Director: Jess Franco
Script: Peter Welbuck
Cast: Christopher Lee, Herbert Lom, Klaus Kinski, Maria Rohm, Fredrick Williams, Soledad Miranda, Jack Taylor, Paul Muller
Running time: 96.5 minutes
Year: 1970
Certificate: 12
El Conde Dracula is Spanish director Jess Franco’s relatively faithful, yet deeply flawed, take on the infamous Bram Stoker novel, Dracula, with Christopher Lee, replete with moustache and white wig, taking a break from Hammer Film’s own Dracula series to again play the infamous vampire, in a more classical sense.
In fact, it was Lee who ‘got the ball rolling’ and enabled the film to get green-lit as producer Harry Alan Towers had heard Lee saying that he really wanted to see someone attempt a proper version of the classic vampire tale. He later persuaded Lee to take part in the Franco production, promising to keep it as close to the original literary source as possible. Lee, therefore, had high hopes for the film because Franco, at least at the beginning, did intend to adhere closely to the book.
It’s true that the first section of the film does stick remarkably close to the source material, even including some nice dialogue exchanges between Harker and the count, which one can clearly see Lee enjoying doing. However, once things move into the second act, so to speak, things start to drift away from the original novel. For example, nothing is made of how Dracula travels over to England, hence the whole ship journey is missed out, probably to keep the film’s length shorter and for budgetary reasons.
Later things get back on track a little once the count begins to become more youthful the more blood that he drinks, which is also a solid take from the source material and something that Lee himself requested. There are also scenes in the nearby asylum, featuring Klaus Kinski, as Renfield, that also stick closely to the book, and Kinski is good at playing mad – I know, that’s not much of a stretch for him!
Also positive are the Gothic locations Franco uses, which are impressive, even if they’re clearly not in England – the film was chiefly shot in Barcelona, Spain, with some of it done in Italy. The film’s other major plus is the cast featuring Chris Lee as Dracula, Kinski as Renfield and the late, great Herbert Lom as Van Helsing; awesome.
However, a significant problem with this version, much like the 1931 Lugosi film, is that although it starts out very well, and probably has most of its best moments in the beginning (say during the first half hour) it becomes rather tedious and, let’s be honest here, rather boring; I did fall asleep watching it at one point and had to rewind to see what I’d missed. It’s a shame as this could have turned out to be the most faithful Dracula adaptation ever done, had Franco tried harder and Towers had managed to obtain a bigger budget.
Of course Jess’s overbearing need to zoom into characters’ faces, and other parts(!), still remains, but I can live with that, however, it’s such a shame that it’s all so yawn-inducing after a while. The dialogue is often stilted and delivered like an am-dram production and Jess’s use of the same ongoing musical cues all the time doesn’t really help either. And the less said about the disappointing climax, the better… Also, sadly, continuity suffers in places and, for a period film, seeing power cables in the background during some early scenes really doesn’t help set the right ambiance, that’s for sure!
Some less satisfactory elements can be excused, for example Franco using Alsatians instead of real wolves, and the overuse use of day-for-night photography, but frustratingly, it feels like the script was rushed out or changed in order to accommodate budgetary restrictions. However, in his defence, Franco did keep a couple of the more shocking elements in; for example, where Dracula gives his three brides a baby to drain it of its’ blood and one of the stakings is particularly bloody with blood spraying across the vampire hunter’s face in quite a disturbing manner.
All in all, this is worth seeing for Lee’s performance during the first third of the movie, but it sadly goes downhill soon after.
Count Dracula is being distributed by 88 Films on Blu-ray. There are a number of substantial extras included in the package, namely:
Audio Commentary with film critic Kim Newman and filmmaker Sean Hogan – Kim and Sean make for a good pairing and they discuss the film’s origins and reveal lots of fun anecdotes about the shoot and the film itself. They point out that the film Alucard is probably closer to the original story than Franco’s and that the dining scene features selective cobwebs in only two places.
