Count Dracula’s Great Love – review

Director: Javier Aguirre

Release Date: 1973

Contains spoilers

Another from the Elvira’s Movie Macabre series and another bad transfer, though not half as bad as The Devil’s Wedding Night.

We begin with two men delivering a crate to an old castle (actually an abandoned sanatorium). They complain about the weight and the fact that they have to take it into the cellar. Not getting all the way to their destination they decide to abandon the crate in a side room when one has the idea of opening it. It contains a coffin and so they open that and find nothing but a skeleton. Somewhat depressed they decide to case the rest of the building for valuables but it is an abandoned wreck. Suddenly they are attacked by a cloaked man, face unseen. One is bitten. The other has a hatchet buried in his head.

Imre (Victor Barrera) is in a coach with four young ladies - Karen (Haydée Politoff), Senta (Rosanna Yanni), Elke (Mirta Miller) and his illicit love Marlene (Ingrid Garbo). He regales them with tales of the area. They are in the Borgo Pass and it is here that Jonathon Harker and Abraham Van Helsing finally killed Count Dracula. He points out the abandoned sanatorium. It once belonged to a Doctor Kargos, a man killed when it was discovered that his patients were dying of anaemia and he was suspected of taking their blood and using it in bizarre experiments. It has recently been purchased by a Doctor Marlow (Paul Naschy). The coach looses a wheel and whilst he and Marlene search for it the horses spook, kicking the driver in the head and killing him. The horses then run off. When Imre returns they decide they have little choice but go to the sanatorium and see if anyone is there.

They are greeted by Doctor Marlow and offered hospitality but he has no transport and no one is due to make deliveries to the sanatorium for a week. That night Karen is woken by a noise, whilst investigating she comes face to face with the deliveryman, who is now a vampire, but is quickly bundled up by a figure. Back in her room we see it is Marlow, who claims that she must have seen a tramp.

The next day Marlow cannot be found – he has left a note to say that he has gone to check his traps in the woods. Now, given that he must have seen the vampire the night before and yet covered it up and he has vanished during the day we, the audience, are left in no doubt that he must be Dracula. Let’s face it Naschy is credited as such. During the day Karen, Elke and Senta investigate the house and find the diary of Van Helsing – Senta reads a bit of it but it is Karen who becomes interested.

That night Karen is reading the book in bed and, with a rather nice sequence in negative (presumably to hide the identity of Dracula - which was a bit pointless, but I reiterate that it did look good), we hear more of the plot from Van Helsing’s research. Dracula is resurrected regularly but not at full power. To regain his power he must be loved, by natural means – no supernatural seduction, by a girl who is a virgin. He will then use her blood to resurrect his daughter (the skeleton in the coffin). It is all a bit convoluted, in truth.

Following this Imre is attacked by the deliveryman and he, in turn, attacks Marlene. The vampire effects are rather good, with plenty of blood and weird looking eyes. Meanwhile Marlow and Karen get to know one another and we suspect a blossoming of romance, as does eavesdropping Senta who wants the doctor for herself in a gold-digging kind of way.

Of course, the next day Marlow is out looking at his traps (allegedly) and Imre and Marlene cannot be found. Senta manages to step in a trap and injure herself, a wound which is treated back at the sanatorium by Marlow but his reaction to the blood on the wound is a vision of barely suppressed desire – which the girls take to be squeamishness, an odd trait for a doctor.

Once in bed Elka hears her name called, investigates and is bitten by Marlene, whilst Senta uses her injury to try and seduce the doctor. Post sex and Marlow is obviously disappointed, Senta was no virgin. She also realises that he was thinking of Karen.

Karen, however, has received a visitation from Imre and it is Marlow who saves her. The fight seems desperate, rather than staged, and in the finale Marlow throws Imre from a window where he lands on spikes, neatly staked. Karen, of course, now realises that vampires are real but Marlow suggests he never realised…

I’ll leave the plot there, but will mention the ending (briefly) later. The film is sadly disappointing. The location and photography gives this a really gothic feel and the film does drip with atmosphere. We get a scene later of Elka and Marlene devouring Senta and it is wonderfully erotic without being too explicit and yet the film falls flat.

The short reason is it is rather dull. This might have something to do with the atrocious dubbing but I feel it has more to do with the direction and the pacing. We see plenty of vampiric action and there are several very beautiful girls (with, for a Euro-horror of its time, very little flesh on show) and yet the film feels lethargic all the way through. You can watch the DVD with or without the Elvira interruptions but at one point she mentions that we are in a lull in the lull – a harsh description of the film, perhaps, but ultimately accurate.

It is also confusing. Dracula and Marlow are one and the same but we are never sure as to whether Marlow is actually more mortal than vampire – until he fully turns after Karen submits to his charms (well you didn’t think she’d hold out did you – that isn’t the ending by the way). The vampires serve the Prince of Darkness and yet they seem unmanageable at times. It is made clear later that Karen’s blood was off the menu and yet Imre attacks her as does both the deliveryman and Senta. All three are despatched by Dracula but was this a ruse to make him more appealing or were they actually going to defy the Count? It’s never answered. We do see the vampire Elka and the deliveryman go for each other with some gusto, so I’d air on the side of out of control.

The ending is just bizarre and the actions at the end seem utterly out of character. I won’t spoil it but I really didn’t see it coming. Perhaps if there were a Spanish version of this, with English subtitles, it’d work better but I think the pacing would still be off. As it is I can only really give the film 3 out of 10. A damn shame as it drips with atmosphere but that is never really exploited.

The imdb page is here.