I LIKE MOVIES #16: THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA

The Satanic Rites of Dracula. Now there's a great title. It's pretty much a sequel to Dracula 1972 A.D. but instead of hip and groovy young people there is a cult of doughy old Englishmen and busty ladies working together to bring about a new plague. Dracula's big scheme is to take the entire world out in order end his own cursed existence. Van Helsing calls it "a last blaze of utter horror and violence, a ghastly annihilation of an entire planet." It's the ultimate murder suicide. And it's ironic that Cushing would be annihilating planets in Star Wars a few years later.

It has all the important ingredients of a 70s satanist/occult movie: pentagrams, black masses, old men in robes, blood, boobies, bad haircuts. But it also throws Dracula and Van Helsing into the mix for good measure. Peter Cushing once again gives an entertaining performance as Van Helsing. The more movies I see him in, the more I'm starting to believe he can do no wrong. Even if he is in the background of the most mundane scene, he can still grab my attention with something he's doing. He can deliver the absurdest of dialogue and make it seem authoritative.

Christopher Lee is back as Dracula. He gets to have fog machine assisted entrances and cool lighting but he also gets to sit behind a desk like a James Bond villain, which, coincidentally, he actually was in The Man With The Golden Gun.

I haven't seen all of the Lee/Cushing Dracula movies but I bet they all try to have a new twist on killing the bloodsucker. Stakes through the heart are fine and dandy the first time around. By the eleventh or twelfth outing it might get stale. So this time around we learn that Dracula gets really annoyed by thorns. Because Jesus wore a crown of thorns. And he didn't like it either. This information comes in handy when Van Helsing lures Dracula onto his own front lawn and through the big patch of prickly bushes. With all of the minions and henchmen that Dracula had in this movie you would think he would have had one of them do some landscaping around the compound. Maybe remove some of the things that are harmful to the eternal, blood-drinking undead. Instead Dracula gets tangle like a sap and Van Helsing stakes him.

Speaking of the minions . . . in addition to the pasty old Englishmen in robes Dracula has these guys who all wear matching sheep vests. One of them gets shot off of his motorcycle in an early scene and sends it crashing through a gate. It's pretty sweet. And we get a pretty good "guy on fire" stunt towards the end. For bonus points the guy on fire is simultaneously rotting away from the super bubonic plague.

There are also the brides of Dracula chained up in the cellar. Drac's big plan is to deplete his food source by ridding the world of humanity and possibly end his own existence. But if it doesn't work it will only be he and his wives living in an empty planet. He'll spend eternity doing "take my wife, please" jokes to an auditorium of skeletons he set up one afternoon. Hi yo!

I mentioned that thorns can hurt Dracula. Silver is also detrimental to a vampire's existence. Van Helsing gets an awesome scene where he makes his own silver bullet. He makes the tiniest little bullet you've ever seen. And then he loads it into the tiniest pistol you've ever seen. It's really funny. And of course Peter Cushing pulls it off and you believe he can go and kill Dracula using this thimble with a trigger. It's such a gentlemanly threat seeing Van Helsing with his teeny gun. High school girls with Hello Kitty backpacks would buy these tiny bullets at Newbury Comics because they deemed them "cute."

It's a 70s occult horror movie dressed as a 70s vampire movie. Check it out if that's your thing. Or if you are a fan of very little guns. I'll give The Satanic Rites of Dracula today's arbitrary rating of 9 tiny little silver bullets out of 15.

I LIKE MOVIES #14: DRACULA DOUBLE FEATURE

I'll take a short break from packing up my house to quickly write about the Dracula Double Feature I treated myself to last week. First up was Horror of Dracula, the first movie for Christopher Lee to suck blood as the famous vampire. If you are familiar with the basic Dracula story or have seen other Dracula movies then you will know what to expect plotwise. The scenery and the performances are what make this one stand out as something special.

As big a fan I am of the classic Universal monster movies, I must admit I have never really delved into the Hammer horror movies. I think I am going to enjoy digging into their catalogue in the future. Christopher Lee is probably the most famous Dracula aside from Bela Legosi so I was very interested to see his take on it. To my surprise, he gives a very restrained, natural persona to the Count (when he isn't in blood thirsty vampire mode, that is). There was no booming bass in his voice to which I've grown accustomed from Lee. His stately demeanor allowed the transformation to be much more startling when his red eyes glare over his protruding fangs.

