La fiancée du vampire

This is one of the best horror films of the '70's, and certainly the best vampire flick of that decade. Based on the highly successful supernatural soap opera DARK SHADOWS, this feature film version of the ever popular series recounts the resurrection of Barnabas Collins(Jonathan Frid), a 175-year-old vampire who passes himself off as a modern-day descendant of the Collins clan. While staying at the Gothic Collinwood estate, Barnabas becomes entranced by a beautiful governess(Kathryn Leigh Scott) who bears a striking resemblance to his long-lost love, Josette, and determines to make the young woman his new bride. Few films based on Tv shows work, but HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS is an exception to that rule and like the TV series on which it is based, HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS has developed into a cult classic over the years. Like its sequel, 1971's NIGHT OF DARK SHADOWS, the film is currently under restoration. There are several sequences from both films missing. Hopefully, the generally unfavorable opinion of NIGHT will change once all of the missing footage has been recovered, and the film will then rank right up there along with its predecessor like it should.

HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS (1970) is the movie-house version of the then popular Gothic Soap Opera. The film's plot is a re-tracing of the TV series. Willie Loomis (John Karlen), while robbing a New England crypt, accidently awakens 200 year old vampire Barnabas Collins (Jonathan Frid's moment of immortality!) Barnabas comes upon his modern descendants as a "long lost relative from England" leaving out the one little detail about being 200 years old. In the meantime, he is secretly feasting on victims. He enjoys a temporary cure, via a local doctor. What makes this film unique is how this murderous vampire is worthy of sympathy, the tender but extremely haunting encounter the pre-teen Collins boy has with his dead sister, and the rather doomsday style climax. This gem came at a time when decent horror films were a rarity. (Relaxed censorship let about 90% of the horror directors depend more on gore and sex).

The film features a number of the series regulars repeating their original TV roles, and there are several recycled plot elements from the show that come in handy for the movie. But producer/director Dan Curtis(the creator of the original series), knows the drastic difference between a daytime TV soap opera and a feature film, and uses this knowledge to create a striking, entertaining picture. Unlike an episodic TV series, the film doesn't allow the suspense to lag at a snail's pace, but actually builds suspense from the opening scene and never lets up! The performances by the multi-talented cast are truly wonderful, though star Joan Bennett(one of my most favorite characters on the show), doesn't get as much screen time as I would have liked. This is probably due to the fact that the film was cut by some twenty minutes before being released. But even in its truncated form, HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS remains one of the greatest vampire/horror flicks of its time.

For anyone who enjoys Gothic melodramas, this one is for you. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, producer Dan Curtis was on a roll with his hit afternoon television series Dark Shadows. When the powers that be decided to make a feature film version, most of the original cast members of the daily soap opera were recruited to star in this production. It is worth noting that several of the performers were pulling double duty at the time, since the daily program was churning out new episodes while HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS was being filmed.

Of course, a feature film version is going to have a much larger budget than its TV counterpart. And it is also going to be made in color, not black and white. Curtis and his crew do a very effective job transferring the basic original ideas to the big screen. In fact, they do not miss a beat introducing vampire Barnabas Collins (Jonathan Frid) and the rest of the inhabitants of Collinwood to celluloid. From the first fade in, it's a bloody good show, and the entire affair is raised a notch or two by the presence of an old pro-- Joan Bennett, doing quite well as matriarch Elizabeth Stoddard Collins, fang you very much!

Intelligently done, but bloody and violent story based on the hit TV show Dark Shadows from the late 60s. The plot revolves around vampire Barnabas Collins, who finds a cure to become human again so he can wed a beautiful girl. Genuinely creepy atmosphere, beautifully filmed and surprisingly first-rate acting by cast.