Scars of Dracula

Plot synopsis:
A vampire bat enters a sealed room inside Castle Dracula with a coffin containing ashes: it regurgitates blood onto the ashes and reanimates them. Later a village girl is found dead and brought to the local tavern, and the landlord [Michael Ripper] realizes that Dracula [Christopher Lee] is back. He sends all the village women to the church so the men can storm the castle and torch it. The villagers and priest encounter the servant Klove {Patrick Troughton}, who tells them the fire won't reach his master. On returning to the church, the men open the door and vampire bats fly out. Inside they find the women dead, horribly mutilated.Meanwhile, Sarah Framsen [Jenny Hanley] is celebrating her birthday. All of her friends are there, except for one empty place at the table for playboy Paul Carlson [Christopher Matthews]. His brother Simon [Dennis Waterman] is competing with Paul for Sarah's hand. Simon gives Sarah a ring but realizes she is still torn between the brothers.Paul is in bed with Alice, who lies about how late in the evening it is: he tries to make a hasty exit but drops a wrapped present for Sarah and infuriates Alice. She wraps herself in the bed sheets and gives chase when her father--the burgomaster--arrives, and she takes the opportunity to get back at Paul by suggesting he took advantage of her: Paul escapes as the burgomaster's men go after him.Paul arrives at the party and gives Sarah his present: a framed photo of her. Sarah and Simon try gallantly to hide the fact that the glass over the picture is cracked (from having been dropped earlier), but when Paul sees the damage he takes back the gift and promises to have it fixed the next day. He then has to flee the burgomaster's men by jumping out a window into a coach. The runaway vehicle drops him at the tavern and, after a disagreeable argument with the landlord, he leaves on foot and winds up at Castle Dracula looking for overnight lodging. Instead, he is seduced by the mysterious Tanya [Anouska Hempel], who is a victim of the count but not fully a vampire. Before dawn, she bares her fangs and prepares to claim Paul as a victim, but Dracula interferes, knocking Paul unconscious and viciously stabbing Tanya to death. Paul regains consciousness at the cock's crow and covers the carnage with a bed sheet and fashions a makeshift rope to scale the castle wall and gain access to the floor below. The sheets are pulled back up by Klove, leaving Paul trapped in Dracula's crypt to await dusk.In the bedroom, Klove finds Sarah's picture among Paul's belongings. He sets it on the bed table to amuse himself as he dismembers and disposes of Tanya's body.Simon and Sarah arrive at the castle looking for Paul, but Klove helps them escape as he is smitten with Sarah, whom he recognizes from the portrait. The servant is punished by Dracula, who burns him with a sword heated to glowing red in the fireplace. Simon and Sarah escape to the nearby village where they seek help. Sarah stays with the priest while Simon returns to the castle and bribes the servant to help him. Unfortunately, he gets helped into Dracula's crypt where he finds his brother Paul dead, impaled on a hook. Meanwhile, the vampire bat has mauled the priest to death and Sarah flees, seeking Simon back at the castle. The bat rips off her cross, and Dracula draws near. Simon escapes the crypt and confronts Dracula on a rampart with an iron spike, but his aim is poor and Dracula retrieves it to use against Simon. A raging storm produces a lightning bolt that strikes Dracula, and the lord of the undead is electrocuted and incinerated by the intense heat and falls to his destruction from the battlement.

Tags: good versus evil, violence, gothic

Review:
Soon his brother Simon and his finance Sarah have gone looking for him, where they encounter unwelcoming locals and learn that Paul has passed through to Dracula's castle.Out of the Hammer Dracula films I've watched (which would be Horror of Dracula, Dracula - Prince of Darkness, Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, Taste the blood of Dracula and The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires), this particular entry (the sixth) would have to be the weakest, but not entirely bad.
In this movie we see Dracula burn his servant with a hot sword and stab his female vampire slave to death with a knife.Christopher Lee had said this was the weakest and most unconvincing of the series.
That would have been sweet.The bat looked fake, the knife looked rubber, the burning castle looked like an obvious miniature with a big candle in it, the lightning hitting Dracula at the end was an obvious stunt man with a really bad (Michael Myers?) mask and the church scene after the bat attack was disturbing.
I've seen some of the best hammer Dracula films and I have seen some of the worst, and all I can say is that this one ranks way up there as a highly enjoyable Count Dracula story, which I'm sad to say is sometimes bombarded by critics and even by Christopher Lee himself as being a weak entry into the series.
Not gonna go into details, but he is part of what made the movie a little different.Dracula is a bit more evil, sadistic and violent in this film than in others, for example he is seen using weapons such as daggers and swords to express his fury, instead of the more traditional ways were used to seeing him use.
