Dracula - Prince des ténèbres

Christopher Lee first put on his max factor fangs for Hammer productions in 1958. The result was the marvelous technicolor classic "The Horror of Dracula". Despite the film's awesome success it took Hammer eight years to convince Lee to do a sequel. The result was the far less heralded but nearly as good "Dracula-Prince of Darkness".

Taking place ten years after the vampire king's demise at the end the of "Horror", "Prince of Darkness" concerns two British couples traveling through central europe on a sight seeing venture. Ignoring warnings to avoid Castle Dracula the foolhardy band enter the vampire's abode and must battle for their lives against the recently resurrected count. One couple escapes and finds sanctuary at the nearby monastery of the Abbott of Kleinberg.

Enraged, Dracula pursues to reclaim his lost prey. Unfortunately, the master bloodsucker must first contend with the Abbott who knows how to deal with toothsome troublemakers.

Lee is his ghoulishly macho self in the title role. Hammer pinup girls Barbara Shelly and Suzan Farmer are appropriately pretty. Peter Latham is effective as the count's creepy man friday, Klove. But the real star of this outing is Andrew Keir as the Abbott, Father Sandor. Tough, gruff, witty and righteous Sandor is a every bit as worthy an opponent for the count as Van Helsing was in the original.

Dracula (Christopher Lee) rides again in yet another Hammer entry in the Dracula franchise. This film is enjoyable horror hokum, but it has an awfully shallow story, fleshed out with a slow opening stretch and some amusing vampire lore in between the sporadic vampire attacks.

Four British travellers are journeying through the Carpathian Alps in the 1800s. They are repeatedly cautioned to steer clear of Carlsbad Castle but, being typically stuffy and stubborn, they end up going there anyway. The castle is deserted apart from a rather zombified manservant. During the night, one of the travellers is slain by the manservant, and his blood is used to resurrect the long-dead Count Dracula. Time for another bout of blood-sucking mayhem....

Christopher Lee has a small role this time around, but gets across a good performance due to his commanding presence in the title role. Andrew Keir is also good as a priest-cum-vampire-slayer, though he has to overcome some dumb dialogue. The slow build-up is rather damaging, as it generates more tedium than chills. The opportunities for real terror are somewhat fudged too, since most would-be "shock" moments are telegraphed too far in advance. However, Hammer buffs and vampire addicts will doubtless feel more than satisfied.

Four English tourists: Charles Kent (played by Francis Matthews), his wife Diana (played by Suzan Farmer), his brother Alan (played by Charles Tingwell) and his wife Helen (played by Barbara Shelley) arrive in the Carpathians for a climbing holiday. Despite warnings from the superstitious locals they spend the night at Castle Dracula. Here, Dracula's sinister manservant, Klove (played by Philip Latham), uses the blood of one of them as a life force to resurrect his master...

Dracula Prince Of Darkness was the official sequel to Hammer's Dracula (1958). Hammer had made two follow-ups to their box-office hit with The Brides Of Dracula (1960) and Kiss Of The Vampire (1964), but neither featured Christopher Lee. Some say that Lee refused to repeat his role through fear of becoming typecast, while others say that Hammer dropped him because he wasn't a big enough star. He got billed fourth in the first film. Whatever the reason, Lee finally returned to his original role after seven years and Dracula Prince Of Darkness made it into the top twenty money-spinners of 1966. You will notice in this film that Christopher Lee has no lines, he has always maintained that the lines he was given were so bad that he wouldn't speak them. On the other hand screenwriter Jimmy Sangster (who penned the screenplay under the pseudonym John Samson) swears that he didn't write any.

Dracula Prince Of Darkness stands as one of the best sequels to Hammer's 1958 film, which is regarded by many as a classic. While Christopher Lee has no dialog, he still manages to create a feeling of lurking evil which lasts long after the movie's over. Whereas in later films he was little more than a supporting character with very little to do. The supporting cast which includes Francis Matthews, Andrew Kier and Barbara Shelley is excellent and Thorley Walters does a fine job of portraying the fly-eating Renfield, an original character from Bram Stoker's novel who is renamed here as Ludwig. Philip Latham is also noteworthy as the creepy retainer, Klove. Director Terence Fisher does a fine job of staging the build-up to the Count's resurrection. This first half of the film is genuinely atmospheric, gothic stuff with the camera tracking around the darkened corridors of the castle to suggest that although Dracula himself is dead, his malevolent spirit is present all the time.

Dracula Prince Of Darkness is in many ways as good as the first of the Hammer Draculas. It isn't actually the first sequel they made- that being The Brides Of Dracula- but that did not have Dracula in it, it actually being another adventure for Peter Cushing's Van Helsing, the vampire hunter. This film is hardly a classic, but it's extremely effective in what it sets out to do.

Rather disappointingly, Dracula is not revived {in startlingly gory fashion}until half the film is over, and even after that only puts in brief appearances. Although this has been heavily criticised, in some ways it makes the film more effective ,as you don't always know when he is going to appear. He doesn't even speak ,just hisses. The leisurely first half is nonetheless full of creepy atmosphere, while the second half is pretty much all action. The scene where a writhing Barbara Shelley is held down and staked remains astonishingly effective, and only Dracula's icy demise seems a little unconvincing technically.

Of course the sexual element is hardly worth thinking about- prudish Shelley becomes'eroticised'as a vampire and than has to be killed, and why were the Hammer ladies always far more attractive in their vampiric form? Still, this film shows many of the Hammer elements at their best.

The plot is simple; four travelers are abandoned by their coach driver near an old castle. Mysteriously, another horse-drawn buggy arrives with no rider. Of course, they decide to take it and move on but the horses are set on taking them to the castle, which I thought was pretty cool. When they arrive, they find they were expected, a table set for four. Out comes Klove, the creepy caretaker, who informs them that the deceased owner's wish was that the castle stay open for travelers. They decide to take advantage of this…and the story takes horrific turns from there. The resurrection of Dracula was a very good scene and the ending was a rather original twist on the vampire mythos but I enjoyed it just because of that. This was the first film in which I had seen the great Christopher Lee play the role of Dracula and everybody was right; he's perfect as the bloodsucker…and he doesn't even utter a word in this one. His tall build, strong face, and piercing eyes are more than enough to inspire his character. Andrew Keir as Father Sandor, a Van Helsing type role, was also of note. All in all, this Hammer production mixes in a bit of blood, some terror, and a whole lot of classic atmosphere to make for one classy, enjoyable horror flick.