House of Dracula released December 7, 1945

House of Dracula was an American horror film released by Universal Pictures Company in 1945. It was a direct sequel to House of Frankenstein and continued the theme of combining Universal’s three most popular monsters: Frankenstein’s monster, Count Dracula and The Wolf Man. Starring Lon Chaney Jr., John Carradine, Martha O’Driscoll, and Glenn Strange. 

This is the only film in which the character Lawrence Talbot sports a mustache.

Footage of Boris Karloff as the Frankenstein Monster from Bride of Frankenstein (1935) appears during a dream sequence, intermixed with footage of Glenn Strange in the same role.

John Carradine, Martha O'Driscoll and Lon Chaney, Jr., with his sons on the set of House of Dracula

Countess Dracula released January 31, 1971

 

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Countess Dracula is a 1971 Hammer horror film based on the legends surrounding the “Blood Countess” Elizabeth Báthory. It is in many ways atypical of Hammer’s canon, but can be considered related to that studio’s Karnstein Trilogy attempting to broaden Hammer’s output from Dracula and Frankenstein sequels.

The film was produced by Alexander Paal and directed by Peter Sasdy, Hungarian émigrés working in England. The original music score was composed by Harry Robertson.

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Ingrid Pitt reprised her role as Countess Elizabeth on the 1998 Cradle of Filth album, Cruelty and the Beast.

Trivia:

• Ingrid Pitt’s voice was dubbed. Supposedly, she was so furious at director Peter Sasdy that she vowed never to speak to him again.
• Countess Dracula was based on Hungarian Countess Erzsebet (our modern day “Elizabeth”) Bathory who lived from 1560 to 1614. Countess Bathory was allegedly responsible for the deaths of approximately 600 virgin girls, all of which involved torture and gruesome methods of killing. Her atrocities are mostly speculation. She is credited for influencing our modern day concept of Dracula as an entity depending on human blood for youth and vitality.

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• The picture that appears behind the opening credits is an 1896 painting by Hungarian artist Istvan Csok. It shows the real Countess Bathory enjoying the torture of some young women by her servants. In an inner courtyard of one of her castles, the naked girls are being drenched with water and allowed to freeze to death in the snow.
• Ingrid Pitt replaced Diana Rigg who turned the role down.
• Although cuts were requested by the BBFC (and the film remains listed as cut on their website) the edits were never made following an appeal by Hammer to chief censor Stephen Murphy.

Ingrid Pitt

House of Frankenstein released December 1, 1944

House of Frankenstein is an American monster horror film produced in 1944 by Universal Studios as a sequel to Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man the previous year. This monster rally approach would continue in the following film, House of Dracula, as well as the 1948 comedy Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein.

 Tagline: FRANKENSTEIN’S MONSTER! WOLF MAN! DRACULA! HUNCHBACK! MAD DOCTOR!

Trivia:

• Despite the title, this is the first of the Universal Frankenstein films in which a member of the Frankenstein family does not appear.

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• Bela Lugosi was slated for the role of Dracula, but the film was dependent upon the presence of Karloff being released from tour of “Arsenic and Old Lace.” Shooting was delayed, and John Carrdine was cast instead of Lugosi, who had a prior engagement: ironically, playing Karloff’s “Jonathan Brewster” role in another touring company of “Arsenic and Old Lace.”
• Originally Kharis the mummy, another Universal “classic monster”, was to be in the movie but was removed because of budget restrictions.
• Originally titled ‘The Devil’s Brood’, this was given a $354,000 budget and a relatively generous (by Universal standards) 30-day shooting schedule. Star Boris Karloff earned $20,000 and Lon Chaney Jr. received a flat $10,000 for his third appearance as the Wolf Man. John Carradine and J. Carrol Naish were both paid $7,000 each. Lionel Atwill earned $1750 and George Zucco was paid $1500. Glenn Strange was paid $500 for his role as Frankenstein’s monster.

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• The title “House of…” could refer to the ruins/house owned by Ludwig Frankenstein, the second son of Henry Frankenstein (portrayed by Cedric Hardwicke) in The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942). It’s also the same “house” where Lawrence Talbot discovers the Monster in ice in Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943); and, of course, where Neiman discovers the Wolfman and the Monster in this film. (The castle is entirely washed away in the flood at the climax of ” – Meets the Wolf Man,” but is inexplicably semi-intact here.
• Glenn Strange was the fourth actor to play the Monster in Universal’s Frankenstein series. The actor who played the original Monster, Boris Karloff, was also present in the film, playing the role of Dr. Niemann. Being on the set, Karloff was able to personally coach Strange in the way the Monster should be played.
• Universal employed an actress to dub actress’s screams for their horror films, but Elena Verdugo’s scream worked so well, it was retained in the final version.

 

Dracula Has Risen from the Grave released November 24, 1968

Dracula Has Risen from the Grave is a 1968 British horror film directed by Freddie Francis for Hammer Films. It stars Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, with support from Rupert Davies, Veronica Carlson, Barry Andrews, Barbara Ewing, Ewan Hooper and Michael Ripper.

