Dracula Exotica

Dracula Exotica (1980)

*** (out of 4)

Count Dracula (Jamie Gillis) forces himself on a woman (Samantha Fox) who in return kills herself. Flash-forward to the current times and Dracula is now in America where he sees a woman (also played by Fox) who reminds him of his long-lost love so he goes after her. Dracula EXOTICA wasn't the first porn version to feature the classic monster but it's certainly a good film and I think a strong argument could be made that it's one of the better Dracula movies from this period. It's certainly much better than the previous year's Frank Langella version. There's a lot of good things going with this film and a lot of credit has to go to director Shaun Costello who manages to keep the film moving at an extremely good pace and best of all is how he's able to mix the hardcore sex with the regular story. I was shocked to see how much plot was actually here and I was even more shocked to see how well-made this film was. It actually looks extremely good and this is especially true in regards to the costumes and sets. Another major plus is that the performances are actually good with Gillis doing an extremely nice job in the role of Dracula. I will admit that I'm not sure what he's going for with the accent but I'm not going to fault him or the film too much for this. Fox is good in her supporting roles and we get a very energetic Vanessa del Rio and a young Ron Jeremy. The film mixes the sex and horror elements quite nicely but the director takes it a step further with some comedy that works at times. The film even crosses the line of del Rio's dead body being molested and raped inside the mortuary. If you think that's weird it gets even worse during one scene where a father molests his daughter (in a dress, with a sucker and piggy tales), which is just rather disturbing to say the least. At nearly 100-minutes the film does run a bit too long but there's no question that the film has a lot going for it.

It's a Dracula story, and it's directed by Shaun Costello; so naturally what we have here is a pornographic version of Dracula. The film is praised by some for having a script...but really it's just business as usual. Most of the movie is porn, and it's all just connected by a loose Dracula story. The porn scenes don't even fit in with the story for the most part. The plot is an altered version of the classic Dracula tale. The film begins by introducing us to the Count; and the woman he loves, a simple maid that he cannot marry because of the class-divide. Frustrated, he drags her from her bed and rapes her, but this leads to her suicide, which leaves Dracula cursed to walk the Earth as the undead for the rest of eternity. He then spends eternity having sex with various women. I can't say that the film is really very entertaining; the story doesn't exactly flow very well and the horror elements are lacklustre at best. But of course I went into this expecting porn and that's what I got. The porn scenes are decent enough; as mentioned they don't particularly fit in with the rest of the film, but that's pretty common when it comes to hardcore porn. Overall, this might be of some interest to porn/Costello fans...but Dracula fans would be better off looking elsewhere.

Certainly DE is something different. A horror movie with a twist of porn, and Gillis who's weak portrayal of our fiendish villain is about convincing as mummy doing the role. But this is expected as when watching adult stars try to be cool or do parody's of other films, stars. It's fun watching them attempt this. By any feat, DE isn't a masterpiece, but shows initiative in it's story. Of course, the horror whatever doesn't hide the fact it's just another sex romp from our adult stars, and like their other movies, there's humour here too, only less of it. The opening in the castle where an orgy is taking place, I was somewhat visually appreciative, but the story becomes sometimes hard to follow, and spends too much time in the mire with sex scenes, but really this is what was intended. But I like movies like this that pretend to be different, like the mafia drama Bound, which it's twist was lesbianism. The problem with DE, was it's story got lost here and there, or was disjointed. The oral scene with Eric Edwards in the porno theatre was funny as was the scene with the same female agent parading as a pig tailed young girl, about to snuff out the dirty old Albanian, my favourite scene, and kinky too. Below par, really.

Watching a porn is often more fun than most people think, or are afraid to admit perhaps. Of course it has some bad acting, a silly story and a low budget behind it but the filmmakers and 'actors' at least know this and simply decide to have some fun, while shooting their movie. It's the thing that makes "Dracula Exotica" quite entertaining to watch.

Having the character of Dracula in a porn movie and in modern times is hardly anything original. It has been done a lot and it's still getting done now days. But I can say that this is one of the rare movies in which it actually works out as fun and entertaining.

As far as the genre goes, this is at least a movie that attempts to have a story in it. Not that I cared about it, or could follow it really but it at least ties certain things together, so it's less random to watch than most other genre movies, that basically consists out of a couple of unrelated sex scenes. It's still pretty random the way certain characters are ending up having sex together but oh well, it's a porn flick, so of course there has to be a sex scene in it every 5 minutes or so.

I also really liked the way the movie got shot. It was a very classy movie, with also some good settings and costumes in it. It's weird but you would think the way porn movies got shot would have been improved and perfected over the years but just give me a movie like this over a modern one any day! It's more pleasantly shot, original and overall feels far more authentic as well.

It also stars same well known names, from the world of classic porn, such as Samantha Fox, Vanessa del Rio and Ron Jeremy in a small bit part, in which he gets to show his juggling skills. And you could say what you want about this guy but he's always entertaining to see in anything (or anyone). He always genuinely seems to be having fun with it all and seems to have a great sense of humor as well.

But of course it's not a great movie and it also definitely is a bit overlong. 100 minutes is just far too long for a movie of this sort and it also definitely starts to drag more toward its end. The movie so easily could had ended 30 minutes earlier and I'm sure if it that I would had given the movie a higher rating, if that would had been the case.

It still definitely remains a fun and entertaining enough genre flick, that serves its purpose well.

6/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

A gem among horror fans and stands out from run-of-the-mill porn! A very good storyline, excellent sets and costumes plus a surprise comedic ending. Every kink imaginable is in this flick. Jamie brings a little class into the genre with his usual dark and quiet demure.