Dracula Movies

[Patti Feinberg]

I had ordered and have received a 4-pack of Hammer's Dracula movies (starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing).
I finished watching "The Horror of Dracula"; I don't believe I've ever seen it!!
(You knew what was around each corner though....)

Patti

[dom]

I hated these movies when I was a kid & teen - I wouldn't even bother to watch them on TV for free - never mind paying to see them in the theater. I don't really know why - maybe I had some kind of loyalty to the universal films - but giving it some thought, I bet the fact that they were in color probably bothered me subconsciously. Even funnier - I enjoyed the black and white stills from these films in the FM magazines. Yeah, maybe it was the color aspect. The Hammer films don't have that glamourous spooky elegance their American counterparts have. Too modern perhaps. I don't particularly enjoy British films as an art form either. I've recently watched a few (Hammer horror films) here and there and my opinion hasn't changed much, if at all.

Are you enjoying them, Patti?

Sorry to digress, but I do enjoy some of the early 60's British slice-of-life/social commentary films. And the mysteries are usually above tolerable. Yet, one of my favorite films of all-time is London Kills Me - go figure

[Uncle Roger]

Haven't seen those in years. As I remember, those films are gorgeous to look at--great costumes, wonderful locations, top notch cinemaphotography. But I also remember them as being extremely talky. Somebody once said that all you really need to do is watch the first 10 minutes and the last 10 minutes. What happens in between is largely filler (extra murders).

I do admit to an affection for the Karnstein trilogy. The second film, Lust For a Vampire, is one of my guiltiest pleasures. It's extremely silly but far more entertaining than it has any right to be. It's a career high point of sorts for the lovely and talented Yutte Stensgaard, who is stunning to look at it but dramatically challenged. Hammer apparently hired her for the lead without seeing if she could act or speak unaccented English. No to both, I'm afraid. So you have a Swedish actress playing a Romanian vampire, dubbed with a British accent.

[Willie Loomis]

they are good movies.  I like Taste the Blood of Dracula the best, i think, followed by Dracula, Prince of Darkness.  Hm.  Maybe I should just get my hammer collection together and watch them. 

But wait, the Karnstein Trilogy,  what are the other two...is one Twins of Evil?  Ingrid Pitt was in these as well, no??

by the bye, Patti, I have other Hammer films you might enjoy that aren't of the Dracula story.  Some are just psychological thrillers and other various horror movies (Oliver Reed in a werewolf movie comes to mind, and if you thought DS werewolf was cheesy, wait til you see this one....LOL)

[Gothick]

The Hammer films had a huge impact upon the art direction of DS, particularly after the series went to color, so it seems odd to me to find fans of the series who don't like the Hammer product.  Hammer's Horror of Dracula in 1958 was the first vampire film to show a vampire baring his fangs (first seen in a shock close-up of Christopher Lee that is one of the most iconic moments in the history of horror cinema).  Hammer also devised a style of Gothic horror drenched in lurid color that had a definite influence on certain sequences on DS.

One of my personal favorite Hammers if "The Gorgon" from 1964 with Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, and Barbara Shelley.  It's just so atmospheric and beautifully shot, with some really unforgettable images.  A lot of fans diss the actual Gorgon FX but I think they're missing the point.  The story is supposed to be about mythic poetry, not literalism.  But I'll spare you all that particular rant.  I do find myself thinking about how interesting it might have been had DS done a gorgon story.  One was actually done for the Innovation comics inspired by the 1990/91 NBC series.

G.

[MagnusTrask]

For decades, I've thought that the British just didn't know how to do a horror film.    I like or sometimes even prefer UK films and TV, but Hammer has left me cold.  Now, I sort of think I'm probably wrong about that.   I am coming to appreciate a lot of films and books which I was too young for before.   Hammer films seemed too blunt, crass, and manipulative.   The color may have something to do with it, but it was more a matter of gore, blood dripping from vampires' mouths, that kind of thing.   The first DS movie seemed like part of the same trend, so I didn't see it back then.