The world of the film is arguably far darker and more ambiguous than the world created by director Terence Fisher for the previous three films in the Dracula series.

Dracula Has Risen from the Grave is the Sequel to “Prince of Darkness” (1966).

Veronica Carlson and Christopher Lee

Directed by Freddie Francis

Writer – John Elder

Producer – Aida Young 

Cast
  Christopher Lee … Dracula
  Rupert Davies … Monsignor Ernest Mueller
  Veronica Carlson … Maria Mueller
  Barbara Ewing … Zena
  Barry Andrews … Paul
  Ewan Hooper … Priest
  Marion Mathie … Anna Mueller
  Michael Ripper … Max
  John D. Collins … Student
  George A. Cooper … Landlord
  Chris Cunningham … Farmer
  Norman Bacon … Mute Boy
 
 The Story: (Spoiler Alert!!)

A year has passed since the demise of Dracula, buried under the ice in the river that flows past his castle. Ernst Mueller [Rupert Davies], monsignor of the monastery at Kleinberg, has decided to visit the village to see that all is well. What he finds is appalling. The village priest [Ewan Hooper] has become an alcoholic. The villagers will not attend Sunday Mass because the shadow of Dracula’s castle touches the church during the evening hours. The Monsignor decides to exorcise the castle and prove to the villagers that the evil is gone. He and the priest climb the hill to the castle, but the priest chickens out halfway. The Monsignor continues alone to the castle door where he performs his exorcism and seals the castle door with a large cross. The priest, in the meantime, is taking swigs from his hipflask. He stumbles over a cliff, cuts his head, lands on the river ice, causing it to crack open just above Dracula’s body. The priest’s blood drips through the cracked ice, flowing into Dracula’s mouth, and Dracula is thus resurrected.

Veronica Carlson

Barred from his castle by the cross on the door, Dracula [Christopher Lee] must now find other lodgings. He enslaves the priest, forcing him to dig up a new coffin for him. He also forces him to reveal who is responsible for the exorcism. The coffin is loaded onto a funeral coach, and the priest and Dracula head toward Kleinberg. His exorcism finished, the Monsignor also returns to Kleinberg where he lives with his brother’s widow Anna [Marion Mathe] and his niece Maria [Veronica Carlson]. It is Maria’s birthday, and a dinner party is planned for her. Tonight, Maria will introduce her boyfriend Paul [Barry Anderson], who she has been climbing over the rooftops to meet secretly) to her family. Paul works as a baker at the Johann Cafe and engages in scholarly studies during his spare time. Scared to meet Maria’s family for the first time, Paul’s plight is not helped when his friends at the cafe spill beer down his shirt. Still, all goes well at the dinner until Paul, in a fit of truthfulness, admits to the Monsignor that he is an atheist. Paul returns to the cafe, downs 3 glasses of Schnapps, and passes out. The waitress Xena [Barbara Ewing] carries him up to bed just as Maria enters through a window.

On her way home, Xena is attacked by Dracula. With Xena’s help, Dracula and his coffin are moved into a storage room in the cafe cellar, and the priest takes a room at the cafe. The next evening, when Maria drops by the cafe to see Paul, Xena leads her into the bakery, covers her head with a bag, and takes her to see Dracula. Maria escapes, however, when Paul comes looking for her, and she tells of being attacked by a man “with burning eyes.” Angry at the failed attempt, Dracula kills Xena and orders the priest to destroy her in the furnace fire. Later that night, Dracula comes to Maria’s bedside and drinks from her. He returns the next night but, just as he prepares to drink from her, the Monsignor enters the room. Dracula sees the cross in the Monsignor’s hand and leaps from the window. The Monsignor attempts to follow but is knocked out by the priest. As the Monsignor lies dying, he sends for Paul and tells him what he must do to save Maria. Paul finds Dracula’s coffin and drives a stake through his heart but, because neither he nor the priest can pray to God, Dracula succeeds in removing the stake. He escapes, summons Maria and, together with the priest, they return to Dracula’s castle. Paul gets a horse and follows.

Upon reaching the castle, Dracula forces Maria to remove the cross from the castle door. As she throws it down the cliff, Paul arrives. He and Dracula battle. They both fall off the porch. Paul catches a branch on the way down but Dracula falls to the ground where he is impaled upon the cross just tossed away by Maria. As the priest recites the Pater Noster, Dracula turns to dust.

Production Info:

This was the first of the Hammer Dracula films to be shot at Elstree Studios in London. Notably missing are the approach road, coach path and moat seen in front of Castle Dracula in 1958′s Dracula and 1966′s Dracula: Prince of Darkness. Those films were made at Bray Studios.

The film was photographed by Arthur Grant using colored filters belonging to director Freddie Francis, also a cameraman by trade, who used them when photographing The Innocents (1961). Whenever Dracula (or his castle) is in a scene, the frame edges are tinged crimson, amber and yellow.

