Mistake adds depth

You might want to watch that scene again. First, there are no other vampires in the film for Paul to be guarding against. Dracula is it. Second, Dracula is dead, and when Paul crosses himself, he is looking down at the scene of Dracula's demise, where the cross is on which Dracula was impaled. He crosses himself at that moment, looking down at the cross and what remains of Dracula, and nowhere else. He's not looking over his shoulder for 'more vampires.' Third, if there actually were more vampires, Paul crossing himself wouldn't be any kind of guard or protection - you would have to present a cross to the face of a vampire to protect yourself; crossing oneself as Paul did doesn't do a damn thing as far as the threat of vampires is concerned.

Of course anyone can interpret the scene however they wish, but the most logical one is this: Paul crosses himself after watching Dracula die and hearing the priest's prayer at the scene. Although he does not say 'amen' as is often said at the conclusion of a prayer, he does 'cross himself,' which is a common response from Catholics at the end of a prayer. He does this after witnessing Dracula's demise, then he and his girlfriend join hands while bells ring. I took that to suggest that the two will now be married, because he has now been converted, having seen all he has seen with Dracula, and how the apparent power of the cross defeated him. The only obstacle to their marriage had been Paul's atheistic stance, and now after crossing himself and taking Maria's hands while bells ring, the suggestion appears to be that he has a new-found faith and the two can finally be married.

On a side note, the naming of Paul's character might not be a coincidence. The biblical Paul did not 'believe' in Jesus until he was struck and blinded on the road to Damascus (in the biblical story, anyway). Only after this incident does Paul become converted and an apostle of the Jesus movement. Interestingly, the character of Paul is this movie is also not a believer until he experiences some fantastical events after which, he, too, appears to become a believer.

>Well Joss Whedon has no trouble dealing with Vampires and he's an Atheist.

The point I was trying to make, is that an atheist would no more believe in vampires than in God. They are both mythological inventions.

Joss Whedon makes TV programmes about vampires. that does not mean he believes they really exist.

I enjoy movies about vampires, ghosts and holy grails. That does not mean I believe they really exist any more than James Bond or Lara Croft does.

The original posting was about a script error, in which the character uses the term atheist when agnostic would have been more appropriate. Thtas all it was, a simple error by someone who wrote scripts without really understanding the meaning of the words used. It happens al the time.

I would be perfect were it not for my excessive modesty.

''As Dracula's death in 'Prince od Darkness' must take place vetween the opening scene of 'Risen' and the rest of that latter film, the years work. 1904 for 'Prince', then the 'Risen' scene of the dead girl in the belltower, then a year passes (as per script) and rest of 'Risen' is in 1905. This all seems logical. The only troublesome aspect is the apparant lack of advances in technology or fashion between the original 1958 Hammer Dracula and this 1968 one.''

Good points. Yes, this film does seem to be set in 1905, so the one before would be 1904. The lack of changes in fashion and technology is interesting, but it can be explained that they most of the characters are ''Transylvanian Saxons''* (like Ernst and his family), Hungarians (like Father Sandor) and Romanians (ironically rather rare as main characters in the film), and thus they live in a very remote and cut off region. I have noticed that the characters drop the starched collars throughout the series though, with hardly a starched collie nary to be seen in 'Scars of Dracula'. 'Scars of Dracula' also features a Parabellum-Pistole ''1908'', or ''Luger'', which were started to be mass-produced in 1900.

* Not actually ''Saxon'' as they were mostly Fraconian. These Germans, like the Hungarian Magyars and Szeklers (another Magyar group) were more privileged members of Transylvanian society; the native Roamnians were mostly considered to be simple peasants.

If you love Jesus 100%... keep it to yourselves, perverts!

We're going around in meaningless circles. Let's just skip it. You go to your church, and I'll stay out of mine.

Exactly. This is the only response they can think of because they believe in something without evidence, so they make up reasons like this without evidence for the reason. As you stated, people can't be angry at things that don't exist. He might as well have said atheists are mad at unicorns while he's at it.