Dracula – season 1 – review

Director: various

First aired: 2013

Contains spoilers

I had watched Dracula as it aired but decided, on reflection, that I wanted to re-watch the series before putting my thoughts to blog (so to speak). The series itself made me struggle towards the end and I really wanted to give it the optimum chance. Worrying then that I struggled to watch it again.

Mina, Jonathon and Lucy

That was a shame because, despite reservations, I found myself (first time round) enjoying the series – for the first few episodes. I felt that the naysayers (often on Facebook) kicked off because it didn’t meet their private vision of who Dracula (Jonathan Rhys Meyers, the Mortal Instruments: City of Bones) should be. If that was the case, and you are reading this, then all I can say is you are in for a lifetime of disappointment because the persona of Dracula shifts from book to book and film to film – this is probably why Draculas have become a plural common noun for vampire (especially, but not exclusively, in Japan). This Dracula was based on the Vlad Ţepeş model but was very different from many portrayals of that variety. The plot also added the resurrected love trope.

resurrection

Dracula’s resurrection was well done. Two men entering a lost crypt and finding the coffin and mechanically impaled corpse. One – revealed to be Van Helsing (Thomas Kretschmann, Blade 2 & Dracula [2012]) – slits the throat of his companion in order that he might resurrect Dracula and it is this sort of turnaround of characters that the series did well.

let's make our enemy a vampire!

Dracula and van Helsing are uneasy allies campaigning to destroy the Order of the Dragon – the Order punished Dracula by burning his wife Ilona (Jessica De Gouw) at the stake and turning him into a vampire (ok, I wasn’t too sure about the appropriateness of that punishment, seemed a little silly to turn your enemy into a supernaturally strong creature) and centuries later punished Van Helsing by burning his wife and children to death in a house fire and forcing him to watch. Renfield (Nonso Anozie) becomes an erudite lawyer and loyal employee of Dracula, notably – given the faux-Victorian London setting – he is African American. Harker (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) is a journalist and engaged to medical student Mina, she is also played by Jessica De Gouw as she is Ilona reborn. Lucy (Katie McGrath) is still there as a socialite and secretly in love with Mina.

attack

The enemies in the Order are new characters and of them the two most interesting are Order leader Browning (Ben Miles) and the chief huntsman (or vampire hunter to you and I) Lady Jayne Wetherby (Victoria Smurfit). She is distracted from the true identity of American industrialist Alexander Grayson (which is the persona that Dracula has adopted) by him pursuing her and involving her in a torrid affair. The supernatural aspect is continued with the Order adopting seers to try and track down the elder vampire they know to have come to London. Dracula’s presence is like a homing beacon and London is being infiltrated by the undead.

proto-steampunk

The way Dracula and Van Helsing intend to take down the order is by a technology they are developing that provides cheap wireless electricity. I liked this almost proto-steampunk feel the series adopted – though where they got the technology from is never answered (perhaps Van Helsing invented it, who knows). However, as much as it is an alternate Victorian London (allowing daring dresses and actions by the ladies) it was here that the series also fell flat. London was too clean, there may have been angst amongst the lead characters but London almost felt like a slightly darker Mary Poppins place of cheeky chaps, progressive (comparatively) asylums and was a place you could walk at night. It might be unfair to compare two series – especially as, at the time of writing this I have only seen episode 1 – but the dark, griminess of Penny Dreadful’s London was a million time more effective and should have been what this series aimed for.

Nonso Anozie as Renfield

The trouble with this generally, however, was that it really did not grab me. For about four episodes (first viewing) I was interested and then it became a drag. Re-watching it for a second time it really did become a chore. It wasn’t the actors, it wasn’t the characters – whilst some (like Harker) were ciphers, Lady Jane, and Renfield were cracking characters and I liked Rhys Meyers’ interpretation of Dracula (perhaps a little presence-lite and much more suave than monster but he had his violent moments). It wasn’t the lore, which was fairly standard in most regards – sunlight was added as deadly to vampires, which we know is out with the novel but it was a definite story element as Van Helsing tried to create an anti-sunlight serum so that Grayson could complete his industrialist persona and be seen in daylight. Other Dracula cinema invented tropes, such as reincarnated love, are virtually so commonplace as to be not noteworthy – neither interesting nor annoying. So what was it?

Vampire in Sunlight

The overall story didn’t grab me I guess, it had little in the way of teeth. It plodded along and, overall, I guess I didn’t care what happened and that’s a shame. Moments of violence and action were too infrequently peppered amongst industrial intrigue that wasn’t that intriguing. It isn’t surprising, however, that the series failed to get a second season. 4 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Blackstone Vampires Omnibus

Carole Gill has had her four book series of the Blackstone Vampires released in Omnibus form. Carole has previously sent me complimentary copies of the individual books in exchange for honest reviews and, as a favour, I have agreed to recap the reviews and scores (links go to the full review):

Book 1: The House on Blackstone Moor: The House on Blackstone Moor is very much a book of two halves… the first half of the book is a gothic joy… the story morphs into something akin to Clive Barker in a period costume…. I for one found this gloriously gothic, refreshingly brutal, honestly horrific and a great read…. 7.5 out of 10.