In Australia, the film was the first Hammer Dracula to be passed by the censors; the previous films Dracula (1958) and Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966) were banned. The film was slightly censored and ran for a three-week season at Sydney’s Capitol theatre in January 1970. In the US, the film was rated G. ……… Source(s) IMDB, Wikipedia

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Dracula vs. Frankenstein released November 1971

Dracula vs. Frankenstein is a 1971 horror film directed by Al Adamson.

 Cast
  J. Carrol Naish … Dr. Frankenstein, aka Dr. Duryea
  Lon Chaney … Groton
  Anthony Eisley … Mike Howard
  Regina Carrol … Judith Fontaine
  Greydon Clark … Strange
  Zandor Vorkov … Count Dracula
  Angelo Rossitto … Grazbo
  Anne Morrell … Samantha
  William Bonner … Biker
  Russ Tamblyn … Rico
  Jim Davis … Police Sgt. Martin
  John Bloom … Frankenstein’s Monster
  Shelly Weiss … The Creature
  Forest J Ackerman … Dr. Beaumont

Story: During the day, Doctor Duryea [J Carroll Naish] runs the Creature Emporium [a sideshow in an amusement park near the beach in Venice, California] from his wheelchair but, by night, Duryea is a mad scientist working on some sort of blood serum. For this serum he needs the blood of women who were scared to death, as it is their fear that “energizes the molecular structure of their blood”. To do this, he has his zombie Groton [Lon Chaney Jr] behead girls with an axe and then bring him their bodies. Duryea then rejunvenates them so that he can harvest their blood.

One day Dr Duryea is visited by Count Dracula [Zandor Vorkov] who has found the remains of the original Frankenstein monster. In exchange for some of Duryea’s serum (which will make Dracula invincable), Dracula offers the doctor the use of the Frankenstein monster [John Bloom] in order to get revenge on Duryea’s adversary, Dr Beaumont [Forrest J Ackerman]. Together, they reanimate the monster and he does eventually kill Beaumont.

Meanwhile, Las Vegas showgirl Judith Fontaine [Regina Carrol] is searching for her sister Joanie, who disappeared after joining a group of hippies who hang near the Creature Emporium. Police Sgt Martin [Jim Davis] has been of no help, so Judith goes to the local hippie hangout and shows around a photo of her sister. No one has seen her. When someone slips some LSD into her coffee, Judith winds up on the couch of aging hippie Mike Howard[Anthony Eisley], who offers his help (along with a few kisses). When they learn that Joanie was last seen at the Creature Emporium, they pay a visit to Dr Duryea, but he claims to have never seen Joanie.

Meanwhile, more girls have turned up missing and a few male bodies have been found chopped to bits on the beach. When friend Samantha [Anne Morrell] is carried through a trapdoor under the Creature Emporium, Mike and Judith break in and discover, to their horror, the undead bodies of all the girls, including Joanie [Marie Lease], that the doctor has been using. In the fight that ensues, Dr Duryea is beheaded in his guillotine and Groton is shot by Sgt Martin. Judith is carried off by Dracula. Mike frees Judith but, as they run away, Dracula zaps Mike with his ring of fire, burning him to a crisp. Dracula and the Frankenstein monster carry Judith to an old abandoned church where Dracula ties her to a chair and prepares to make her immortal, but the Frankenstein monster has a sudden change of heart and protects her.

Dracula and the Frankenstein monster duke it out. Their fight carries them outside into the surrounding woods. Dracula bests the Frankenstein monster by pulling off his arms and head. But the sun is rising, and Dracula must get back to his coffin. He makes a dash for the church door but collapses on the stairs and burns up in the morning sun. Judith unties her binds and gets away.

 Trivia
Final film appearances of J. Carrol Naish and Lon Chaney Jr..           

Originally planned as a sequel to Satan’s Sadists, with Russ Tamblyn and other “bikers” reprising their parts from that film. However, not long after filming began, it was decided to turn it into a horror film instead of a biker picture and much of the footage with Tamblyn and other actors from the first film was cut out. They were unable to cut them completely out of the movie, though, which is why Tamblyn and his biker gang seem to be wandering in and out of the film, with no connection to the story line and with not much to do.

It was originally intended to have Dracula turn Frankenstein’s Monster into a bloodthirsty vampire, so the Monster could better serve the Count’s purpose. The idea was dropped, however, when the fangs kept falling out of actor John Bloom’s mouth, which he couldn’t keep in due to his heavy makeup.

Much of the electrical lab equipment in Duryea’s lab are props originally used in Frankenstein. Ken Strickfaden, who had designed all the electrical gadgetry in that film, supplied the equipment.

In his scene confronting Count Dracula, J. Carrol Naish looks noticeably older than he does elsewhere in the film. This is due to the time that had elapsed between the bulk of his scenes, when it was intended as a different film entirely, and the Dracula/Frankenstein scenes that were grafted on later.

