Scream Blacula Scream (1973)

William Marshall, Pam Grier, Don Mitchell and Richard Lawson star in this 1973 horror sequel. This begins with a funeral of an elderly priestess. Grier (Foxy Brown, Coffy) plays Lisa Fortier, a young woman who is her adopted heir. Lawson (Poltergeist) plays the woman's son, Willis Daniels who seeks revenge for not being the rightful heir. Soon, he resurrects Mamuwalde aka Blacula (Marshall) using voodoo and becomes one of his vampires. Blacula starts feeding on others and seeks Lisa's help to drive the evil spirit out of him. Mitchell plays Lisa's friend, Justin Carter who is an ex-cop investigating the bodies bitten and disappearing which eventually lead him to Blacula. This sequel is as good as the first and a bit darker. Marshall was great in it as usual as well as Grier. I recommend this.

I actually liked this a bit more than the original Blacula. While that film was very fun and had some real pathos to it in William Marshall's performance, this one really does not have all the racial content(and intended stereotypical "humour") of the first film. As I watched the film I kept thinking how familiar it was...it should be as it was directed by Bob Kelljan who directed the Count Yorga films of the 70's. This film is very like those in style, mood, pace, and I wonder if the house in this movie was used in the Yorga films? Anyone? Anyway, we again have William Marshall as the victim of Count Dracula and cursed as Blacula. This time I think in Louisiana though setting really does not matter. The film opens with a groovy soundtrack(keeping with the times here) where we find an old voodoo woman die and the cult wants new leadership to fall to Pam Grier rather than her own spawn - Big Willis played by then newcomer Richard Lawson. So what does Big Willis do...bring back to life a force he does not understand as he is a complete idiot - a fun idiot - but an idiot nonetheless! He brings Blacula to life, has his neck bitten into, and then gives some great one-liners about how he never wants to go out again if, in his words, "a brutha can't see himself." Lawson does a good job. Then we get all kinds of people that wander up to this huge, dark mansion at the wee hours of the morn only to be chased and erased as human beings but soon to be badly decorated vampires by association. One of these early treats is a real treat for the eyes - Barbara Rhoades. She is just lovely though her time is short-lived. Well, Blacula goes to a party and finds voodoo priestess Pam Grier and her boyfriend and former cop Justin(Don Mitchell of Ironsides fame) and we have the ever urbane William Marshall chatting her up with his eyes and charm. Marshall plays this role with restrained gusto and a sophistication really not seen with most vampires. He utters his lines with particular articulation and is easily the best thing to see in this film(yes, that is with Rhoades, Grier, Lynne Moody, and many other beauties in the reckoning as well). Michael Conrad of Hill Stree Blues plays a detective and we get the inevitable meeting of many people being attacked by a horde of undead(like in The Return of Count Yorga). The movie has loads of style, atmosphere, fun moments like when Marshall is walking down a street at night and kills two pimps after warning them not to mess with them in his suave manner, sit-on-the-edge-of-your-seat moments, and good, solid acting. It is cheesy fun to be sure. Heck, it is called Scream, Blacula, Scream. For what it is though it is done exceedingly well in my opinion. Where can you get vampirism, voodoo, a voodoo doll of Blacula(Dracula), great one-liners, creepy house with candles in seclusion, and a bevy of beauties even with the bad make-up jobs. The make-up in the film, on the minus side, is the most horrifying thing in the whole film. The soundtrack and titles are wonderful as well. I miss the 70's - indeed I do!

Following up "Blacula", the title vampire is resurrected by a voodoo priest, who is promptly converted into one of the undead.I think the flaw in this movie is that it is never really clear what happens to people when they are converted into vampires. Do they just retain their normal urges? Or are they mindless minions of the master vampire? This movie has it both ways.Anyway, Blacula is trying to get a cure for his Vampirism by local Voodoo priestess Pam Grier, queen of Black Exploitation films. This movie only seems to hold together in that the main characters never talk to each other. Blacula says he wants the cure immediately (despite the fact he's sucked the life out of one of her friends) and wants to talk to her the next night, but he waits three days to do it, even taking time off to banter with her boyfriend, ex-cop/art collector/publisher dude.The movie ends with a fight between vampires and cops that seems a little pointless other than the bookkeeping.

Having just rewatched Blacula, I've now done the same with Scream Blacula Scream. Once again, William Marshall reprises his character of Prince Mamuwalde who became the feared Blacula. Pam Grier plays Lisa Fortier who becomes the new voodoo priestess after her elderly predecessor dies. The one who thought he should have taken over, Willis Daniels (Richard Lawson), is the one who brings Blacula back to life when he buys a bag of bones from the Ragman (Bernie Hamilton) and performs his own voodoo service. Lynne Moody plays Denny, Willis' girlfriend. Don Mitchell plays Justin Carter, an ex-detective who's with Lisa and who is the one that thinks about the marks on many victims' necks are the work of a vampire which he tells a skeptical Sheriff Harley Dunlap (Michael Conrad). I'll stop there and just say this was almost as effective as Blacula. I did like the way director Bob Kelljan had both the music score and the background music play at the same time at the same volume to provide many chillingly effective scenes. And there was a humorous scene with a couple of pimps (Bob Minor, Al Jones) harassing Mamuwalde that I got a kick out of. So on that note, Scream Blacula Scream gets a recommendation from me. P.S. Many of the supporting cast I cited are probably more well known outside of this movie like Don Mitchell had played Mark Sanger on the TV series "Ironside". Richard Lawson would years later play one of the exorcists whose name is Ryan on Poltergeist. Lynne Moody was the original Jenny Willis on "All in the Family" before Belinda Tolbert replaced her on the spin-off "The Jeffersons". And then there's Michael Conrad who would eventually become Sergeant Phil Esterhaus on "Hill Street Blues" becoming well known for the tagline "Hey, let's be careful out there." And another player, Janee Michelle who played Gloria, is a native of the Seventh Ward of New Orleans which is a two-hour drive from where I now live. Also, she was-in N.O. parlance-a "Creole's Creole".