Mama Dracula

Embarassing vampire satire with Fletcher sucking the life out of her career.

Obviously I had nothing to do with this production, and actually it was released before I was even born, but still I somewhat feel the necessity to apologize to all the poor people who – like myself – struggled their way through this film and literally hated every single minute of it. Why? Because I'm from Belgium and apparently so is this miserable excuse for a horror movie! There aren't too many horror films being made in Belgium, but judging by the quality of "Mama Dracula", that's maybe a good thing. This is supposed to be a horror comedy, but we all know what the main problem with these flicks is… They're not scary and they're definitely not funny! Some of the basic ideas in the script definitely show potential (like the spin on the Countess Bathory legend), but the film is unendurably tedious, imbecilic and embarrassing. It's a complete mystery how Louise Fletcher ended up in such an inferior Belgian film production, barely five years after winning an Oscar for one of the greatest motion pictures ever made, but luckily enough she stills keeps her dignity. Fletcher plays the title role, but perhaps they couldn't pay her enough, as her role definitely isn't the leading part. She's a posh vampire who requires bathing in the blood of young virgins in order to maintain her beauty. The problem nowadays, however, is that virgins are becoming quite rare in this indecent day and age. She therefore orders to kidnap the young scientist Dr. Van Bloed, as he's on the verge of achieving a breakthrough with his synthetic blood formula. The jokes – if you can even refer to them like that – solely revolve on a handful of totally insufferable characters. The horrible vampire twin brothers are the absolute worst, closely followed by a police inspector who yells out "sabotage" all the time, and the young dorky scientist. "Mama Dracula" is hectic and irritating, with a plot that continuously jumps back and forth between semi-processed plot ideas and lame gags. The twins own (or perhaps just work) in a fashion store where they kidnap young girls from the cubicles. These sequences aren't very important, but I want to mention them nevertheless because at least they featured some nudity. Horrible movie, avoid at all costs … and once more my most sincere apologies in case you already had the displeasure of seeing it.

This is the question one must ask himself while watching this... how can I put it? Infamous? Dull? Stupid? Below the waist? Anyway, tremendously trashy movie.

I don't know what went on in both Boris Szulzinger (director, also writer) or in Pierre Sterckx and Marc-Henri Wajnberg (also writers), when they decided to put this project in motion.

Probably, since this was made a few years later than "The Rocky Horror Picture Show", they must have thought that another such attempt would be worthwhile, but seeing that the former was a kind of a Musical Fantasy movie, and not indeed just yet another comedy, one must ask on what basis they started doing it.

Just four years earlier "Dracula and Son", starring the otherwise great Christopher Lee, and even six years earlier "Old Dracula", starring David Niven bombed totally at the box office and although in the meanwhile they might have joined the ranks of other so called "cult movies" (only heaven knows why), "Mama Dracula" doesn't seem to be part of them.

In fact I just found it due to my music score research, which is the only worthy thing in it, just because it was composed by none other than Roy Budd.

And since Roy Budd had been known to have composed some of the best scores for movies like "Get Carter", "The Black Windmill", "The Wild Geese I & II" and indeed for "Who Dares Wins" (Aka "The Final Option"), I assumed that even this effort was made for a worthy film.

Alas, how wrong I was.

And besides, there was already a much better depiction of the source material based on Countess Elizabeth Bathory made in 1971 by none other than Hammer Films which starred Ingrid Pitt in the main role as "Countess Dracula". Although that was indeed a horror movie.

So, again, why had they to waste money in something like this?

My answer to my preceding question on why Louise Fletcher did accept the role has only two possibilities: one, she needed the money; two. She was handed a better script to start with, only to be embroiled and trapped under contract, while the authors did shamelessly re-write it during filming.

Something that even happened to great actors such as Malcolm McDowell and Peter O'Toole while working on the infamous "Caligula" movie.

In any case, story or no story logic, this project had no real bearing nor did it have a real final goal. It was just made for the fun(?) of it.

Probably just to have the director's and writer's names written on the billboards in the hope of notoriety and fame.

And Louise Fletcher, in her usual professional way does what she was supposed to do: act in it, but one can easily see that she was only doing it by the numbers, with no real enthusiasm.

It is only for her presence in it that I gave it an uplifting three stars, because were it just for the movie alone, I wouldn't even have considered to pick one to start with, that bad of an experience (at least for yours truly) it was.

Instead of having been entertained, I was utterly embarrassed for all the performers in it, who I believe and hope, have finally found more worthy projects to work on since then.

So, what is my final judgment on "Mama Dracula"?

Simply put? Forget it, it does not exist, but should you want to be educated on how not to ever film something like this, this would probably be one of the finest examples among others.

And would I recommend it? Are you kidding me?

Why experience something so abysmally idiotic and painful?

Mama Dracula (1980)

BOMB (out of 4)

Oscar winner Louise Fletcher (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest) and Oscar nominee Maria Schneider (Last Tango in Paris) star in this Belgian horror/comedy that has to be one of the worst films ever made. In a mixture of the Dracula and Elizabeth Bathory stories, Fletcher plays a female Dracula who needs to take a bath in the blood of virgins in order to live. Her two gay sons own a clothing store that keeps them supplied but it's getting harder and harder to find virgins in today's times. Man, oh man what a horrible film this one turned out to be. This was a minor holy grail to me as I've been wanting to see it for ages just to see if it was really as bad as the reputation that goes with it. It's every bit as bad and I'd say it's even worse than any of the reviews I've read for it. I'm really not sure what the hell they were going for or how they got Fletcher to star in this but the movie is a complete misfire from the opening scenes to the very last. There's plenty of slapstick and silly situations but I didn't laugh a single time nor did I ever crack a smile. The story makes very little sense and it appears that the screenwriter was a drunk because the movie jumps all over the place so much that you can't help but wonder what they're trying to do. As for Fletcher, believe it or not she comes off fairly well and never embarrasses herself too much. She's seems to be playing everything straight as if the producer's didn't tell her this was a spoof. Maria Schneider, like the rest of the cast, comes off horrible. The "wirgins" gag from Blood for Dracula is ripped off here but that doesn't even get a laugh here. There's plenty of naked women but not even that can save this turkey.

When I initially heard about Mama Dracula and read the premise I immediately thought of the Carry On films. I expected a camp Carry On Screaming knock off set around Countess Elizabeth Bathory. Truth be told that's what it tries to be but sadly lacks the talented cast, the charm and the humour that was essential to the Carry On movies success.

Featuring a terrible generic story line, viciously annoying characters, jokes that fall flat and some dire dialogue this is everything I'd hoped it wouldn't be.

I get the impression the vampire twins were supposed to be the true stars who steal each scene but truth is the movie dropped in my opinion every time they appeared as they offered little beyond face palms & cringe inducing moments.

If you seek horror, keep looking. If you seek comedy, you won't find any here. If you seek something that quite frankly isn't far off deserving a place in IMDb's bottom list, you've found what you're looking for.