‘Abraham’s Boys’ Review: Shudder’s Slow-Cooked, Sun-Drenched Dracula Reinvention Melts Off the Bone
A morbid curiosity lingers throughout Abraham’s Boys, the new horror drama from director Natasha Kermani and writer Joe Hill. It takes the same foundational impulse behind the recent wave of low-effort childhood character reinventions—think public domain exploitation with no budget or vision—but filters it through a prestige lens and genuine creative ambition. Instead of nostalgia bait, it turns to one of horror’s most enduring literary texts, mining Bram Stoker’s gothic classic Dracula for something deeply intimate and unsettling. Hitting theaters this month via IFC and Shudder, the film is a deliberate and unnerving exhumation of legacy and monsters, both real and remembered. Sun-drenched and slow-burning, Kermani’s latest feature reimagines the Dracula mythos with striking originality.
Based on the short story by Joe Hill, Abraham’s Boys picks up years after the events of Dracula, centering on the sons of Abraham Van Helsing: Max (Brady Hepner) and Rudy (Judah Macley). Their father, the title character played by Titus Welliver, is a husk of the man he once was, living in a state of paranoid exile in rural California. As his sons grow up under his erratic, oppressive rule, they’re torn between believing their father’s delusions about vampires or possibly escaping his control entirely. When tragedy forces the brothers to align, long-buried secrets resurface, and the fangs of the dark seem to be sinking their way back into reality.
Kermani, who previously helmed Dread’s Lucky and Imitation Girl, proves once again she’s one of the genre’s most thoughtful voices. Her take on Abraham’s Boys is a family drama with a Gothic-fried underbelly that’s been marinating in dread and existential seasoning. This is a film about the horrors we inherit, but it’s also a reflection on masculinity and the ghosts men carry across generations when left repressed.
Abraham’s Boys isn’t without its limitations, though. It’s a small production with modest resources, and occasionally that scale is evident on screen, whether through a vague setting or scenes that feel a bit stretched. The creative team seems self-aware of their restraints, and is often able to be intentional with its sparse theatrical qualities. At times, the film plays almost like a stripped-down West End stage production of The Woman in Black: lean on spectacle but heavy on mood, tension, and performance. The strength of the writing and acting consistently elevates the material, pushing it somewhat beyond its budgetary constraints.
Visually, the film is dripping with authentic, old-school Gothic horror. Shot with painterly precision by cinematographer Julia Swain under the direction of Kermani, the daytime horrors feel both oppressive and faded simultaneously. The dusty Americana landscape is a perfect setting for the Van Helsing legacy to rot away slowly. There’s a sun-scorched deadness to everything on display. Kermani skillfully mines horror not just from what’s hidden in the shadows, but what’s sitting plainly in the light.
The performances here are uniformly strong, but Jocelin Donahue delivers something special as Mina, the brooding matriarch of the film. A throwback to Gothic powerhouse performances by Barbara Steele, Donahue’s work here is award-season caliber. She brings spooky complexity to a character that could have easily been sidelined, grounding the world around her with a strange, dread-filled atmosphere. Titus Welliver is also exceptional, infusing Van Helsing with conviction and humanity while always keeping the audience guessing about his true intentions.
In a genre landscape often overcrowded with reboots and safe IP retreads, Abraham’s Boys is both elegant and refreshing. A bold reinvention from a certified Master of Horror, this film doesn’t just update the Dracula mythos, it needles it. And still, there’s no reliance on nostalgia or gore. Instead, it leans into atmosphere, character, and existential horror. Kerami’s film is slow-cooked so well and so carefully that it’s practically falling off the bone.
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Abraham's Boys
Summary
‘Abraham’s Boys’ is Shudder’s sun-drenched, slow-burning reinvention of Dracula from a certified Master of Horror.
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