Vampira

I caught this on cable, and found it quite amusing. Not laugh out loud, but still rather good. Granted, it's no masterpiece, but I enjoyed it for what it was, a kitchy cool retro film from the 70's. I love watching bad 60's and 70's films for the music, the clothes, the decor...and this was the perfect film. How can you deny seeing London at the end of the swingin' 60's? And the Playboy element, the swinging party...I don't know. I took this film for what it was, and I would definitely watch it again....

Maybe the fact that I watched it as a morning double feature with Vincent Price's "Scream and Scream Again" helped me get into the mood for this...

David Niven has a role that is clearly beneath his stature (in his first scene, he is reading a Playboy magazine), and Clive Donner's direction is almost embarrassingly crude (the dreadful copy I saw made it look even worse than it is, but it's crude nonetheless). Still, the movie has some unexpectedly clever lines (Dracula's assistant to his master: "I cross my fingers, sir" - Dracula's response: "I'd rather you didn't"), and (don't crucify me for this) I really found it more enjoyable than Polanski's overrated "Fearless Vampire Killers" - mainly because it has no pretensions of greatness. (**)

This movie is rather offensive. Not because I am Black and that I should take offense to the premise, but that they should spoof Dracula to the point where even a card carrying Van Helsing club member would be offended. This movie seemed as if it was a British writer trying to compete with Mel Brooks. I am not offended with the premise because I must defend the actors who chose to do such a dreadful movie. Ms. Graves found popularity by being a beautiful funny Black woman on Laugh In. She needed work and wanted to also be accepted by the public and further her career. She was one of the few Black women to play a lead role with the great David Niven. David Niven, on the other hand, was in his last days as a lead and his last years on earth. He valiantly tried to make something out of nothing. I don't think he (Dracula) was concerned with the color of his bride's skin more than seeing her the way he remembered her. Vampira was sexy enough to grace the last scenes of the movie and even seduce the two lead men. It seems as if the writer was celebrating the new times and he wanted to join the party of real race relations. Ms. Graves went on to have her own series for a short while and I think she made an impact on many young girls and taught them to stand for themselves. The only thing that was disturbing to me was that the young actor playing the Don Juan like character looks a lot like Jeremy Pivens. The end was very predictable and it made the whole thing look like what it was meant to be; A meaningless pursuit of the old ways while change to the new ways ended up not being so bad. In fact the change helped in the end. This movie was fun and the limited nudity expressed some class. I would recommend it to only those with an affinity to the art of movies and you should remember the times when this was done. I believe this was just at the start of Blacksploitation, disco and spoofs. In conclusion, it was a failed attempt to suck blood from the new times and still win favor of the old school. I think I would watch it again, though.

The movie is just not all that funny - you would expect a comedy to give more laughs than this film gave us. It has a few moments worth of giggles but not bust-a-gut laughter like one wants from a comedy.

All the actors are fine - really good. It's just a terrible story with very few laughs.

I have to agree with other reviewers that Dracula's problem is not that she's black but that he wanted his wife, Vampira, the way he remembered her - he just wanted his wife back. He felt he was with another woman because she acts different and looks different.

It's such a shame the comedy wasn't funnier and the storyline a bit better because this film had the potential to be really comical if better written.

3.5/10

Almost so bad it's brilliant, this is one of the more strange versions of Dracula. Set in London in the seventies we see an older Dracula (David Niven) hosting parties for young people at his castle. He's searching for suitable blood to bring his former lover Vampira (Teresa Graves) back to life. Only trouble is when it works she is now black much to Dracula's distaste. They must try again with the help of Marc (Nicky Henson) who unwillingly gets samples of blood from girls.

It's certainly a camp version of the Dracula story, but it has a certain charm and is obviously being played for laughs.