Dracula au Pakistan

A vampire flick coming from Pakistan, go figure that one out. Zinda Laash did had a reputation. This flick was supposed to be lost forever but as with so many lost flick suddenly someone popped up with a bad copy. It's now restored and is in fact watchable. On the other hand while being screened at movie theaters a woman got a heart attack so it really became a well sought flick.

It's loosely based on Bram Stoker's story, it do has a girl being bitten by Dracula and it do has the famous sentence about the children of the night but that's it. typical for those kind of flicks it do has a few songs in it were they do dance on. There's no blood to mention, well, maybe one shot where the girl do has blood running from her mouth but it's done really cheesy. It's just added with make-up.

It takes around 100 minutes and that's too long for such a lame flick. If you want to see how Pakistan made a horror then this is a perfect example. You will see how they do things to avoid blood and nudity. And the acting was really unbelievable bad. Just watch the fighting at the end, baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad acting. And also see the audio equipment making shadows on the wall. Only for the geeks of bad flicks. But coming from Pakistan worth entering your collection just for the sake to say, I have a Pakistanese flick, although there are better ones.

Gore 0/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 0/5 Story 2/5 Comedy 0/5

This is exactly the type of stuff you expect the good people over at Mondo Macabro to release under their formidable DVD-label: Obscure, horror-themed curiosities from all over the globe! These movies aren't necessarily good, but definitely unique in some way and they at least always feature aspects that appeal to avid cult collectors. This particular oddity, for example, is a Pakistani vampire movie (how many of those do you know?) and it's one of the only horror films ever to be heavily censored not because of the horrific subject matter but because the female characters act & dress too provocatively! The Mondo Macabro DVD restores all the cut footage in which the women dance "too" sensually, although sometimes you wish it hadn't because these parts are overlong, dreary and serve absolutely no purpose. The story introduces Rehan (interesting how some of these actors have last names and others don't) as an overly ambitious scientist striving to become immortal. He develops an elixir that does the job, but the side effects involve an allergy to daylight, pointy teeth and the incontrollable hunger for human blood. In short, the poor man transforms into a vampire (although he doesn't seem to mind) and nobody in a large area around his mansion is longer safe, especially not when he sets his mind to drinking the blood of Dr. Aqil's beautiful fiancée. The first half of the story is involving and occasionally even atmospheric & suspenseful, but then it turns into a dull family drama with hardly any noteworthy moments, apart from the virulent man vs. vampire showdown in the end. The popular title "Dracula in Pakistan" is obviously the best choice for marketing purposes, but "The Living Corpse" is of course far more accurate since there's no actual blood relation between Professor Tabani and the legendary count of Bram Stoker's novel. The film does try really hard to be reminiscent to "Dracula", however. The main star, Rehan, could easily pass for Christopher Lee's brother from another (Pakistani) mother, the "brides" also look familiar and the script even bluntly copies famous quotes that are irreversibly linked to the original Dracula ("Children of the Night … What music they make"). In fact, the absolute most suitable title for this movie would be "The Pakistani Vampire Musical". There really are a LOT of musical interludes. Some of the songs are truly misfit (La Cucaracha in a horror film?), others are sexy (the bride's dance to a song that sounds like "The Shadows") and just plain goofy (the women's overlong beach song), but they practically all are redundant and exclusively added to stretch the running time. "The Living Corpse" is a curious find for people with a wide interest in global cult cinema, but not necessarily fundamental viewing for horror fanatics.

This was one of the films I watched over Christmas via Mondo Macabro's exemplary SE DVD. I had never heard of the film before it was announced for release but I was immediately intrigued by it, and even more so after watching the trailer which had been made available online.

Well, now that I've watched it, I'd say it's a pretty hard one to classify and even more so to recommend: it's more than just a horror film (at the time only the second ever produced in Pakistan) and, frankly, not for all tastes. It follows the basic plot line of Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' novel but obviously substituting locations, names, time periods, etc. During the Audio Commentary, Pakistani film critic Omar Khan repeatedly says that while the film-makers were doing their utmost to emulate the style of both the Universal and Hammer films – which is very fairly captured, in my opinion, via several atmospheric sequences (especially those set in the vampire's mansion) and a shock moment or two (the first screen appearance of Stoker's notorious baby-feeding scene, a lady vampire is repeatedly stabbed in the presence of a little girl), what came out of it most distinctly perhaps was their basic lack of confidence in how to tackle the material at hand.