Regina Carrol and victim

At this point in his career, J. Carrol Naish was very ill and frail and could no longer remember dialogue, so he read it off cue cards. However, he had only one real eye, so in his dialogue closeups you can see one eye moving back and forth, reading the lines, while the other eye remains fixed in position.

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Bram Stoker’s Dracula released November 13, 1992

Dracula (also known as Bram Stoker’s Dracula) is a 1992 horror-romance film-thriller produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola, based on the novel Dracula by Bram Stoker. It stars Gary Oldman as Count Dracula and Winona Ryder as Mina Harker in an ensemble cast, also featuring Anthony Hopkins as Professor Abraham Van Helsing and Keanu Reeves as Jonathan Harker. Dracula was greeted by a generally positive critical reception and was a box office hit. It also had a significant cultural impact, spawning a video game, a board game, a comic book adaptation, collectible cards and various action figures and model sets. The film’s score was composed by Wojciech Kilar and the closing theme song “Love Song for a Vampire” was written and performed by Annie Lennox.

Trivia:

• Winona Ryder saw the script when it was originally going to be made as a TV movie, directed by Michael Apted. She took the script to Francis Ford Coppola, whom she had not spoken to since withdrawing from The Godfather: Part III (1990) due to exhaustion six months earlier. Coppola agreed to make the film, and Apted stayed on as executive producer.
• Director Francis Ford Coppola was insistent that he didn’t want to use any kind of elaborate special effects or
  

  Winona Ryder

  computer trickery when making the movie. He initially hired a standard visual effects team, but they told him that the things he wanted to achieve were impossible without using modern digital technology. Coppola disagreed and fired them, replacing them with his 29 year old son Roman Coppola, who set about achieving some the effects by using old-school cinematic trickery. A thorough exploration of these effects can be found on the 2007 Special Edition DVD in the In Camera: The Naïve Visual Effects of ‘Bram Stoker’s Dracula’ (2007) (V) featurette and in the ‘Heart of Darkness’ article from Cinefax magazine (also found on the DVD), but some of the most interesting examples include: – When sitting in the train on his way to Transylvania, Jonathan Harker is looking at a map which appears superimposed on his face. This was a live effect achieved simply by projecting the image of the map onto actor Keanu Reeves’ face on set. – In the same scene, outside the window, Dracula’s eyes mysteriously appear in the sky, watching Harker as he travels. This was achieved by combining three separate shots. First, the shot of Gary Oldman’s eyes was done with him wearing special makeup so that only his eyes would be visible when the image was projected onto the sky backdrop. The next shot involved the projection of the eyes onto the backdrop of the Carpathian Mountain set, making it appear as if two eyes are appearing in the sky. Then, a shot was taken of Keanu Reeves sitting in the train with the combined background/eye shot rear-projected through the window. – Another shot in this sequence involves a close up of Harker’s journal with the train appearing to travel along the top of the book, blowing smoke across the pages. This was a forced perspective shot using a huge book and a tiny miniature train model. – After arriving in Translyvania, Harker is met by Dracula’s carriage and the driver seems to magically reach out and lift Harker into the carriage. This shot was achieved by having the rider sitting on a camera crane which reached out and brought him towards Keanu Reeves. At the same time, the camera was moved to the right, so it appeared as if the rider’s hand wasn’t actually stretching, but was simply defying physics. For the lift, Reeves himself was also standing on a fake floor, which was in fact a movable rostrum which raised him up into the carriage. – As the carriage approaches the castle, there is a shot of the castle in the background as the carriage speeds along a narrow driveway. This was achieved by painting the image of the castle onto a piece of glass, and then positioning the glass in front of the camera whilst the scene of the carriage was shot on the sound stage. – The scene when Harker is shaving and Dracula approaches him from behind without a reflection in the mirror was shot by a classic technique as old as cinema itself. The actor with his back to the camera is actually Keanu Reeves double, not Reeves himself, and the ‘mirror’ is simply a hole in the wall, with the real Keanu Reeves standing on the other side in a portion of the set – hence when the hand touches the shoulder of the double there is no reflection to be seen because there is literally no mirror. – When Harker is exploring the castle, there is a shot of some rats walking on the ceiling upside-down whilst Keanu Reeves descends a staircase right-way-up. This was achieved by using a double exposure. First, the shot of the rats was done with the camera upside-down. Then the film was rewound and a matte box was placed in front of the lens so as to ensure only the correct portion of the image would be exposed. The camera was then turned right way up and the scene of Harker going down the stairs was shot. Due to the matte box, it appears as if the beam with the rats is above Reeves, and because it was shot upside-down, the rats appear to be defying gravity. – The first scenes in London after Dracula’s arrival were shot with a real Pathé camera that was being hand cranked. It was also shot on a special Kodak stock to enhance the grain. There were no post-production effects added for this scene. – The scene when Dracula seems to magically catch Mina’s bottle was shot by simply having two men and two bottles. On set Winona Ryder drops the bottle and Gary Oldman scoops down and catches it. The camera then pans up to reveal he is already holding it out to Mina seemingly without having raised his hand. In reality, the hand holding the bottle out is a double standing just behind Oldman, wearing identical gloves, and holding a completely different bottle. – For the scenes involving Dracula’s POV, Francis Ford Coppola wanted to achieve something unusual, and it was ultimately decided to try to create something of staccato effect. These shots were created using a old piece of equipment rarely used today called an intervalometer. When shooting at 24fps, an intervalometer trims the end of certain frames, and prevents the exposure of certain frames here and there, creating the ‘jumpy’ effect seen in the scene. Again, this was all accomplished in-camera, no post-production effects were added to the scenes.

