Taste the Blood of Dracula (1969)

Title: Taste the Blood of Dracula (1969)

Director: Peter Sasdy

Cast: Christopher Lee, Ralph Bates, Linda Hayden, Geoffrey Keen

I have started a lot of these Hammer film reviews with the words “this is one of the best” and I just realized while re-watching a lot of these old Hammer Dracula classics that they truly were a very well produced batch of films. It was in their last days that they started to go down in quality. But these earlier Dracula films, were awesome. Taste the Blood of Dracula was the fourth Hammer Dracula film to star Christopher Lee as Dracula, and if you ask me, it truly was one of the best of the series!

The film concerns these three rich entrepreneurs who are bored with life. They have seen it all and done it all. Now they want something new to spark some life into their redundant and dull lives. So in there search for new amusements, they stumble upon one Lord Courtley, a young guy who’s very much into black masses and selling his soul to the devil. Not in the poetic sense, but in its literal sense. Lord Courtley offers the three rich dudes the opportunity to sell their souls to Satan by resurrecting Count Dracula himself! Will these three gents go through with it and literally taste the blood of Dracula?

What I loved most about this movie was the way the script was unfolding. It was written in such a way that there is never a dull moment. And this is saying a lot since the film managed to retain my interest with no Dracula in sight for more then 45 minutes! I mean, I was literally interested in everything that was happening before Dracula even shows up, so that’s a bonus in my book! The thing about this movie is that the three rich gentlemen prove to be such interesting characters. On the one hand, they put up this façade where they go to church, and they are respectable members of society, while on the other they go away to some hidden whore house and entertain themselves with alcohol, drugs and whores dancing with snakes. But even with all the lewd entertainment they can afford, they are still frustrated and bored with their lives. In comes Lord Courtley one day (played with evil relish by the great Ralph Bates) to offer these gentlemen the opportunity to resurrect the lord of darkness.

Ralph Bates was being considered to play the role of the main vampire in this movie because Christopher Lee was refusing to appear on this film. Hammer was basically going to do the same thing they did with Brides of Dracula. If Christopher Lee doesn’t want to be on our movie fine, will do the movie without him! But unfortunately for Hammer, American distributors were not going to market this movie unless Lee was in it, so after a lot of begging from Hammers part, Christopher Lee agreed to appear on Taste the Blood of Dracula. What this meant for Ralph Bates was that he was denied the chance to play the lead vampire. This is probably the reason why Dracula does not appear until we are already way into the movie. But like I said, that’s not a major problem because the film itself is interesting on its own without Dracula. We get Ralph Bates being the evil one for one half of the film, the one that instigates the three rich guys, and the one who offers them the doors to hell. Then Dracula takes over on the second half of the film.

Honestly, I would not have minded if Ralph Bates had played the main vampire on this movie, to me he was always such a great asset whenever he appeared on any Hammer film. He always did a great job. Specially when playing villains. On this one, he is the young guy unafraid to resurrect Dracula, but not entirely comprehending what he is truthfully getting himself into.

What I enjoyed the most about this picture though were the three rich dudes. They are these two faced heartless individuals. They go to church, they have these beautiful families, but in their personal lives they are idiots. One in particular, Geoffrey Keen who pretty much plays the leader of the trio did an outstanding job of playing the evil over protective father. He is a Christian, yet goes to whore houses, does drugs and gets drunk, yet he expects complete chastity from his daughter Alice, who is only looking for true love in her life. Keen played the type of father who doesn’t want to let his daughter ouf of his home, he wants to keep her in her room locked tight! No flirting with young men, though its completely normal behavior at her age. Geoffrey Keen's performance is outstanding, in one scene he feels real remorse for having dealt with the forces of Darkness, and I swear real pain could be felt in his performance!

Speaking of performances, Christopher Lee doesn’t do much on this movie besides do what he does best. Play the silent evil Dracula! There are some memorable Dracula images on this one! Like the scene where Dracula has completely red eyes! Not bloodshot, but entirely red! Dracula appears 50 minutes into the picture, when his resurrection is finally complete and he begins to take revenge upon the three fathers who weren’t willing to go through with the resurrection ritual in its entirety. In this movie, Dracula goes for the sons and daughters of those who wronged him, so he goes about turning them into vampires. This movie does a good job of getting us to like and fall in love with certain characters, like the beautiful Alice (played by the incredibly angelic Linda Hayden) and then transforming them into tools of evil! Awesome, this movie was one of the ones where I was yelling at the screen “No! That is NOT happening!” So it moved me that way, I got into it.