Audio commentary with film experts Troy Howell and Nathaniel Thompson – Again, another good pairing with the two providing plenty of interesting anecdotes about the film and Jess Franco. They highlight the fact that this was Franco’s first vampire film and that this was made between Hammer’s Taste the Blood of Dracula and Scars of Dracula. They both think that this is one of Franco’s more accessible films in the UK along with The Awful Dr Orloff.
Audio commentary with horror historian David Del Valle and actress Maria Rohm – Again another good pairing with David leading Maria into reminiscing about her time on the film, which was also called The Nights of Dracula in some territories. She shares that she found Jess very creative but also very volatile, although she enjoyed working with him nethertheless. We also learn that producer Towers’s father actually knew Bram Stoker through his working at the theatre and that Dracula was modelled on Henry Irving.
Bloodsucker – David Pirie on Count Dracula (23 mins) – Vampire cinema expert Pirie talks about the history of Dracula and how it was originally seen in the UK as a ghost story, hence wasn’t censored, despite some very erotic elements. He talks about the differences between the Lugosi version, which focused on the menace of the character and on Hammer’s version, which concentrated more on the Count’s handsome charm.
Dracula in the South – an interview with Troy Haworth (33.5 mins) – Unfortunately the sound quality isn’t as good on this featurette, but Troy still manages to convey some interesting thoughts and facts, especially about Chris Lee’s legacy within euro horror.
Illustrated 1973 Christopher Lee interview with Filmmaker Donald Glut (20 mins) – Lee talks very candidly about his role in the film and explains how he’s the only person to have played the count correctly; at least up until then. He seems a little frustrated by the fact that the film had been shown theatrically across Europe but not in the UK. He also talks about the documentary he had been involved with, namely In Search of Dracula, which is certainly worth checking out, I seem to recall.
Beloved Count – an interview with director Jess Franco (23.5 mins) – Jess shares the story of how the film came about saying that Harry had asked him ten times until he finally agreed. He shares his thoughts on Francis Ford Coppola’s later film, which he wasn’t keen on as he doesn’t believe that Dracula could feel love. Instead he prefers Bela Lugosi’s take on the character. He didn’t think that Hammer took the character seriously enough.
Handsome Harker – an interview with actor Fredrick Williams (26 mins) – The actor reminisces about his time working with Franco, who he made several films with. He enjoyed working with him on most of them, although not on the last couple which were mostly cheap erotica. He recalls that Jack Taylor was treated badly by Franco and that Lee was very pedantic about the dialogue.
Interview with actor Jack Taylor (23 mins) – He recalls that he first met Jess over diner and ended up doing Succubus with him prior to Count Dracula. He says that he enjoyed Franco’s wicked sense of humour. He ended up doing eight films with Franco over a ten year period, with his favourites being Dracula and Eugenie.
Stakeholders – an appreciation of the film by director Christophe Gans (7.5 mins) – Gans suggests that Lee, being a well-read man, was keen for literary recognition and wanted to do proper acting such as Shakespeare, etc. Gans says that he’d have personally preferred to have seen Kinski playing Dracula.
Jess Franco’s Bram Stoker’s Count Dracula – Stephen Thrower on Count Dracula (46 mins) – A thorough review of the film and of Franco’s directing style by the ever reliable Thrower. He reveals some interesting anecdotes about the financing of the film, i.e. brown paper bags of money would appear on set from time to time, most of which was spent looking after Lee and making sure that all the scenes that he was in had the budget they required to pull them off. Unfortunately, Towers wasn’t so generous when it came to the rest of the film!
In the land of Franco (6 mins) – Stephen Thrower takes Alain Petit for a ‘walk and talk’ to chat about the production and his encounters with Lee who could speak perfect French. The interview gets side-tracked somewhat when one of them treads in dog shit!
Alternative title sequences – In French, German, Italian and Spanish.
Trailer (3.19 mins) – After saying that ‘horror stalks the earth’ the narrator then says: ‘We wish you pleasant dreams’!