• During preproduction of the movie, director Francis Ford Coppola came up with the idea that when in the
  

  Keanu Reeves

  presence of a being such as a vampire, the laws of physics don’t work correctly. This is why shadows often seem to act independently of the figure casting them, why rats can run along a ceiling upside-down and why liquid drips up instead of down.

• According to director Francis Ford Coppola on the commentary track for the 2007 Special Edition DVD, the film is full of homages to other movies and other directors. Three specific references he points out are to three of his favorite horror films: – the shot of Dracula rising upwards out of his coffin is a homage to F.W. Murnau’s Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922)). – the blood splashing onto Lucy’s bed from the sides of the room is a homage to Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (1980)). – Lucy vomiting blood all over Van Helsing is a homage to William Friedkin’s The Exorcist (1973).
• Costume designer Eiko Ishioka (who won an Oscar for the movie) had never seen a Dracula movie prior to being hired for this film. She was initially hired as the art director, but when Francis Ford Coppola saw some of her costume sketches, he immediately asked her to work as the costume designer.
• It was Winona Ryder who brought the idea of redoing Bram Stoker’s novel to Francis Ford Coppola’s attention. She had been given a pile of scripts by her agent, one of which was titled “Dracula: The Untold Story”. This was the first time Ryder had ever read anything to do with Dracula, let alone see a film about him. Coppola was interested as he saw it as a bridge-building exercise between him and Ryder after she had inexplicably dropped out of The Godfather: Part III (1990).
• Francis Ford Coppola considered at one point of giving the film the title, “D” in order to distinguish it from previous Dracula adaptations.
• Prince Vlad’s scream after he drives his sword into the cross is not the voice of Gary Oldman. Lux Interior, lead singer of punk band The Cramps, recorded the scream and it was dubbed in.
• Sadie Frost dyed her brown hair red after concerns that she resembled Winona Ryder too much.
• In an attempt to elicit more emotion, director Francis Ford Coppola shouted “whore” and “slut” at Winona Ryder while filming the scene when Van Helsing catches Mina with Dracula.
• Anthony Hopkins also plays Cesare, the priest who tells Dracula that Elisabeta’s soul is damned; and he provides the voice-over sequence during the narrative for the Captain of the Demeter.
• Red jelly was used for the blood.
• Earnings from the film was enough to save Zoetrope (Francis Ford Coppola’s studio) from bankruptcy after
  

  Gary Oldman

  suffering from financial difficulties and liabilities of $27 million over the past 3 years.

