammer films with Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing were quite popular, and they obviously inspired this bloody tale. Fifty years later, Paterson used that story verbatim to make a movie about Dracula, which is spelled Dracular just as it was on that original assignment.

Although the film is comical, it comes from a very personal place as my Dad has been a continuous inspiration to me for as long as I can remember, and I credit a lot of my love of film and animation to him. Thus, this film is in large part a tribute to him. Claymation is also our favourite form of animation, and some of my oldest memories were us sculpting various characters and creatures out of Play-Doh and Plasticine.

The film has since won awards. It moves a little slow at the beginning, but then picks up in a rather gory way. After all, it was written by a nine-year-old. Dad has to be proud of the result.