User Reviews

The prolific Spanish director Jesus Franco, who has helmed over 160 films, makes marginal movies. Essentially, Franco's films contain only vestiges of drama, urgency, and sentiment. The mystery is that Franco has made so many films when most qualify as unremarkable. Franco's "Count Dracula" surpasses most of his monotonous movies, but it too suffers from anemia. Christopher Lee made a name for himself playing the most celebrated vampire in English literature, Bram Stoker's immortal vampire, and the elegant but imposing actor reprises his role for Franco as Dracula. Admittedly, Franco and scenarist Harry Alan Towers, a.k.a. Peter Welbeck, of "The Blood of Fu Manchu" strove for greater fidelity to the classic novel. Nevertheless, they do take liberties with the narrative the undermine "Count Dracula." Chiefly, the budgetary boundaries that they confronted compelled them to eliminate Dracula's voyage to England on the Demeter and they have omitted the relationship between Jonathan Harker and R.M. Renfield. Although Lee and fellow co-stars Herbert Lom and Klaus Kinski give "Count Dracula" some credibility by appearing in it, their marquee value is negated by the lackluster storyline. Aside from the solid cast, the only other asset that "Count Dracula" boasts is Bruno Nicolai's brilliantly atmospheric orchestral score that injects some suspense and tension into this dreary stuff. Among other things, Nicolai served as the arranger and conductor for the legendary Ennio Morricone on most of his best soundtracks.

The story takes place in 1897. Wannabe attorney Jonathan Harker (Frederick Williams of "A Bridge Too Far") travels from England to Transylvania where he confers with Count Dracula (Christopher Lee of "Horror of Dracula") about a real estate property that the nobleman wants to purchase outside of London. The early scenes show Harker traveling by train to see the Count. He doesn't understand why some of the people that he meets want to keep their distance from him. At his hotel, the innkeeper's wife warns him of his impending danger. Harker takes a stagecoach to Count Dracula's castle. The first coach deposits him in the middle of the wilderness. After a short wait, another arrives with a coachman, suspiciously resembling the Count, who offers Harker a flash of whiskey with which he may fortify himself. Harker refuses the coachman's offer and climbs aboard the vehicle.

Count Dracula (Christopher Lee) meets Harker at his castle. "Enter freely and of your own will," the Count bids him without explanation. No sooner has Dracula shown Harker to his room than the Englishmen is puzzled by an unusual sight. The mirror in his room casts a reflection of himself but shows nothing of the Count standing alongside him. Later, Harker asks the white-haired, heavily mustached Dracula why he has chosen to leave his castle in the Carpathian wilds, he replied, "I am not young, but I am restless." Harker's comments prompt Dracula to relive the exploits of his bloody past when he helped to repulse the invading Turks. Finally, Dracula concludes his monologue, "The wind blows coldly through these broken battlements. Although this is my home, I must move on." Harker observes that he could have sent the Count the real estate papers through the mail. Disagreeing with Harker, Dracula explains that he wanted to learn something about the people and customs of his new home and so he invited Harker as his guest. At this point, Harker's hackles rise at the howls of wildlife around the castle. Dracula utters his immortal line. "Listen to them, the children of the night, what music they do make." Later, Dracula intervenes when three of his women are poised to suck every last drop of blood from a supine Harker's throat. As it turns out, Harker has been dreaming. He decides to escape from Dracula's castle and does a header out of a window. The next time that we see him, he is a patient in Dr. Seward's sanitarium. Dr. John Seward (Paul Muller of "Lady Frankenstein") operates an asylum for the mentally ill and one of his consulting colleagues is Professor Abraham Van Helsing (Herbert Lom of "Mysterious Island") who has been studying the 'black arts.' Seward explains to Harker's fiancée Mina Murray(Maria Rohm of "Twenty Four Hours to Kill") that her future husband was brought to his sanitarium because of the outrageous stories that he told about Count Dracula and an army of bats. Mina has been accompanied by her friend, Lucy (Soledad Miranda of "She Killed in Ecstasy"), and she faints when she hears one of the patients screaming. Later, we learn that R.M. Renfield (Klaus Kinski of "Nosferatu") is kept there because he told a trip to Transylvania. Renfield's daughter died from loss of blood and has been insane and eating insect since her demise. Meantime, Dracula has moved into the house across the road from Seward's clinic, unbeknownst to any of the occupants until Harker realizes later that the count is residing there. Mina walks in on Dracula sucking the blood out of Mina and we get the scariest shot in "Count Dracula." Eventually, Harker and Lucy's fiancée, Quincy (Jack Taylor) pursue Dracula and burn him in his coffin.

