Blood for Dracula (1974)

Review may contain spoilers.Udo Kier doesn't play a very convincing Count Dracula. He cannot turn into a bat, nor a wolf, nor ethereal mist. He doesn't have a hypnotic effect on his victims like previous vampires. His assistant isn't a mentally disturbed man from an asylum, but rather a well dressed socialite with perfectly styled hair. In an ironic twist, the peasant servant of the castle has more of a predator like hunger for the females living there then the count does. The male servant's libido is off the charts as he has sex with 3 out of the 4 daughters of a rich aristocrat. The main idea behind this plot seems to be to cram in as much sex as possible into the total viewing time. In one scene two of the sisters engage in a passionate kissing session with each other. There is no reason for this except to try and increase lust on the part of the viewer. The Count has to feed but can only suck the blood of virgins, and believes he has found some highly available ones in the mansion. In his first attack on one of the girls, he sucks so much blood for so long that it would have at the very least caused her to lose consciousness or at the most die from rapid blood loss. His second attack is a little more believable because he doesn't suck in as much blood. But in both cases, the vomiting scenes afterwards are a huge turn off. The only thing more repulsive then those scenes are when the count laps up virgin blood off the floor left behind by the youngest daughter after the male servant sexually violates her. In the end, when the count is hacked to death by the ax wielding servant, I hoped that there was no way he could be resurrected for a continuation of this story in a second film. So far to date I have been right.

Blood For Dracula is a gorgeous looking piece of cinema that succeeds even though it has some real weaknessesThe story tells of Count Dracula coming to Italy to look for a virgin bride in an aristocratic family with four daughters. Sadly (for him), the first two daughters offered to him have already lost their virginity to the randy gardener. This much is predictable, but what awaits the remaining two girls makes for an interesting conclusion to the story.The movie looks stunning. Whatever faults it has, the cinematography is not one of them. Beautifully shot on location in an ornate villa, every shot drips with elegance. The whole thing looks consistently lavish. It even has a delicate and wonderfully nuanced musical score. Not overly gory (a million miles from it's partner "Flesh For Frankenstien"), only a couple of pretty realistic blood-vomiting scenes and an over- the-top axe chopping conclusion would give the squeamish any trouble.What lets things down here is the acting. All the cast look great, Udo Kier is effective as the ailing count, and Arno Juerging is hilarious as the manservant, but the rest of the performances are terrible. The four daughters are certainly beautiful but the way they read their lines is appallingly stilted and often very difficult to understand. And Joe Dallessandro provides his usual wooden performance, although he does contribute to the frequent and lengthy sex scenes. There is a LOT of (female) nudity in the movie, and even today it still seems quite excessive. Apart from the excellent photography, the film shows little originality, but I particularly liked the budding friendship of Dracula and the prudish, oldest sister, who never gets offered as a romantic option, but is actually the best match for the eccentric count. There are tender moments between the two that were quite touching.The movie is still worth watching. "Flesh For Frankenstein" has become the more notorious of the two, but Dracula still has it's moments.

A sickly Dracula (Udo Kier) and his loyal manservant Anton (Arno Juerging) travel from Romania to Italy in search of a 'wirgin' wife. At the villa of the Di Fiore family, the vampire is introduced to four sisters, but not all of them are as pure as they claim to be.The last five minutes of Blood For Dracula are great: handyman Mario (Joe Dallesando) chases Count Dracula with an axe and hacks off his limbs one by one, blood spraying everywhere. He then stakes the vampire's torso. Distraught, the eldest of Dracula's victims throws herself onto the stake, pinning herself to the dead vampire.If only there had been some of this OTT craziness throughout the preceding 100 or so minutes; instead, we get a rather restrained, slow moving story, the only exploitative content some soft-core sex, randy Mario seeing to several of the sisters (which allows for some full frontal female nudity), and the sight of Kier vomiting as he reacts to impure blood.A spot of subtle black humour and the constant mangling of the English language by the largely European cast provides a few giggles, but on the whole, this is a less satisfying effort than its companion piece, the outrageous Flesh for Frankenstein.

It's weird how Andy Warhol produced so many movies with naked women. I mean, he was gay! Well, this is more or less a retread of "Andy Warhol's Frankenstein". I realize that his movies where literally nothing happened were all made in the 1960's. I guess he decided to make movies that had stuff happen. It seems like he did better with Frankenstein than he did Dracula. This has the same effects with the blood and nudity. It still isn't as messed up, though. I admit that the budget looks pretty high and the sets and costumes are fun.There should have been more plot than just Dracula looking for a bride. Now, I do think it's kind of unique with the location. It just doesn't seem to do enough for a full length movie. The ending is fairly anti-climatic, but the overall acting isn't bad. It seems like the people who worked on this were trying pretty hard. It just doesn't seem to be sending any kind of new message, which you should do with a character this prolific. **1/2