The true message of the movie is towards parents. The message being, if you are an evil father, you are going to eventually pay for it. There is one truly shocking scene in which Alice is going to commit patricide! I thought that was kind of shocking for this kind of film, but there it was in all its shocking glory. I like that idea of kids running away when they realize that their parents aren’t good for them in the least. It’s the rational thing to do when you have the unfortunate fate of getting unreliable or just plain evil parents, run for the hills! Make it own your own in this damn life! So that’s more or less what this movie is trying to put forth. Be a good loving parent to your kids…or else it will come back and bite you in the ass! Or in your neck.

Rating: 5 out of  5

To the Devil...A Daughter (1976)

Title: To the Devil A Daughter (1976)

Director: Peter Sykes

Cast: Christopher Lee, Nastassja Kinski, Richard Widmark

Review:

If you know Hammer Studios history, then you should know that this was Hammer Studios last film. And as they say, it was “too little, too late”. With this film, Hammer wanted to steer away from their outdated Dracula/Frankenstein films, and go into new ground. You know, to keep in touch with modern movie goers. Where movie goers back in those days wanting to see Christopher Lee in a black cape and fake fangs? Nope. They had outgrown and tuned out of that. What were audiences curious for back in those days? Satanic worshipping films! Anything with demons! You see, in the 70’s satanic films where the talk of the town, and they were getting made left and right. All thanks to the success of films like The Exorcist, The Omen, Beyond the Door and Rosemary’s Baby. So Hammer, looking for away to help the studio survive, decided to jump on the satanic band wagon and made To the Devil...A Daughter based on Dennis Whitley's 1953 novel of the same name. This is the second adaptation done by Hammer Studios of a Dennis Whitley book, the first one being The Devil Rides Out (1968). Was Hammer’s last attempt to stay afloat any good?

To the Devil a Daughter is about this demon worshipping cult, who wants to bring their demon Astaroth to our world so he can rule humanity and bring hell on earth. In order to do so, they raise a young girl named Christine (played by a very young Nastassja Kinski) as the vessel for this demon. When push comes to shove, the young girls father gets a case of cold feet, so he decides to back out of the deal and tries to protect his daughter from the cult. This proves to be very difficult since the girl herself thinks this is her destiny and something she was born to do!

This film is interesting because you can see Hammer trying to get away from the old look and feel of previous Hammer films. Dracula isn’t here, neither is Frankenstein, and there’s no castle at the top of the hill, there’s no angry/scared villagers suffering, all these things that represented what a Hammer film was during the 60’s and early 70’s is gone. Hammer had tried to update Dracula for our day and age, but it just didn’t work, as evidenced by films like Dracula 1972 A.D. (1972) and Satanic Rites of Dracula (1974). So Hammer decided to drop those characters (which had been done to death anyways) and went the way of what American films were doing, namely, scaring the pants off of audiences with Satan, demons and demon possession films! As a result, this film ends up feeling a heck of a lot like a mix between The Exorcist (1973)and its Italian rip off Beyond the Door (1974). The main parallel between this film and The Exorcist is that we have a young girl about to be possessed by a demon. Nastassja Kinski plays the young girl, Catherine, who is more then willing to go forward with everything! And it’s a lot like Beyond the Door because it has a woman about to give birth to a child who’s body will be inhabited by a demon.

In my opinion, though this movie tried to get away from what Hammer films always did in the past, it still remains a Hammer film. We still get Christopher Lee playing the major villain, and no matter how much you tell me that this guy is the leader of a Satan worshipping cult, if he is a villain and he is dressed in black, he is freaking Dracula. Also, old Hammer films always had black masses and rituals with women on top of altars, and we get a lot of that on To the Devil a Daughter as well. The dungeon like place where the cultist unite feels and looks much like Dracula’s castle did. So in reality, this film tried to get away from the old formula, but ultimately, it really isn’t all that different from the old Hammer films. The making of this film was a fiasco, they couldnt find the right director, the film was offered to damn near every director even Ken Russell (who directed The Devils) was contacted, but he declined because he hated Hammer films! They finally decided on Peter Sykes because he'd directed Demons of the Mind for Hammer in 1972. They couldnt find the right actor to play the main character. Hammer wanted an American actor, to pull in american audiences, so they decided upon Richard Widmark, who ended up being a complete asshole during the whole shoot of the film. They even started shooting without having a completed script! The screenwriter would write pages as the film was being shot! Peter Sykes would shoot things that werent in the script! And finally, since they started without a completed script, they didnt know how to end the film! Which is probably why the film falls apart in its last 10 minutes. Dennis Whitley, who wrote the novel on which the film was based hated the completed film because it wasnt his book!