Believe it or not, "Count Dracula" surpasses the typical Franco fiasco. Lee delivers a terrific soliloquy in his castle about his valorous combat against the invading Turkish horde, but he doesn't have half as many lines after he forsakes his castle. Lee appears appropriately sinister, but he is rarely frightening. As perfectly cast as he is as Renfield, Kinski seems wasted in a peripheral role, while Herbert Lom fares best with more substantial role as Van Helsing. "Count Dracula" is clearly an example of 1970's film-making. Franco's long-time collaborator, lenser Manuel Merino relies heavily on zooms to indicate surprise and tension. Meanwhile, Franco directs with his customary lack of fanfare and rarely covers a scene with additional shots. The Spanish production values are good, but there aren't any scenes set in London. Francis Ford Coppola's "Bram Stoker's Dracula" is a far better retelling than Franco's "Count Dracula."

My forgiving temperament allowed me to score it 2, but really this is SO much a 1 ! Mr Lee does his best with a woefully underwritten part and certainly looks wise he is true to the Stoker written description, a lack of rapport from the German actors around him stifled any possible creativity. Herbert Lom is always good value but was written as someone doubtful of his own extensive research and looked too dithering in most of the group scenes. The ladies were pretty clotheshorses and the leading men sturdy and handsome but none seemed to be engaged with the story itself. Cinematography was pretty abysmal, indeed many scenes were cloaked in utter darkness with only the soundtrack to tell us anything was happening. Shooting day-for-night was a farce as the super bright Spanish sun in most exterior shots completely washed out the shaded parts, leaving us bemused and befuddled. Dubbing was generally good but dear me, those cut glass English accents sat ill with those European faces. Kinski was totally wasted, Renfield in the book is central in moving the plot forward, his silence gave us nothing. The minuscule budget meant studio scenes (Renfield's cell etc) were little better than Community Theater quality with plain walls and invisible ceilings. Perhaps American audiences would swallow the "English" scenes but to this Brit the architecture screamed Southern Europe (and I guessed, correctly Spain. If this director is considered cutting edge for the 21st century I feel sorry for the next generation...

In 1922 German filmmaker F. W. Murnau failed to get rights to film Bram Stoker's novel Dracula and so he made many changes in his vampire film "Nosferatu". In 1931 the most famous Dracula film, starring Bela Lugosi, was released. Instead of the book, it was more based on a famous theater play. In 1958 Hammer Films released its first Dracula film that was a greatly simplified version of the story. Christopher Lee, who continued to play the part of Count Dracula in many of Hammer's sequels, often complained that writers didn't use any of the great scenes and/or dialog from Stoker's novel. In 1969-70 a Spanish c-filmmaker Jess Franco (or Jesus Franco) agreed with Lee and begun to plan filming an authentic movie version of Stoker's book. Delighted Lee agreed to play the part in his film.

Franco's film "El Conde Dracula" (a.k.a. "Count Dracula", "Nachts, wenn Dracula erwacht", "Verenhimoinen Dracula" etc.) has a very promising beginning. Although film is shot in Spain, Franco has found very Gothic looking places where to shot the film and on the background we hear Bruno Nicolai's powerful organ music. Jonathan Harker's (Fred Williams) journey to Dracula's castle follows Stoker's pages faithfully and Lee looks stunning with the white hair and mustache (Dracula appears as an old man for the first time in cinema history). When he starts speaking Stoker's lines, about Dracula's past and passionately tell how "Dracula's ancestors" defeated Turks, you can see Lee is having a time of his life, finally playing Dracula as he wanted.

Sadly, the first 20 minutes are also mainly the only good ones in this film. Apparently the producers backed out suddenly and Franco lost most of his budget. He has tried to keep most of his film faithful to Stoker, but the lack of money has forced them to make changes. After Harker escapes from Dracula's castle, he wakes up weeks later in a hospital ran by Prof. Abraham Van Helsing (Herbert Lom) and Dr. John Seward (Paul Muller). Soon Harker's fiancée Mina (Maria Rohm) arrives with her friend Lucy (beautiful Soledad Miranda) and her fiancé Quincey Morris (Jack Taylor). Count Dracula has moved to an old abbey very close to a hospital and his presence has an odd effect on Van Helsing's patient Renfield (Klaus Kinski, who actually played Dracula later in 1979).

