«THE REVENGE OF DRACULA»

Vampires & More! 20 Movie Pack
Dracula, prince of darkness was directed by Terence Fisher, who had guided Christopher Lee through his first performance as the blood-thirsty count. Yhis film was the first NOT to feature Dracula's nemesis Van Helsing(played by Peter Cushing). Instead vamoire-fighting expertise was supplied by Andrew Kier in the role of Father Shandor. Like Van Helsing, Shandor despises blind superstition, but recognizes the forces of evil and respects their power. Dracula, Prince of Darkness, is in many ways a different sort of film from Hammer's, Horror of Dracula. Rather than jumping right into the expected vampiric activities, this film, takes its time introducing and developing its new characters before the revival of Dracula. Along with Shandor, the film's featured characters are two vacationing British British couples, newly-weds, Charles and Diana(Francis Mathews and Suzan Farmer) along with Charles' elder brther, Alan and his wife Helen(Charles Tingwell and Barbara Shelly). Despite Shandor's warnings, the holiday-quartet, find themselves, stranded near Castle Dracula at night. A driver-less coach appears and on boarding it, they find that they are unable to control the horses, who bring them directly to the castle, where they encounter, Klove(Philip Latham), an eerie "servant" of Count Dracula. Once Dracula is introduced, the pace of the film picks up, and a number of thrilling vampiric encounters ensue. While much of this footage is similar to material in Horror of Dracula, variations and some novel ideas do crop up. Even Dracula himself, is is a bit different. Most obviously the lining of his cloak has been changed from black to red. The most interesting of the film's new material is drawn from Bram Stoker's original,'Dracula', novel. Thorley Walters plays an insect-eating character named Peter, who is obviously based on the novel's Renfield. And Dracula summons Diana to vampirism by baring his chest, cutting himself with his fingernail, and drawing the girl to him, to taste the wound: a sequence lifted almost exactly from the original work.. The film also uses Stoker's premise that a vampire cannot cross a threshold uninvited, and coverts Stoker's idea that a vampire cannot cross running water into the premise that running water is fatal to the vampire.

[Tuesday, October 14, 2008]

«Drawn out but not altogether bad »

Dracula Prince of Darkness was Hammer's only Scope entry in the Christopher Lee series, but it's frankly a rather dull and dragged out affair - Drac doesn't appear for 49 minutes and the first hour of the film could have been done much better in half the time. Lee is clearly bored and has little to do, but Andrew Keir's gun-totting monk is one of Hammer's most interesting characters and there's no doubting the effectiveness of Barbara Shelley's transformation from uptight sister in law to hottie demon dyke ("You don't need Charles!"). There are good moments, from Dracula's reincarnation to the Dracula-on-Ice finale, and the fact that the hero and heroine are called Charles and Diana is good for a few unintentional laughs, but this is far to sedate and drawn out for its own good.

The DVD is an impressive package, with some great home movie footage of the shoot taken by 'juvenile lead' Francis Matthews' brother, original trailer and an audio commentary typically dominated by Christopher Lee. A rather uninspiring episode of the World of Hammer clip show dealing with the studio's vampire movies is also included. The 2.35:1 transfer is mostly pretty good, although the arrival at Castle Dracula is excessively dark.

[Wednesday, March 05, 2008]

«A fine sequel»

This is the second Hammer Dracula film to feature Christopher Lee in the title role. Although Peter Cushing sadly does not reprise his definitive role as Van Helsing this has much to offer.

The film starts with a replay of the final few minutes of the first Hammer Dracula (US title The Horror of Dracula), which is perhaps the greatest moment in the history of Hammer films. From there it develops quickly, with two couples ending up staying at Castle Dracula. Some well known faces make up the rest of the cast including Francis Matthews, Barbara Shelley and Andrew Keir. This film was made eight years after the original and its quite surprising how much more violent and gory it is.

The film was directed by Terence Fisher and you always know with a Hammer film that if he was the director you would get a quality film. He also directed Curse of Frankenstein, The Devil Rides Out, Hound of The Baskervilles, Brides of Dracula and of course the original Dracula (all worth buying). Add this to James Bernard's great score and you have a fine horror film that has stood the test of time really well.

[Saturday, November 03, 2007]

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