• When Mina recalls her previous life as Elisabeta she says she remembers a land beyond a great forest. “Land beyond the forest” is the literal meaning of Transylvania.
• Among the moving-picture displays in the scene where the prince and Mina first converse is a shadow-figure show depicting the battle between Vlad’s army and the Turks.
• Ian Dury was among those interviewed for Renfield.
• Steve Buscemi was the first choice to play Renfield but turned down.
• Francis Ford Coppola has openly criticized his own reasoning for casting Keanu Reeves as Jonathan Harker. According to him, he needed a young, hot star that would connect with the girls.
• The painting of Count Dracula which Jonathan Harker mentions after his arrival at the castle, is in fact a self portrait of Albrecht Dürer (a German painter, 1471-1528), but with Gary Oldman’s face (the face of the young Count).
• Mina walks past an advertisement for the Lyceum Theatre and Henry Irving. Dracula author Bram Stoker managed the Lyceum, and Sir Henry Irving is rumored to be one of the primary inspirations for the character of Count Dracula.
• At the first “cast meeting” called by Francis Ford Coppola, he got all the principal actors to read the entire Bram Stoker novel out loud to get a feel for the story. According to Anthony Hopkins, it took two whole days to complete.
• The little girl who played the child carried into the crypt by Lucy was genuinely terrified of Sadie Frost in her vampire make-up, and obviously wasn’t expecting to do more than one take. Director Francis Ford Coppola and Sadie Frost had to do a lot of sweet-talking to the child in order to get her back in Sadie’s arms for another go at the scene.
• The scene of Lucy (Sadie Frost) getting back into her coffin in the underground crypt was shot in reverse to give it an eerie quality.
• Gary Oldman was quite drunk the night they filmed the scene where he had to lick blood from Keanu Reeves’s straight razor. The scene was filmed far beyond midnight, which added to the spirit of the scene and helped put the cast “in the proper mood”.
• To keep the budget manageable, Columbia insisted that the film be shot in Los Angeles and not on location.
• Among those who auditioned for the part of Dracula were Andy Garcia (who had concerns over the number of sex scenes), Gabriel Byrne, Armand Assante, Antonio Banderas and Viggo Mortensen.
• Sadie Frost didn’t bother auditioning for the part of Lucy as she figured that she was too physically similar to Winona Ryder. It was only after Francis Ford Coppola had real trouble casting the part, and had happened to see Frost’s performance in Diamond Skulls (1989), that she was approached.
• The blue flame that the coach crosses over to enter the castle is mentioned in the original book. In the novel it is explained that on one night every year blue flames are seen over areas containing hidden treasures.
• Dracula’s final Kabuki dress is directly inspired by a Gustav Klimt painting known as “The kiss”
• Liam Neeson was considered for, and very much wanted, the role of Van Helsing, but after Anthony Hopkins, still riding the success of The Silence of the Lambs (1991), showed interest in the role, Neeson was ultimately turned down.
• This is the first major US motion picture to be edited entirely on a nonlinear edit system.
• The film’s original teaser trailer (which consists of blood forming the logo on a jagged surface and quick flashes of scenes from the film) was pulled from theaters by Columbia Pictures when patrons complained of it being too intense. This trailer appears on the Criterion edition laserdisc.
• In the scene where the heroes bust in on Dracula and Mina, Dracula turns into a bat-like creature and frightens the heroes out of their wits. Oldman had problems with this scene, feeling constricted in the suit and not very scary. Coppola told him to whisper something scary into each actor’s ear, which Oldman did with relish. No one knows what he said to them, but they all look absolutely terrified in the scene.
• Writer James V. Hart started writing the screenplay in 1977. According to him, David Lean was the first choice to direct the movie, but was unavailable as he was working on Nostromo, which was eventually shelved after his death.
• The front of Gary Oldman’s hairline was shaved, both for make-up purposes and to resemble Vlad.
• According to Francis Ford Coppola, much of the cast was assembled as Winona Ryder’s “dream cast”, including Anthony Hopkins, Gary Oldman, Keanu Reeves and Richard E. Grant.
• Despite his occasional discomfort in them, Gary Oldman creatively contributed to the make-up effects when Dracula transforms into various monstrous forms.
• The exterior view of Dracula’s castle, as seen in several shots from the approach from the road, is designed to resemble Czech artist Frantisck Kupka’s painting “Resistance – The Black Idol.”
• Francis Ford Coppola had Richard E. Grant, Cary Elwes and Bill Campbell embark on a series of “adventures” including horse back riding and hot air ballooning to build the camaraderie between the three.
• Coppola’s original list of possible actors to play Dracula included Daniel Day-Lewis, Alec Baldwin, Jason Patric, Aidan Quinn, Christian Slater, Keanu Reeves, Nicolas Cage, Michael Nouri, Dermot Mulroney, Gabriel Byrne, Costas Mandylor, Nick Cassavetes, Adrian Pasdar, Hugh Grant, Rupert Everett, Ray Liotta, Sting, Kyle MacLachlan, Alan Rickman, Colin Firth and Hart Bochner.
• To help put himself in a grieving mood at Elisabeta’s corpse in the opening prologue, Gary Oldman carried a photo album of his then young son Alfie during and would go through it before doing a take. Interestingly, he also doubled , but uncredited as the mysterious coach driver when Jonathan is taken into the castle from the pass.
• The coach scene before the arrival of Keanu Reeves at the castle (including the slow-motion horses) is taken directly from Mario Bava’s La maschera del demonio (1960).
• Costume Designer Eiko Ishioka was from Japan, and because the costumes had a Kabuki theater-like appearance, Gary Oldman’s wig maker and hair designer Stuart Artingstall studied traditional Kabuki and Geisha hair styles and incorporated them into her unique and elaborate designs. Each wig was “built” and took many hours of painstaking work to thread each hair in a base individually, as is done in traditional opera companies do.
• Prior to Sadie Frost’s casting as Lucy, Juliette Lewis was the first choice for the role of Lucy.
• Originally, director Francis Ford Coppola had wanted to use highly impressionistic sets using only lights and shadows with minimum props. Instead he wanted to spend the entirety of the production design budget on the costumes. The studio however wouldn’t allow this, and ordered him to build ‘proper’ sets.
• Director Francis Ford Coppola explains on the DVD commentary that Mina and Harker’s wedding was a reshoot done at a Los Angeles Greek Orthodox church. They filmed the entire ceremony with a genuine Orthodox minister and realized afterwards that Winona Ryder and Keanu Reeves really were married.
• Preview audiences are alleged to have found the film too gory so 25 minutes of footage was removed to it less bloody.
• One of the very few Dracula films in which, like in the novel, Dracula begins as a white-haired old man and becomes younger as he feeds on blood. His appearance as an old man is changed, however: in the novel he is described as “a tall old man, clean shaven save for a long white moustache, and clad in black from head to foot, without a single speck of colour about him anywhere,” while in the film he wears a long red robe, is of average height, and does not have a mustache.
• Greek-American avant-garde performance artist, vocalist, keyboardist, and composer Diamanda Galas provided vocal effects for the three brides of Dracula.