Recently, I saw two Dr. Phibes films for the first time.   The sequel suffered from typical sequelitis but had ridiculousness going for it... the original film, though, seemed like a much cooler, improved Phantom of the Opera.   I now regret all my film-going decisions, growing up.   Someone ought to have whacked some sense into me, and loosened me up.   I'd be a much less repressed human being now.

I still have yet to go through a Hammer phase.   I hope to.

[Lydia]

Someone ought to have whacked some sense into me, and loosened me up.

If only Julia had slapped you!

[Uncle Roger]

The Karnstein trilogy consists of The Vampire Lovers, Lust For A Vampire and Twins of Evil. Ingrid Pitt appears in the first film and gives a multi-layered performance. It's a shame that she never got to work in the DS universe.

[Willie Loomis]

Thanks Unc.  I have all three then.   

Magnus.  Shame on you.  You didn't see Dr. Phibes while growing up.....?   But all jokes aside, the original is the best of course, the second being a repeat of the same story more or less.  But, now Magnus, did you see the Count Yorga films?  (please say yes, please please please say yes...)  they were good, Robert Quarry made his mark with these two films. There were actually plans to make a film where Dr. Phibes and Count Yorga actually meet.  And there was a plan for a third Dr. Phibes film.  Robert Quarry also made an unrelated vampire film called Deathmaster, where in he plays a Mansonesque vampire.   

And, then there's Blacula films....

[Patti Feinberg]

Wow!!!
...and I was worried no one was going to reply

I've seen Dr. Phibes (a looooonggg time ago, and I believe it's been mentioned on this board).

YORGA

I had never heard of the Karnstein trilogy; sounds interesting....

Lolol on the Ingrid Pitt mention....

Patti

[Cousin_Barnabas]

I enjoy the Hammer films - not anywhere near as much as the Universal Monster films, but I find most of the earlier ones entertaining.  I could do without the racier ones.  I usually watch either Horror of Dracula or Dracula: Prince of Darkness every October.  And now I add the modern Hammer spook-show Woman in Black to the mix.  But my favorites are definitely the American originals. 

As for Dr. Phibes, I love it.  It's my favorite Vincent Prince movie. 

[MagnusTrask]

WL-- Sorry man, no Yorga have my eyeballs witnessed.   You begin to see my repression as a child, which may have been partly self-inflicted....  Then again, it means off in the world somewhere, these movies are waiting for me still.  It's like opening a time capsule, when I get to see a little more of it, good thing too, since I hate new stuff.

[Uncle Roger]

In the second Yorga film, the count is shown watched a Spanish version of The Vampire Lovers!

[Gerard]

It's possible to find the Yorga films on-line; I know I watched both of them that way.  It might've been youtube, but I don't recall if that was the venue.

Gerard

[Gothick]

The first Yorga film is done in a very rough-and-ready way--it almost looks like a student film.  Robert Quarry as Count Yorga has moments that I personally find very reminiscent of Barnabas, and there's even a scene where the two vampire hunters visit the Count in his elegant drawing room that make me think of the original 1967 DS.  Some of the "actresses" in the film came from the soft-core porn industry but they are effectively used in the film's often bare-bones approach to horror.  There's one scene involving a female victim of the Count's and a kitty that I personally find really disgusting, stomach-churningly so, but it does hearken back to the Renfield sections of the original Dracula novel.

I still haven't seen the second Yorga film, but I have been told that it had a bigger budget and a glossier look.  I have seen a clip with this eerie scene of Robert Quarry sort of floating down a hallway with fangs bared.  I think this is also the one in which Ketty Wells, the legendary Sixties vocalist (who recorded the hit "Love letters") has a minor role--I hadn't known she was an actress.

For afficionados of Seventies camp and kitsch, Deathmaster is worth checking out.  It may also be on Youtube.  Quarry had to wear a big old hippie-wig in it and was made up to look like Charles Manson.  He runs a hippie vampire cult and everybody runs around in an old Victorian house in Malibu, or someplace.  I have vague memories of trying to watch it on the CBS Late Movies back in the mid 70s and just finding it all too ridiculous. Now it might be a bit of fun.  I wonder if Tim Burton is a fan of Deathmaster since the hippie stuff in Depp Shadows seems partly to allude to this.

G.