This is clearly evident in their making the vampire a 'Professor' (shades of Jekyll & Hyde) rather than a Count, for instance, but especially in its bizarre soundtrack comprised of unauthorized lifts from James Bernard's Hammer Dracula scores, cues from popular (but, in this case, wholly inappropriate) classical and contemporary tunes and – most surprisingly (for a Western audience, at least) – musical numbers that come out of nowhere and go on for minutes at a stretch, thus effectively stopping the film dead in its tracks! The actors involved (some of whom were highly respected in their country) are adequate under the circumstances but, for obvious reasons, cannot hope to compete in the horror stakes with the more 'professional' approach of the genre stars we know so well. The final obliteration of the vampire at the climax, however, is quite nimbly made and highly effective.

The DVD transfer was as good as could be expected (the main offender is some jittering around the half-way mark). The extras are surprisingly plentiful and very interesting: we've got an Audio Commentary, a three-part Documentary on South Asian horror films (featuring excerpts from a number of unbelievably tacky and campy recent genre efforts), a shorter Documentary about the making of the film proper (comprised of interviews with surviving cast and crew), the trailer I mentioned earlier (more a promo for the DVD), a poster/stills gallery, and there's even an Easter Egg highlighting an unused song originally written for the film that we were mercifully spared from.

In the end, THE LIVING CORPSE is a goofy but agreeable – and oddly endearing – film, one of three 'revisionist' takes on the Dracula 'legend' I received on the very same day incidentally; having recently watched Jess Franco's VAMPYROS LESBOS (1970), I look forward now to checking out the last one of them – Paul Morrissey's BLOOD FOR Dracula (1974)!

Historically this was Pakistan's first venture into the terror film genre and we came mighty close to losing this film before it was discovered (in some "rusty old cans", according to the brave film buff who found it) in a vault.

The plot borrows heavily from Hammer's HORROR OF Dracula, in fact there are times when the music even has a noticeable similarity to James Bernard's score. There are some classical themes thrown in as well, notice "The Barber of Seville" playing during the car chase scene) and some other cues which are . . .well . . . eccentric to say the least. Early in the film when someone is driving to the vampires mansion you can recognise strains of "La Cucaracha" on the soundtrack. The lighting and the sets reminded me more of the vampire films coming out of Mexico in the late 50's. The vampire's vast home might have suited Count Frankenhausen or Count Lavud quite well. This time though the vampire is created via scientific means. A doctor who believes he has discovered the elixir of eternal life takes one swallow and turns into a vampire! Well, that is eternal life of a sort, right?

Oh and there are songs in the film too, in fact it was beginning to remind me of the Mexican film CRY OF THE BEWITCHED (1965) with the plot stopping . . .er . . ."dead" in its tracks so characters could sing. This is not to say the characterisations were not believable, they certainly are. The hero, our Van Helsing character, has a very hard time convincing anyone there is a vampire stalking victims until our bloodsucking villain strikes very close to home, claiming the sister of a man who refused to believe vampires were real.

Okay, now remember this film was done in Pakistan in the mid-60's so don't expect gore or nudity or anything like that; although there is a great man vs. vampire fight scene near the end. By all means do not miss an opportunity to see this film.

I like a good vampire movie now and again, and "Zinda Laash" is easily one of the most fun and bizarre examples of the genre that I've come across.

As other commentators on this site have noted, this is very clearly based on the 1950s British film version of Dracula, which was released in the U.S. as "Horror of Dracula." At times, "Zinda Laash" is almost a scene-for-scene remake of the British film, with even some of the same music cues re-used. (I could less charitably say "stolen!") I didn't mind this derivativeness too much, though; in fact, it was like a wacky bonus sometimes.

Despite being unoriginal in terms of plot, "Zinda Laash" still feels unique because it's got very bizarre (to a U.S. viewer) touches that clearly come from the Pakistani culture. For example, several scenes are suddenly interrupted by great song-and-dance numbers. The song lyrics are often weirdly fascinating, and the dances strangely sexy. I know these musical numbers slow down the plot, but I found them to be great fun nonetheless.

It's also interesting to see a version of Dracula that's largely secular - certainly there's no Christian iconography in evidence, which is logical of course, considering that this was produced for a mostly Muslim audience.

Another weird touch I should note is that some elements come directly from Bram Stoker's novel, not "Horror of Dracula." I don't want to spoil anything, but you might notice these faithful little inclusions during the scene when Dr. Aqil meets Dracula's bride. So, the film-makers obviously read the book in addition to ripping off the British film version! I like a bit of fidelity to the source novel.

Of course, most people would laugh this stuff off the screen today for seeming hokey. But actually, the photography is moody, the locations are well-chosen, and the hokey parts really just enhance the film's charm for me. What can I say? I got a charge out of it...