The real star of the show, though, is Peter Cushing as Van Helsing. He has a cocky coolness to him and carries the movie. He's so cool that when it comes time for Van Helsing and Drac to throw down at the end, you kind of feel that Dracula doesn't stand a chance. Van Helsing is seemingly the only guy on the planet who knows what he's doing when it comes to fighting a vampire. I had complete faith in him. Dracula's toast. (That means Dracula is toast. It is not a cross promotional breakfast treat)



But Drac isn't toast for too long since Dracula AD 1972 sees the Count resurrected in London.



Since I haven't seen the numerous other Christopher Lee Dracula movies, I don't know how much continuity there is between them, but this stands alone well enough. Something tells me this was a last straw, out-of-the-box attempt to get the swinging London kids interested in spending their time and money on Dracula. I wonder if, at the time, sending Dracula to the 70s was like sending Jason to space?

In Dracula AD 1972, a group of groovy kids are hanging out, being hip, looking to do something really boss. One of these kids just happens to have the last name Van Helsing. And her grandfather just happens to be Peter Cushing. Another kid in the group happens to be a Dracula minion and is determined to resurrect his master. You see, several generations ago Dracula and Van Helsing were having an epic fight on top of a runaway horse-drawn carriage. Van Helsing gets the win and Dracula gets buried in holy ground.

When Dracula gets woken up he realizes how delicious Van Helsing's ancestors would be. He wants to eat Peter Cushing's busty 1970s granddaughter. An awesome 70s soundtrack plays while the Van Helsings and Dracula do their eternal dance. It's pretty fun.

I enjoyed my Dracula Double Feature and I'm looking forward to seeing more of the Hammer horror movies. I'll the give the entire late night experience today's arbitrary rating of 4 stakes through the heart out of 5.



Bonus Cool Italian Poster

I LIKE MOVIES #11: HORROR EXPRESS

I'm going to try to do this without making any train jokes. Here we go.

Horror Express is a great fix if you are hankering for a 70s European creature feature. It's a Spanish/British production starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing as scientists on a train travelling through China and Russia at the turn of the 20th century. Rivals at first, they end up having to work together to fight a thawed-out prehistoric humanoid monster that absorbs passengers' minds through their eyeballs.

Christopher Lee is Prof. Saxton. He finds a fossil that he thinks is the missing link and will prove evolution as fact to all the doubters. Unfortunately, the fossil was possessed by an evil alien being millions of years ago and is still alive in the ice. Like Encino Man. It thaws out and starts draining people's brains until they are utterly barren of memory or thought and are dead. Like Encino Man.

Lucky for the monster, a thieving locksmith tries to open his crate. The monster absorbs his mind and is now himself a master lock picker. Now he can get himself out of his box and wander the train cars. It's kind of funny seeing a brown, hairy monster hand delicately picking a lock. The next victim is a train steward with huge Irish-guy sideburns. Rather than the monster getting sideburns from this attack, he acquires the man's trademark "whistling of the movie's theme song."

The victims look really cool. After having their minds sucked out, they are left with bulging, bleeding white eyes. Considering this movie was made in 1972, when contact lenses were actually the size of dinner plates, this couldn't have been an easy visual to create. The other option is that they had to build the effect on top of the actor's eyes. Either way, it is visually effective. They look like less crusty versions of the demons from Evil Dead.



For an audience in 1972, the scene in the picture above was probably the equivalent of the part in The Ring when they open the closet door and you see this sexy lady:



Peter Cushing, while trying to use some of his smooth English charm on an attractive young lady who turns out to be an international spy in an unnecessary sidestory, gets grabbed by the monster. Lucky for him he did not look into its glowing red eye. Not so lucky was the inspector who saved him. He succeeded in shooting the monster but little did he know the alien beast had a trick up its monster sleeve. Not only can it take your mind, but it can apparently also take your body. So the monster is now in the inspector.

So now it's like The Thing and no one on the train knows who the monster is. Telly Savalas shows up and hams up the joint and all Hell breaks loose. The monster had another trick up his monster sleeve. Not only can he take minds and jump bodies, but he can also create zombies from his victims. This is a shocking turn of events indeed!

Well, I've ruined a lot of the movie for you now, but check it out anyway. It also has a mad monk, skull-sawing autopsies, and a few good mustaches. And an alien trying to get back to his home planet. Like E.T. if he were a total dick.

Horror Express gets today's arbitrary rating of two and three quarter monster hands out of five.


Cool VHS Cover Bonus Points

Looks like I did it. No train jokes. I hope it wasn't boring. That you weren't bored. Aboard. All aboard. Trains.

Dammit.