As said, Franco tries to keep the film as faithful to Stoker as he can. However dreams of making a completely authentic adaptation were gone. Also the film is far from being even a good film. Poor supporting performances, Franco's annoying habit of taking many close-up shots and the general lack of money are too visible effects to ignore. Also after the castle sequence, Lee doesn't have much to do anymore. He does get younger which is interesting to see but he mainly just gives threatening glares. Herbert Lom, who has played different roles from Captain Nemo to Phantom of the Opera, is the saving grace here. His Van Helsing becomes the only interesting character here and Lom does put his best to the role, stealing the rest of the film from others. Klaus Kinski sadly just wastes his talents here, for he has no lines at all. Story tells that producer Harry Allan Towers would have tricked Kinski in the film by not telling him it's a Dracula film. Franco has denied this though.

Jesus Franco's "El Conde Dracula" is the first movie really trying to be faithful to Stoker's book. Unfortunately it doesn't reach it goals and is not even that great movie in the first place. God only knows that they might have done a lot better with more money. Now the only things memorable are performances by Lee and Lom, as well as the organ music.

I thought I'd check this out after reading good reviews and I like Christopher Lee in the Dracula role. This movie is terrible!!! I can't believe people stating this is better than Coppola's version. Even with great source material(Bram Stokers novel) JF just can't make a good film. I've seen every movie version of Dracula and this is the worst one out there. It's boring, unmoving, and a complete waste of time. If you like Chris Lee, stick with the Hammer films. If you want to see a movie that is close to the novel, check out the BBC 1977 Count Dracula and Coppola's(my personal favourite) Bram Stoker's Dracula. If you do watch this you will be treated to plastic bats, cheap sets, rocks that are clearly made of foam, a pace slower than a snail and a lack of competent direction.

This cheap international production of Bram Stoker's novel "Dracula" is poorly conceived and poorly made in most ways, but it does have the draw of featuring two actors who played the titular role in other, better films, and is, thus, interesting for comparison. Christopher Lee had already played Dracula in the 1958 Hammer production and would continue to appear in the role in the studio's sequels. He again plays the Count here. Klaus Kinski would later play Dracula in Werner Herzog's remake of "Nosferatu" in 1979, and here he plays Renfield.

Although championed as faithful to the book, as an adaptation, this "Dracula" features some bad deviations from Stoker's tale and in other ways is a poor imitation of prior "Dracula" films—especially the 1958 Hammer one. Although it adopts the gore and blood splatter from Hammer, it's, overall, a tamer version, and there's very little sex appeal here as opposed to some of the Hammer productions. This film also steals from the 1958 film the part where the Count lures Mina away, but adopts from the 1931 Universal picture the scenes of Dracula prowling the streets and entering a theatre. This stuff is absent from Stoker's original. Also absent from the book is Van Helsing's weird stroke, which in this film leaves him wheelchair bound and stuck at home with Mina while Quincy and Jonathan go to Transylvania. Also, in the final scenes, a fire motif is invented, with Van Helsing making a makeshift, fiery cross to ward off Dracula, and the Count is climactically burned to death in his coffin.

There's a laughable scene involving taxidermic animals supposedly coming to life to threaten our heroes, some obvious dummy boulders in the climax, and the film makes the head-scratching mistake of trying to pass off docile German Shepherds as wolves. The fake bat gimmickry is far more tolerable by comparison. Overall, the main stylistic theme of director Franco's movie is an abundant reliance on zoom-ins.

Lee and Kinski can't save this dull and ill-advised mess, but their characterizations are of some interest. Kinski as Renfield seems too true to art imitating life, as the actor really had been committed to a psychiatric hospital in years past, and his continued abnormal behavior was evidenced in his frequent-director Herzog's documentary "My Best Fiend" (1999). Unlike other portrayals of Renfield, Kinski plays him comatose, with occasional screaming and violent outbursts, including jumping out a window and choking Mina. Kinski's later stilted Nosferatu isn't that far removed from his Renfield, really, except his Dracula talks more and breaths heavier. Meanwhile, Lee got the opportunity to play a Count that is a somewhat closer approximation of Stoker's characterization than his Hammer iterations, although he still manages to play him mostly mute after his castle scenes. His mustached appearance and white-to- black hair transformation is closer to Stoker's description, too, than his wild-eyed sex beast in the '58 shocker.

The final embarrassment is that the filmmakers of a documentary, "Cuadecuc vampire" (1971), of the making of this film, made a better movie.

The next year, Franco made a looser, Sapphic Dracula adaptation, appropriately titled "Vampyros Lesbos" (1971).

(Mirror Note: Contrary to the novel, Dracula has a wall mirror in his castle, which, for further inexplicable reasons, he points to in a scene with Jonathan—revealing to him his lack of a reflection. Although also contrary to the novel, a shadow disappearance shot is handled better later in the film.)