It seems to me that there's a little bit of all these Hammer films in Fright Night.Finally I think that anyone fond of Dracula films, and specially Hammer films will find this film highly enjoyable, because of Christopher Lees evil performance, high atmosphere, Gothic sets and the high blood quotient (for a Hammer film anyways) Don't go expecting a huge bloodbath, by todays standards its tame, but by Hammer films standards up to that time, its got lots of the red stuff.
The script is little more than a rehash of Dracula and Dracula Prince Of Darkness, but there is more action than any others in the series, and several memorable sequences, including the discovery of bodies horribly gored by bats in a church [replete with Lucio Fulci style zooms into the nasty bits], Dracula climbing up a wall a la Bram Stoker, and a vampire seduction ending with Dracula stabbing the woman to death.
Directed by Roy Ward Baker and starring Christopher Lee in his fifth outing as Dracula, Scars Of Dracula, hamstrung by low budget as it is, is one of the better efforts in the Hammer Horror Dracula cycle.Standard rules apply, buxom wenches are ripe for slaughter and the guys are a mixture of village yokels and posh gentlemen.
The cast reads like a who's who of British television, you got a Doctor Who {Patrick Troughton with the worlds scariest eyebrows}, Minder {a badly miscast Dennis Waterman}, a Bond girl and presenter of Magpie {the lovely Jenny Hanley} and Lord Melbury from Fawlty Towers {Michael Gwynn}.Safe & solid Hammer Horror fare that just about rises above the normality of the script.
The story isn't really that good--just a bunch of young, good-looking, talentless young actors getting involved with Dracula (Christopher Lee).There are MANY things wrong with this film: 1) The plot is slight and heavily padded (even at 90 minutes) 2) There are some ridiculously fake rubber bats 3) The special effects are dreadful 4) With two exceptions the acting is even worse than usual for a Hammer film 5) Dracula stabs a woman vampire to death (why???) with an obviously fake knife and THEN drinks her blood.
MORD39 RATING:    ***   out of  ****In my opinion, SCARS OF DRACULA is the most satisfying entry of all the Hammer Dracula's, even squeaking past the revered HORROR OF DRACULA.People like to pick on the reduced budget, but I have never felt that the sets look too bad when all is said and done.
The script is at best mediocre and at worst shoddy, some parts are far too talky, and there's some silliness, vaguely explored ideas and sometimes tedious melodrama(like Dracula Has Risen from the Grave but worse).The special effects do look dreadfully fake, especially the bats that look laughable even by today's standards.
While the acting is fine on the whole, Dennis Waterman did nothing for me, he is incredibly bland and while he looks and sounds right at home in 1970s London he looks and sounds completely out of place here.Scars of Dracula has some highly atmospheric sets(especially Dracula's castle, which is like a character all by itself), is very stylishly shot and has wonderfully moody lighting.
Christopher Lee has more screen-time and dialogue than the rest of the Hammer Dracula films featuring him, which is great considering that generally his screen-time and amount of dialogue were lessoning with each instalment, and he absolutely relishes that in a powerful and positively blood-curdling performance.
Some have said that he was losing interest and that he considered this film the worst of the series, but it didn't come over that way to me, besides Lee was too great and conscientious an actor to show that.Overall, decent but could have been much more; Hammer's fifth Dracula film out of eight ranks right in the middle personally.
Roy Ward Baker's "Scars Of Dracula" of 1970 is not only by far the goriest and most violent of the awesome Dracula movies from Hammer Studios, it is also one of the best sequels.
Count Dracula, played once again with greatness by Christopher Lee, is more vengeful, blood-thirsty and sadistic than ever, and the (once again) excellent eerie Hammer atmosphere makes "Scars Of Dracula" an must-see for Horror fans.The story is, admittedly, not too elaborate, in some minor parts the script has its flaws, and the film has some cheesy moments, but what the hell, it remains suspenseful and creepy and top-notch horror entertainment anyway!
Count Dracula has, of course, always been a scary and evil villain in the Hammer films, but in "Scars Of Dracula" he is the Devil himself!The movie begins with Dracula's (admittedly slightly cheesy) resurrection when a bat drops blood on his rotting ashes.
After some girls fall victim to the vampire, angry villagers try to burn the count's castle, and have to notice that they are not capable of fighting the Prince of Darkness, who immediately takes terrible revenge When a young man has to flee his town after spending the night with the burgomaster's daughter, he comes to the area where Dracula is striking terror into people's hearts, people who are living in constant fear and who are therefore anything but hospitable towards strangers"Scars Of Dracula" is, in my opinion, one of the greatest Dracula-sequels from the Hammer Studios.
The violence is more graphic than in any of the other Dracula movies from Hammer, and although some effects in the movie may look a bit fake, the gory parts are very well made, and the great score by James Bernard makes the whole thing even creepier.