The movie does have some interesting moments in it. Like for example, the Satanists do this ritual where they rip the baby out of a woman’s womb. Though most of it happens off camera, just the idea of this happening and all the blood make it more shocking then it is. And let’s not forget Nastassja Kinski. She was 16 when she made this movie, yet somehow they managed to get her to do full frontal nudity! During the last sequences of the film she takes of her robe and walks around naked! Doesn’t that make this movie illegal or something? I don’t know, somebody check that out. There’s a laugh inducing moment when Astaroth invades her body, where we can obviously see the creature is a pathetic looking hand held puppet! I mean, they could have done that better. Or avoided it all together somehow, because it just brings the movie down. Also, I have to warn you guys, Christopher Lee bares his 50 year old ass on the screen while having sex with a cult follower! Just a warning. Speaking of Lee, he gets to act a whole lot more then he did on any of the Dracula films.

Don’t know what it is, but to me Satanic movies always end up being kind of laughable. Mayb it’s the fact that I don’t believe in the devil at all. To me, true evil lies in the hearts of man, not some invisible evil force we've never seen. I can never take these movies seriously, specially if a demon or Satan himself shows up and its done in a laughable manner. I mean, in order for me to take a movie of this nature seriously, it has to be done well, and avoid any cheesy factors whatsoever. For example, dont know how many of you guys and gals have seen The Devils Rain, but god, when Ernest Borgnine shows up as Satan, I couldnt help bursting in laughter! This movie was going well, until that hand puppet showed up, and until we see Nastassja Kinski having sex with a golden statue of Astaroth, that’s when I stopped taking this movie seriously cause the first thought that pops into my mind is, wow, what a bunch of buffoons! What a bunch of idiots! And these guys are supposed to be the villains? They aren’t menacing, they are just loony! Unfortunately for me, just when Nastassja was being humped by a golden statue was the exact moment when my girlfriend decided to walk in and see what kind of a movie I was watching. That my friends, is another story.

Rating: 2 ½ out of 5

Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)

Title: Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)

Director: Alan Gibson

Cast: Peter Cushing, Christopher Lee, Stephanie Beacham

Review:

When it comes to Hammers slate of Dracula films everything is fine and dandy until we come upon two films. Dracula A.D. 1972 and The Satanic Rites of Dracula. Today I'll be focusing all my hatred on reviewing Dracula A.D. 1972. Thing I love about these old Hammer films is how they all take place in a time of castles, and fog, and full moons. Where people rode in horse carriages and didnt have cars. It was another time and another place. Made almost magical because of the atmospheric way in which Hammer Studios produced these films! So what happens when a studio wants to adapt to modern times and tries to put these old Dracula films in moder times? A disaster. Thats what happens!

Sometimes movies can turn into time capsules that transport us into the past or into the future. With Dracula A.D. 1972 were magically whisked away to a groovy time in wich Austin Powers would have felt right at home! The story is about this group of kids (were not a gang! were a group!) that love to hang out at a cafe shop called "The Cavern". The kids are bored, and looking for something to do. One day, Johnny Alucard (hmm strange last name...wait...it spells Dracula backwards!) a new kid in town waltzes into the coffee shop and offers the group of kids a new way they can get their kicks. He offers them a night of black mass and black magic! To wich they say "sure why the hell not, it could be fun!". So in no time flat, the find themselves resurrecting Count Dracula from the ashes. Problem is, one of the kids in the group is a direct descendent of Dr. Van Helsing! And that just doesnt sit well with Dracula at all!

This movie opens up with a swinging party somewhere in London, of course, this is just a way to try and get modern kids interested in these films, so they can feel identified with their music, and their clothes and they'll want to spend there money in this new modern take on the age old Dracula formula. As I watch this whole scene of young kids partying the night away in his house, doing drugs, making out and dancing on top of tables, I kept asking myself how they were going to fit Christopher Lee with his red and black cape into all of this. The filmakers wanted to make sure that this film was completely engulfed in whatever young people considered cool at that time. Everyone says words like "way out" and "groovy" and they finish many of their sentences saying "and all that jazz". To top it all off, theres a band that sounds something like "Jefferson Airplane" playing at the party...I mean youll be drowned in all things 70s! How was Dracula going to react when he wakes up in this modern world? Is there room for Dracula in the midst of modern 1970's London?

Of course this being a Black Mass, some blood has to be spilled on the altar..

