On a personal level, I really enjoy Dracula movies for the ostentatious, gothic castles and atmosphere, especially the part where one first enters the castle and is received hospitably but slowly realizes the true horror of the place. This means that the beginning of these movies are usually my favourite but also makes this a guilty pleasure, because although it isn't as good as the Hammer Dracula films preceding it it does have that drawn from the beginning of the novel. The part about entering the room without a door is from the novel as well I believe, and the imagery really feeds my soul's craving for the gothic and sort of balances out the bad aspects of this film.
Sadly Hammer apparently isn't up to the same gorgeous set design they were in the first few Dracula films because it's rather sparse here. This is not what I'd call 'baroque set design'. Ignoring those little details which are not of great importance to the usual film watcher, this film still falls short. It's rather confusing and has random things that really don't make much sense, either in the series or even the film itself. It's much more violent than the others as well. Also I don't understand why some of the cast is wearing clothes from the 1700s when the rest are wearing clothes from the 1800s at least, if not the late 1800s.
Review of Scars of Dracula