Last classic in the Hammer's Dracula series, because it was the last film set in the right Victorian/Gothic milieu: 19th century fairytale Transylvania of castles, peasants, pretty girls and adorable rubber bats.
They protect their wives in the church and head to the castle, but evil wins and their wives are murdered by bats under the command of Dracula.Sometime later, the womanizer Paul Carlson (Christopher Matthews) has one night stand with Alice (Delia Lindsay, who is the burgomaster's daughter.
Dracula's vintage castle looks much more Gothic and authentic here than it ever did in "Horror of Dracula," and director Roy Ward Baker even includes a shot from straight out of Bram Stoker's novel where the Count is witnessed scaling the sides of the castle's exterior like some kind of lizard.
When she commands: "love me!" all I can do is ask her how hard.Detractors like to pick on the fake look of the bats in the movie (as if movie prop bats have ever looked authentic in any old vampire films!) and they also cite the low budget sets as a detriment (and I'll maintain that "Horror of Dracula"'s sets looked far cheaper).
Due to this energy-boost in the series, veteran actor Christopher Lee seems to enjoy his repetitive role some more again, and his great performance contributes in making "Scars of Dracula" a sleazy and violent Hammer highlight.
Christopher Lee is only rarely in the film and much of it consists of people stumbling along looking for their missing friend until the final confrontation which ends the vampire menace forever....or at least until the next film!Aside from a servant for Dracula who actually manages to betray his master, there really isn't a lot innovative or memorable about the film.
Having seen most of the Hammer "Dracula" series with Christopher Lee as the Count, I always look for something different to catch my interest.
Roy Ward Baker directed two of the best Hammer movies in 'Quatermass And The Pit' and 'The Vampire Lovers', but 'Scars Of Dracula' isn't of the same standard.
Scars of Dracula, without a pre-sale agreement with the U.S. was therefore filmed on a low budget, and while this shows, it does not prevent this from being one of the most memorable and unfairly derided of the long-running vampire series.Christopher Lee turns in an excellent performance as the Count, and has plenty of screen time and dialogue compared to "Dracula: Prince of Darkness" (1966), where the script was so woeful he refused to say any of it and ended up saying nothing at all.
Christopher Lee is once again featured in the titular role (the fourth time in one year he appeared as the Count), but the frightened lovers who have invaded Dracula's castle searching for a lost relative are brash and boring.
Maybe this movie is most gloomy and gore Dracula of all Hammer's productions,the plot is often the same,but in the beginning something fresh all villagers burn the Dracula's castle after one more body appears,another high point is a lot of beauty women in the movie all them gorgeous and sexy...without forget the amazing acting of Patrick Troughton as Klove a weird guy who is enchanted by Sarah's portrait and help Simon escapes....Lee needless a word to describe....the movie spoke itself,cruel,violent,bloody and gloomy!!
Meanwhile, Paul's elder brother Simon (DENNIS WATERMAN) and his girlfriend Sarah (JENNY HANLEY) arrive at the village in order to find him and end up doing battle with the dreaded Count, in which they discover the extent of the evil that goes on within the castle walls...The tremendous success of TASTE THE BLOOD OF Dracula (also 1970) meant that Hammer wasted no time in putting another sequel into production.
The last two, Dracula AD 1972 (1972) and THE SATANIC RITES OF Dracula (1974) were both set in contemporary London.SCARS OF Dracula is one of Hammer's goriest films, sequences like the priest's demise at the hands of a bat in close-up are exceptionally nasty, but all in all it is a disappointing addition to their celebrated Dracula series.
But it must be said that Christopher Lee gets more screen time here than in most other Dracula films and he is still the definitive Count.
This is probably "Scars" Weakest element, and for Toppers, there are many Scenes with Dracula's Totem Dominion Displayed throughout.This is Hammer's most Gruesome and Gory of the "Dracula" Movies, one of the Things that puts the Film on its Supporters Side, and the "Bats" Carnage is Substantial.
The middle of the film could be seen as a weak point of the movie, as nothing of real significance happens, and it does tend to drag out a bit here with the traditional Hammer scenes, from the overlong set-up to get him out to the castle in order to disappear in order for their later search to occur and the later parts of them wandering the countryside stopping at the end where it takes forever for something to finish out.
Flaws aside, Dracula is biting, stabbing, impaling and burning his victims this time and he is out for blood.Local villagers, enraged that yet another young woman has been murdered by the Count, rise up and set fire to Castle Dracula.
