The Big Whatsit

Having read various comments and reviews about Dracula: Prince of Darkness, it strikes me that this film is seen almost as the quintessential Hammer experience. If you don’t like it, then you aren’t a true Hammer fan, and it’s time for you to watch something else instead, like [insert name of postmodern horror film here; something along the lines of The Hunger, with its Bauhaus music and ’style over substance’ ethic that bewilders the average viewer]. Unfortunately, it left me absolutely cold. Though not entirely without entertainment value, DPoD appeared to go through the motions, retreading a familiar formula but doing so with little effort or enthusiasm. At its (lack of) heart is a staid, disinterested performance from Christopher Lee. Making his long awaited reappearance as the eponymous Count, Lee acts as though he would far rather be somewhere else. The irony of the film is that its best moments all come either before Dracula is brought back to life, or during scenes that don’t feature him.

DPoD starts with a brief reprise of the closing act from Horror of Dracula, reminding us of the climactic duel between the vampire and his nemesis, Van Helsing. Sadly, this is the last we see of Peter Cushing, who presumably was convalescing after squaring off with David Peel in Brides of Dracula, which appears to have been expunged from the canon now that Lee has made his comeback.

It’s ten years since the Count’s death. The vampire cult lingers in the memories of the Transylvanian peasantry, despite the best efforts of cynical Father Sandor (Andrew Keir) to crush it. He knows that as long as nobody goes to the mysterious castle above Carlsbad, then all will be fine. And perhaps in time, the diabolical legacy of Dracula will fade. Everything appears to be working out, providing the region isn’t visited by some hapless British toffs who are tailor-made to stroll directly into the path of terror…

Enter the stiffs, our lambs to the slaughter. The menfolk are Charles (Francis Matthews) and Alan (Charles Tingwall). Buttoned up Helen (Barbara Shelley) and prim Diana (Suzan Farmer) are their ladyfriends. They’re warned about going to Carlsbad, and off they trot regardless. Once on the town’s outskirts, they’re booted out of their own coach, the driver refusing to take them any further. As though this weren’t foreboding enough, another coach without anyone driving it appears out of nowhere and takes them straight up to the castle. Helen doesn’t think they should proceed any further, but her companions are suitably amused, particularly by the table that’s been prepared for dinner. Klove (Philip Latham), the ashen, sinister butler, makes his appearance. As he serves the bemused guests, he explains that his dead master wished the castle to be used for entertaining people. They eat and then go to bed, only Helen at all sceptical about what’s happening.

Seasoned Hammer viewers will have realised what was going on some time ago. The travellers are walking into a trap, a trap that started opening as soon as they made their first appearance in the movie. Forget the wholly implausible plot and the frankly unbelievable gullibility of the characters. They’re only present in the film to provide the means for resurrecting Dracula, who of course is the ‘dead master.’ It’s at this point, however, that DPoD enters its best and creepiest sequence. They’re all supplied by Klove, who draws in his guests by clunking around, appearing at doorways and pulling a coffin along the corridors. It’s Klove who dispatches Alan, ritually sacrificing him in a scene that’s shocking by today’s standards. Alan’s blood is used to bring the Count back to life, and when another victim is required, Klove sends for Helen.

Poor Helen. The sole member of the group to doubt the castle’s hospitality, she winds up being Dracula’s first bitten. Fortunately, this makes her character far more interesting. Shelley simply transforms Helen into a siren and a killer, at once tempting and moving in for the kill. The change in her is altogether astounding. Helen is miles ahead of the wan bloodsuckers dished up by Hammer previously. She knows how to work any men who come near her, and the scene where she’s tapping on Diana’s window, begging to be let in, is one of the film’s best. Eat your heart out, Salem’s Lot…

The downside is Dracula himself. In The Many Faces of Christopher Lee, the interview that was supplied on this disc as an extra, the actor claims that having read DPoD’s screenplay, he felt the Count’s lines were ‘literally unsayable.’ As a result, his vampire doesn’t speak, communicating instead in hisses and snarls. This relegates Dracula into a standard movie monster, but also robs the film of Lee’s voice, surely one of its better assets. Dracula should be an intelligent, cunning villain, but we find little sign of that here. Klove does all his dirty work. Helen supplies the words. The Count simply threatens people, and never looks entirely comfortable doing so. Besides, the method in which he is finally offed comes across as arbitrary and rushed, as though everyone involved knew how silly their project was and simply wanted it finished.

Maybe it’s the absence of a dignified Cushing that ruins it. Possibly, the cheap, cliched excuse of a story is the problem, or the horribly shallow characters, none of whom appear to have any more complexity than the extent to which they serve the mechanisms of the stale plot. DPoD is a step down from both its prequels, conjuring little of the fairytale nightmare that underpinned ‘Horror’ and ‘Brides,’ and turning out to be inferior to its supposed ‘B’ feature, Plague of the Zombies (subject of the next review, eager reader). That said, it isn’t a total disaster. The scenes featuring Klove or vampiric Helen are frequently unsettling, whilst the noticeable increase in gore hints at a production company willing and ready to push the boundaries of what they were allowed to show.