Thats exactly the problem for me with this movie. Dracula feels really out of place in between all the partying and the rock and roll and the drugs. There are some potentially cool situations going on but sadly the music they decided to add to the proceedings doesnt fit at all and completely takes you out of the mood of things. Something horrifyin or scary will be happening on screen and suddenly a bunch of loud trumpets and congos start to beat and your just completely taken out of the horror element. The musical choices for this film sucked the atmosphere right out of this movie! Suddenly it felt like when Dario Argento puts heavy metal in one of his movies, and it just doesnt match with the feel of the horror film. Why couldnt they have updated Draculas look somehow? Does he always have to dress like he is stuck in time? How about having Dracula update his garments or something? Unfortunately, on this film, Dracula looks like an old dude trying to fit in within the young kids of the 70's. The ones to blame for this is Warner Brothers Studios. Count Yorga The Vampire was succesful, therefore they wanted two modern day Dracula films from Hammer Studios. As a result we got this one and The Satanic Rites of Dracula, both dreadful in my book.

Another negative aspect of this film is that the story is just a re-hash of what they had already done in Taste the Blood of Dracula, which was a great film on its own. The story in Dracula A.D. 1972 is damn near identical, save for the fact that its set in London during the 70's and its got young people as lead actors. Lets see, A young lad inherits Draculas ring and ashes? Check! He then decides to bring Dracula back to life with the help of some people who know nothing about what they are getting into? Check! They perform a Black Mass to bring Dracula? Check! Said black mass takes place in a desecrated church?Check! The list of similarities between these two films goes on and on. So to top things off, this movie wasnt too original either.

No! Get those boobs away from me! They are too beautiful to behold!

There are a few things that make this movie worth while though. For example the fact that the movie is a time capsule to London in the early seventies makes the film entertaining. It made the movie fun for me, but we are here to get spooked, were here to see Dracula kill a few virgins and take his revenge on the House of Van Helsing. Did we get any of that? Well, in a way we do. We do get some Dracula vs. Van Helsing action. Only thing is that its too brief. The movie starts 100 years in the past, with Van Helsing and Dracula fighting ontop of a horse carriage as its rasing through a forest! Both Dracula and Van Helsing die, but one of Draculas servants picks up his ashes and they are cared for 100 years, until they end up in the hands of the guy who resurrects him in 1972. Then, in the 1972 Van Helsing and Dracula have another encounter and they fight each other off yet again, the proverbial battle of "good vs. evil". The one good thing this film has for it is that Christopher Lee plays Dracula, and he looks awesome even if the film does make the character feel like its entirely out of place. And that we get Peter Cushing playing both Van Helsing in the past and Van Helsing's descendant in 1972. I really cant say this film has anything other then that going for it.

All in all, an unintentionally funny Hammer Dracula film. Its trapped in the 70s and though that makes it a fun watch (and its not as horrible as Satanic Rites of Dracula) it still doesnt gel well with the Dracula universe we had come to expect from Hammer.

Rating 2 out of 5

This foreign poster for the film was altered because it was released one year later in other countries.

Scars of Dracula (1970)

Title: Scars of Dracula (1970)

Director: Roy Ward Baker

Stars: Christopher Lee, Dennis Waterman, Jenny Hanly, Patrick Throughton, Christopher Mathews

Review:

This is the fifth Dracula film from Hammer Studios starring Christopher Lee as Dracula. It comes to us from director Roy Ward Baker. To those of you who have not seen this flick, or are just discovering Hammer films, go and search this one out. It’s a very enjoyable and creepy Dracula tale, that will please fans of Dracula films and gore alike! Ive seen some of the best hammer Dracula films and I have seen some of the worst, and all I can say is that this one ranks way up there as a highly enjoyable Dracula story. Some critics and even by Christopher Lee himself criticize this one for being a weak entry into the series. Me? I thought it was a kick ass vampire movie, old school style of course, but mega fun non the less. The only reason for it being called a “weak”entry is because it has more violence then other Hammer films. This in my opinion does not make it weak, if anything it made it a cooler film to watch. It made it more of a horror film.

On this film, the towns people are sick and tired of Count Dracula! So they decide to takes matters into their own hands and burn down the bastards castle! So they hide all their sons and daughters and wives inside of the Church and run of to the castle to set it on fire! After they do, Dracula gets infuriated and sends a bunch of his vampire bats to kill every last woman and child thats hiding in the church! Meanwhile, a young womanizer (and all around libertine) named Paul is escaping the local authorities for having his way with the burgomasters daughter. Anyhows while escaping the local authorities, he ends up in Draculas castle and after that night, no one hears from him ever again. After his lengthy dissapearance, his brother Simon decides to go and look for him with his girlfriend Sarah. What they encounter is Count Dracula himself who of course first offers them his hospitality, then proceeds to try and suck their blood! Pretty soon, both Simon and Sara are running around Draculas labyrinthian castle looking for Paul and end up encountering the true nature of the Prince of Darkness himself!