Although Hammer's horror films were becoming more prolific by 1970, there was a definite downturn in their fortunes: audiences were falling out of love for their modest-budgeted Gothic tales.Released shortly after 'Taste the Blood of Dracula', the drop in quality for this latest offering is noticeable, both in budget (there is a very studio-bound feel to Dracula's castle for example) and in interesting new ideas (Dracula's life-saving blood-spewing personal bat is particularly unsuccessful).Rather than an ongoing story, 'Scars' is more a series of set-pieces.
We then have the slaughter of a church full of villagers we never get to know, various sadistic acts by Dracula (as well as a partially successful scene of him crawling snake-like down the walls of his castle, lifted from the novel – presumably keeping Christopher Lee happy) and finally the least convincing climactic dispatch of the Count by lightning as Dennis Waterman and a badly dubbed Jenny Hanley watch on.Although it gives Lee more to do than most sequels in this series, it is nevertheless a palpably tired offering and wastes most of its cast.
Trying to evade his guards, Paul winds up at Dracula's castle when he can not find shelter anywhere else when his horse carriage was driven way too far from his village.Simon(Dennis Waterman), Paul's brother, and his gorgeous girlfriend Sarah(Jenny Hanley), seek out of their village to try and find him not knowing what evil lied ahead.This is continuing right after "Taste the Blood of Dracula" and we watch as a bat swoops over the remaining ash of the Count releasing blood from it's mouth.
By far, the most sadistic and violent of the Hammer vampire films to that point, this is by far Christopher Lee's best rendition of Dracula.
When he does not return, his brother and his fiancé come looking for him, and they find out the hard way why people in those parts aren't keen on the name Dracula.The biggest problem with this movie is, the story is too slim, and it reduces the thing just to series of set pieces.
After a very silly opening sequence, in which Dracula is revived by a rubber bat regurgitating blood onto his dusty remains, this movie, the sixth in Hammer's Dracula series, quickly gets into gear and delivers plenty of what fans expect: handsome heroes, beautiful women (in cleavage enhancing dresses), an overload of Gothic atmosphere, some bright red gore, and Christopher Lee at his creepy best.A young man, Paul Carson (who has been run out of town for banging the Burgomaster's daughter), seeks shelter in a ruined castle where he is surprised to find it inhabited by a busty brunette (Anouska Hempel), a mono-browed manservant (Patrick Troughton), and the Count (Lee).
After unwisely accepting his host's offer of a room for the night, he (not surprisingly) meets a rather sticky end.Disconcerted by his brother's strange disappearance, Simon Carson (Dennis Waterman) decides to go in search of his missing sibling, and, accompanied by his pretty blonde girlfriend Sarah (Jenny Hanley), follows a trail that ultimately leads him to Castle Dracula, and a deadly battle against the evil Count.Despite being very reminiscent of the first Hammer Dracula movie plot-wise, and having the aforementioned silly opening (and an equally daft ending in which Dracula is conveniently hit by lightning and set on fire), Scars of Dracula is a very watchable effort that benefits from some nice little creative touches (Dracula's almost impenetrable daytime retreat is pretty cool), some fairly bloody moments, and several tasty Hammer babes (Hanley's heaving bosom was particularly hypnotic, although I did find it rather strange to be lusting after the woman who presented TV's Magpie when I was a kid!)..
It's impossible to begin discussing any of Hammer's Dracula films without first mentioning Christopher Lee. In Scars of Dracula, Lee plays a more sadistic and evil version of the Count.
In spite of Christopher Lee's greater than usual screen time and Patrick Troughton's presence, this is by far my least favourite of the Hammer Dracula series.
"A Night to Remember" director Roy Ward Baker helmed the liveliest "Dracula" sequel, "Scars of Dracula," with Christopher Lee reprising the role for the fifth time in the Hammer Films franchise.
Baker brought this same sensibility his other Hammer films, like the similarly outrageous "The Vampire Lovers" and "Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde." With a more focused screenplay and less bumpy pacing, "Scars of Dracula" could have been the best of the series.
They manged to carry on for a few more years and made some much better movies along the way, but Scars is pretty much a stake through the heart.Denis Waterman, best known to UK viewers as Regan's up-for-a-punch-up Cock-er-ney side kick in The Sweeney, and the tough Cock-er-ney ex-boxer in Minder, is rather charmingly cast as a posh student lawyer in search of his missing brother.He almost brings it off, too.Hammer seem to have made some attempt to placate Christopher Lee, who was growing increasingly disenchanted at playing Dracula; they cover Stoker's original novel a little more (including a brief scaling of the castle walls by The Count himself) and give Lee a bit more to do.Unfortunately, the borrowings from Psycho become rather obvious, with Dracula even stabbing his vampire bride.
There really isn't much to Scars of Dracula beyond the Hammer horror clichés of Christopher Lee seducing pretty young English girls, superstitious local villagers & lots of running around in a supposedly huge Gothic castle that seems to consist of about three rooms.