• Several elements of the film were taken from previous Dracula adaptations. Renfield being Harker’s predecessor (the characters are completely unrelated in the novel) has been used in numerous previous Dracula films, starting with Nosferatu, eine Symphonie des Grauens (1922). The scene of Dracula rising from his coffin for the first time is also taken from “Nosferatu.” Dracula’s line of dialogue, “I never drink…wine” has also been used in numerous previous Dracula films, originating with Dracula (1931). The idea of Dracula’s motivation for coming to England being to find his reincarnated lost love was first used in Dracula (1973/I) (TV). The lunatics in the asylum rioting to signal the coming of Dracula was used in Dracula (1979). References to non-Dracula films include Dracula turning Mina’s tears into diamonds, a reference to the Jean Cocteau film La belle et la bête (1946), Lucy’s glass coffin, taken from the various versions of the “Snow White” story, and the window in Lucy’s bedroom, taken from the Frank Capra film The Bitter Tea of General Yen (1933).
• Director Francis Ford Coppola claims that Bram Stoker’s name was included in the title because he has a tradition of putting the author’s names in the titles of his movies that are adapted from novels, such as “Mario Puzo’s The Godfather” and “John Grisham’s The Rainmaker.” Others have claimed, however, that Stoker’s name was included in the title to avoid legal action from Univeral Studios, who claimed to own the rights to the simple title “Dracula.”
• Comic book artist Jim Steranko served as “project conceptualist” for the film.
• Like The Godfather: Part III (1990), the film was made in part in the hopes of rescuing Francis Ford Coppola’s production company Zoetrope from bankruptcy.
• Director Francis Ford Coppola and the special effects team consulted with a professional magician the achieve the effect of Dracula’s brides rising up from the bed.
• Director Francis Ford Coppola notes on the DVD commentary that although the three actors playing Dracula’s brides had agreed to appear nude in the film, everybody on the set was too timid to ask them to take off their clothes before filming their scenes. Coppola asked his son Roman Coppola to ask them, but Roman didn’t want to do it, either, and asked another crew member to do it.
• The battle scene in the prologue was originally intended to be performed with shadow puppets instead of actors. The idea was used later in the film when we see, in the cinema house, a shadow puppet battle similar to the prologue battle.
• Director Francis Ford Coppola says the 2007 Collector’s Edition DVD audio commentary that the “Arabian Nights” book that Mina and Lucy giggle over went missing.
• Miniatures were used extensively in the film. Examples can be seen when Dracula drops Mina off in the carriage; the house behind the gate is a miniature model. Also, when Mina looks out the window at Carfax Abbey when the men go there to sanitize Dracula’s crates of soil, Carfax Abbey itself is a miniature model in this shot.
• Director Francis Ford Coppola says on the DVD audio commentary that during the shaving scene, the walls of the set gradually move inward to create a subliminal growing sense of claustrophobia.
• A scene that was storyboarded but not filmed involved Seward and Holmwood coming across the dead bodies of Harker, Morris, and Van Helsing impaled on posts before the climactic confrontation, and then realizing that this is simply a hallucination conjured by Dracula using his powers of psychological persuasion.
• Though the film is notable for being more faithful to Bram Stoker’s novel than most other adaptations, numerous liberties were taken, including (SPOILERS FOLLOW): The pre-title prologue and the subplot about Mina being the reincarnation of Dracula’s wife are inventions of the film. The novel never explicitly identifies Dracula as Vlad the Impaler and Mina has no personal connection to Dracula. This alters later scenes taken from the novel, such as when Mina asks Dracula to turn her into a vampire and willingly drinks his blood. In the novel Dracula forces Mina to drink his blood and she is traumatized by the incident. * In the novel Dracula immediately dies and crumbles into dust after suffering the knife attacks by Harker and Morris. In the film he lives for several minutes after the attacks, and Mina delivers the final death blow. * In the film Van Helsing asks Mina for permission to hypnotize her, while in the novel it’s Mina’s idea and she asks Van Helsing to do it. * In the film Mina seduces Van Helsing and attacks him. This does not happen in the novel. * In the film Van Helsing presses a communion wafer against Mina’s forehead to defend himself against her attack, while in the novel he does this to bless her and does not know it will burn her. * In the film Dracula transforms into large werewolf and bat creatures, while in the novel he only transforms into a regular wolf and bat. He also is not explicitly shown to have had sex with Lucy as in the film. * In the film, when Dracula is caught with Mina in her room, Jonathan comes into the room with the rest of the men. In the novel, Jonathan is also present with Mina when the men come into the room, lying in a stupor unable to move due to Dracula’s hypnotic power over him. * In the film Dracula escapes Mina’s room by turning into mist and going under the closed door, while in the film he turns into a hoard of rats and they scurry away. In the novel he turns into rats at Carfax Abbey while the men are destroying and sanitizing the crates of soil. * In the film Dracula transforms into a wolf and leaps into Lucy’s room and attacks her. In the novel’s version of this scene, the wolf is not Dracula himself, but a wolf escaped from the zoo that’s under Dracula’s hypnotic control, and it does not attack Lucy. In the film the escaped wolf appears when Dracula and Mina are at the cinema house, a scene not present in the novel. * In the film Dracula’s brides call Harker into the room with the bed and when he lies down on it, they appear to rise up from beneath it, and they attack him before Dracula appears and scolds them. In the novel Harker wakes from sleep on a sofa and sees the brides standing before him, and Dracula appears before they have a chance to attack him. The brides also appear semi-nude in the film, while in the novel they do not. * In the film Renfield is shown to be Harker’s predecessor and it’s implied that his experience at Dracula’s castle drove him insane, while in the novel Harker and Renfield are unrelated and Renfield’s insanity is not implied to have been caused by Dracula. * In the novel none of the gypsies carrying Dracula to his castle are shot or killed. * In the film the blue flame is seen directly in front of Dracula’s castle, while in the novel it’s seen in the distance on the journey to the castle. The flame appears again later in the film, though only the one time in the novel.
• The blue flame is the only optical effect in the film; every other effect was achieved completely “in-camera” on the set with no post-production effects work.
• In the scene where the count serves Jonathan Harker dinner after his arrival at the castle, the count mentions his ancestors were members of the Order of the Dracul. There was an actual Order of the Dracul (Dracul=dragon), an order of chivalry fighting against the Ottomans in the Balkans in the 1400s. Vlad Tepes, who the character of Dracula is loosely based on, was known as “Draculea”, which means “son of the Dragon”, as his father was a member of this order.
• The portrait of Dracula seen when Harker is having dinner at the castle is based on the self-portrait of the German painter Albrecht Dürer.