 In Scars of Dracula we get reintroduced to Klove, a character that was also presented in Dracula : Prince of Darkness. He plays the role of Draculas day time protector. On this film Klove is a bit more like an animal, like a disfigured Hunchback of Notre Dame as opposed to how he is presented to us in Dracula Prince of Darkness, where he is just this regular dude who serves Dracula. On this film Klove brings a different twist to the story, because he falls in love wih Sarah. So the issue on this movie is, will Klove be faithful to Dracula? Or will he faithful to his heart? Klove is Draculas servant, so on this one he is at war with his inner self because he' s also secretly obsessed with Sarah. So we have that whole will love conquer over evil thing going on with this one.

Its always a pleasure to see Christopher Lee play Dracula in these old Hammer films, no matter how reluctant he was to being typecast as the age old vampire, he always came back to the role that made him famous. On Scars of Dracula, the Prince of Darkness is a bit more evil then your usual Hammer Dracula film, and this is really one of the reasons why I like this one so much. On Scars of Dracula, the count is sadistic and violent! For example in one scene he uses daggers and swords to express his fury. Theres this really cool scene in which Dracula uses a burning hot sword to punish Klove with! All these touches simply make Dracula more evil for me, as opposed to how he was portrayed in Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, where he just sends somebody to do his bidding, or other Hammer films where he is simply reduced to throwing furniture at his enemies, which is something I always thought was kind of dumb of these Hammer films. Hey, the good guys are following Dracula, what should he do? Oh yeah! Have him throw that candle stick at them! Or have him throw that chair! But not on Scars of Dracula! On this film Dracula is all about using weapons, which is something kind of different in these films. And theres also a wink at Vlad the Impaler for in one scene Dracula actually impales one of his adversaries.

Dracula is more of an Impaler on Scars of Dracula

Another thing that we get a lot of in this film is Dracula using his giant vampire bats to get to his enemies. Theres that scene where he sends a legion of bats to kill most of the towns people that are hiding from him inside of a church. And theres this one really cool scene in which Dracula is trying to bite Sarah but cant because she is wearing a crucifix! So Dracula sends one of his bats to rip the crucifix from her chest! Of course this also works as a way to focus on the actresses breasts, but such is the nature of these films. Dracula always goes for the hottest babes!

Theres more giant vampire bats on this Dracula film then on any other Hammer Dracula film!

These movies always tried to pay homage to Bram Stokers novel in one way or another. The films are never a direct adaptation of the book, but in between their story lines they will add moments that come directly out of Bram Stokers book. For example in Prince of Darkness, Dracula cuts his chest so that one of his victims can suck blood from it. That comes directly from the book. On this one, we get a scene in which we see Dracula crawling on the walls. This comes directly out of the Bramstokers novel, so I found it amusing. This was the first Dracula movie to show this! Another film that did this was Jhon Badham's version of Dracula were Frank Langella does the scaling up the walls thing.

Dracula is more sadistic and violent on Scars of Dracula

After seeing this film, I see how other films have been inspired by it. For example, Draculas demise on Scars of Dracula, served as the the inspiration for Jerry Dandridges fiery death sequence in Tom Holland's 80s vampire film Fright Night (1985). Speaking of which, theres a scene in Fright Night where Charlie is watching TV and Scars of Dracula is playing on it! The scene we see is the one that I described earlier, with the giant vampire bat trying to take away a crucifix from Sarahs neck. It seems to me that theres a little bit of all these Hammer films in Fright Night.

This film comes to us from another one of Hammers best directors Roy Ward Baker, who was responsible for some of Hammers most unorthodox films. They always broke the mold somehow, Roy Ward Baker was very much in favor of breaking with that old Hammer formula of vampire films and made his films just a little bit different. On this one Dracula is more violent then other films. Roy Ward Bakers other Hammer films show that knack for breaking the mold: Vampire Lovers for example had lesbian vampires falling in love with each other! The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires has count Dracula move to China and take the form of a Chinese Monk! So he was always looking to do the most off beat films, and I have to tell you, Bakers films always ended being the most entertaining of the Hammer films. They had all the usual elements we could except from a Hammer film, but there was always something that set them apart.

Finally, I think that anyone fond of Dracula films, and specially Hammer films will find this film highly enjoyable, because of Christopher Lees evil performance, the films high level of atmosphere, the gothic sets and the high blood quotent. For a Hammer film anyways. Don’t go expecting a huge bloodbath, by todays standards its tame, but by Hammer films standards up to that time, its got lots of the red stuff. Expect a fun ride into gothic atmospheric horror.

Rating: 4 1/2 out of 5