he film focuses on a small group of scientists who hope to use Dracula's desiccated — but still alive — body to discover the secret of immortality. Elizabeth Blaine, working at the New Orleansmorgue, where Dracula's 'corpse' is brought following the events of Dracula 2000. She pricks her finger on a fang in what is supposed to be a human mouth. This leads her to alert her boyfriend Lowell, who is suffering from an ultimately fatal degenerative sickness. Lowell claims a wealthy investor wants to fund their research into the mysterious corpse (assuming the explanation for its condition is natural rather than having anything to do with God or magic). They spirit the body away.
On their heels is Father Uffizi, seemingly the Vatican's official vampire hunter. He has been given the task of not only killing Dracula, but granting him absolution (the Church realizes that Dracula is in fact Judas Iscariot). This will allow the vampire to rest in peace. What the Cardinal giving Uffizi this task may or may not know is that the priest was scratched by a vampire fang in a previous hunt. Each day he exposes himself to the sun, burning out the vampiric infection while he screams in pain.
But one of the scientific team, Luke (who loves Elizabeth), doubts Dracula is a purely natural phenomenon. He surrounds the now-awake (but severely weakened) vampire with folkloric wards like mustard seeds and knots. Elizabeth, meanwhile, feels increasingly strange as the infection in her grows, as does her attraction/bond to Dracula.
Finally, another member of the team injects himself with Dracula's blood, becomes a vampire and goes out to feed. He kills a woman, making her undead like himself. Uffizi finds and kills them both, then backtracks. The truth comes out about Lowell. There is no "secret investor." Seeking a cure for his illness, Lowell has used Elizabeth and the others ruthlessly. An injection "cures" him but he survives mere moments before Uffizi arrives. Uffizi tells Elizabeth, now on the verge of becoming a vampire herself, to enter the sunlight. He says it will be agony, but the vampiric part of her will be burned away. Then he goes after a now-free Dracula.
Dracula taunts him with the fact Elizabeth will simply die and Uffizi knows it. In his weakened state, Dracula is not quite a match physically for Uffizi. The priest manages to get a whip around Dracula's neck and begins the rite of absolution. Elizabeth, now a vampire, attacks Uffizi from behind. She leaves with Dracula, who says he is letting the hunter Uffizi live because he knows Uffizi will find him.
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