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The Return of the Vampire

The Return of the Vampire is a 1944 film, released by Columbia Pictures starring Béla Lugosi, Nina Foch, Frieda Inescort, and Miles Mander.

In 1918, an English family are terrorized by a vampire, until they learn how to deal with it. They think their troubles are over…

Cast
  Bela Lugosi … Armand Tesla/Dr. Hugo Bruckner
  Frieda Inescort … Lady Jane Ainsley
  Nina Foch … Nicki Saunders
  Miles Mander … Sir Frederick Fleet
  Roland Varno … John Ainsley
  Matt Willis … Andreas Obry

 Crew

Clay Campbell … makeup artist

Aaron Nibley … special effects

 

 

 

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Nina Foch

 

Frieda Inescort

Scars of Dracula released November 8, 1970

Scars of Dracula is a 1970 British horror film directed by Roy Ward Baker for Hammer Studios.

It stars Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, alongside Dennis Waterman, Jenny Hanley, Patrick Troughton, and Michael Gwynn. Although disparaged by some critics, the film does restore a few elements of Bram Stoker’s original character: The Count is introduced as an “icily charming host”; he has command over nature; and he is seen scaling the walls of his castle. It also gives Lee more to do and say than any other Hammer Dracula film except its first, 1958′s Horror of Dracula.

Trivia:

• Jenny Hanley was dubbed by Nikki Van der Zyl.
• Dennis Waterman was Hammer’s choice; Roy Ward Baker has said in interviews he thought Waterman was badly miscast.
• The last feature of Toke Townley
• Last Hammer horror of Michael Ripper.
• Scars of Dracula is the first Dracula film to attempt to capture the scene in Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel where the Count actually crawls out and climbs along a wall in a bat-like manner, the only difference being that in the Stoker novel, Dracula climbs down, while in Scars of Dracula he climbs up.
• This is the second Hammer Dracula film to feature a servant to the count named “Klove” (the first was Dracula: Prince of Darkness, though the role was played by a different actor in each film.

Cast  
  Christopher Lee … Dracula
  Dennis Waterman … Simon Carlson
  Jenny Hanley … Sarah Framsen
  Christopher Matthews … Paul Carlson
  Patrick Troughton … Klove
  Michael Gwynn … The Priest
  Michael Ripper … Landlord
  Wendy Hamilton … Julie
  Anouska Hempel … Tania
  Delia Lindsay … Alice, burgomaster’s daughter

Jenny Hanley

 

Make Up Department
  Heather Nurse … assistant makeup artist
  Wally Schneiderman … makeup supervisor
  Pearl Tipaldi … hairdresser

   Roger Dicken … special effects

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