Book 2: Unholy Testament - The Beginnings: …The book itself works well. It perhaps is neither as gothic or horrific as the previous – the former does not take away from the rich prose… Occasionally there are phrase structures that seem incongruous with the time period of the portmanteau but they are only occasional and are mentioned here for balance sake… 7 out of 10

Book 3: Unholy Testament – Full Circle: …However something within the book didn’t gel for me… there is another agenda and this comes to a head at the end of the book but that ending just seemed rushed to me. We had spent so long immersed in Eco’s past that the events in the book’s present seemed to be resolved very quickly and I feel that the final section of the book needs expanding… 6 out of 10

Book 4: The Fourth Bride: …the book itself concentrates on a new character, Dia, a young woman cursed from birth to be the fourth bride of Dracula… The author writes a fantastic victim and this worked so very well in the first book – when the primary character was human. With the primary character being a vampire I was less comfortable with the “female victim”…I would like to see the author write a strong female lead, one who isn’t the victim and doesn’t need rescuing by a man… That criticism aside… this was more rounded as a book than the third volume… 7 out of 10

Rufus – review

Director: Dave Schultz

Release date: 2012

Contains Spoilers

Rufus is a film I have had my eye on for a while. I finally found the film on Canadian DVD, indeed the film is Canadian in origin (with an English lead) but has been slow getting a wider release.

Perhaps that is down to the fact that this is much less a horror than it is a drama. It actually looks into the subject of the outsider, a favourite of the vampire genre as that is a main theme that runs through Dracula. However, the seminal novel played on fear of the outsider, this is more contemplative.

Louise and Rufus

The film begins with credits in which we just see Rufus (Rory J. Saper). As the blue skies turn to frost we realise he is sat before a window. As the film starts proper he and an elderly lady, Louise (Christina Jastrzembska, the Twilight Saga: New Moon), get off a bus in the middle of nowhere, it appears. He asks her why there and she says that she can go no further and implores him to fit in. She steps into the road in front of a truck. Her blood splatters him and we see his tongue tentatively taste some from the corner of his mouth.

David James Elliott as Hugh

Hugh Wade (David James Elliott) is the top cop in a two cop town. When he arrives at the scene his deputy, Chet (Tom Carey), tells him what apparently happened and directs him to Rufus – warning him that the young man stinks. Rufus gives his forename (he has an English accent) but says nothing else. Hugh drives him to town, and to underline the fact that the boy stinks tells him to crack a window. He takes Rufus to his home, something his wife, Jennifer (Kelly Rowan), is not enthusiastic about. Later we find that they had a son, about Rufus’ apparent age, who died in a handgun accident and this has caused a marital rift.

Merritt Patterson as Tracy

Rufus is sent for a bath but discovered an hour later just lying in it, in his clothes. Hugh discovers from the local vet (where he has stored Louise’s body) that she had two scars and the vet suspects she might have been lobotomised – though he is no coroner as he points out. The girl who lives over the street from Hugh and Jennifer, Tracy (Merritt Patterson), speaks to Rufus who is stood in a tree. He drops the great height with no ill effect and notices she wears pj’s and bunny slippers. She invites him over, tells him to stand behind an invisible line and orders him to strip as she does too. When he hasn’t moved towards her she says most boys would have already crossed the line but, he explains, she told him not to. She touches his chest and says he is cold and she can’t feel his heart. Its on the other side he says – Jennifer later discovers he has situs inversus (mirror organs).

Kim Coates as Van Dusen

The fact that Tracy is so brazen with him might seem odd but the whole film moves reactions just slightly off kilter in a way that works because the skewed nature is consistent. As things progress we meet Aaron Van Dusen (Kim Coates, The Dresden Files & Dracula the Series) a vampire hunter – but not your normal one. He works for a pharmaceutical company who Rufus escaped from with the help of Louise (and several other institutionalised individuals) decades before. He wants to take their “property” back. At one point, looking at a model kit of a bomber plane, Rufus mentions the factory in Seattle where they were built as though he was there. When Jennifer says that the war was 70 years before he says it didn’t seem so long. Indeed we discover that his age is unknown but he is at least over 100 and time is perceived differently by him.

Rufus attacks

Tracey discovers the truth of him when an ex-boyfriend, Chet (Tom Carey), tries to force himself on her and Rufus defends her. He grows fangs and claws and growls in a bestial manner. Instead of fearing him she accepts him almost immediately. Chet – who survives because Tracy whacks Rufus with a pipe – also starts to accept him and thus is confronted with his own homosexuality and this tension (his feelings versus the societal norm in a small town) is a major tension in the film. Rufus does heal the claw wound on Chet’s face with his blood and it is the blood's restorative qualities that Van Dusen wants and which kept Louise younger than she actually was. Beyond the need for blood (which causes him to vomit if he eats anything other than bloody meat) he reflects, can go out in sunlight but is physically enhanced. He is said to be a one off (by Van Dusen), a freak of nature.

claws

I was struck as I watched the film by a similarity, tonally perhaps, of the classic film The Man Who Fell to Earth. This was probably enhanced by Rory J. Saper’s performance of the outsider that seemed so lost, so naive and innocent (in many ways) that it reminded me of Bowie’s performance in the afore mentioned film. Rufus is socially inept and illiterate, his accent makes him seem foreign to those around him. He really did make you think of the outsider; he became an accepted cuckoo in the nest who could cause a final confrontation of grief and allow healing to occur, he was attractive to some and yet reviled because of the attraction and he was there to be exploited by an uncaring capitalism (the file we see has photos of him being vivisected whilst awake, aware and screaming). Even when he attacked you had sympathy – he attacks a man who tried to sexually assault him and says the man selected himself and yet, as we think about it, he deliberately put himself into the position of being selected and that belies the naivety somewhat. The film is perhaps ponderous because it wants to explore these relationships and themes but it is Saper who pushes you along, preventing that ponderousness from becoming laborious. The skewed feeling allowed the exploration to occur outside the bounds of normal reaction and felt right in film, which is a credit to the script.

Rufus is a fine film and it deserves much more attention than it has thus far. 7.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

From Dusk till Dawn: The Series – Season 1 - review

Director: Various

First Aired: 2014

Contains Spoilers

Written by and starring Quinten Tarantino and directed by Robert Rodriguez, the 1996 film From Dusk Till Dawn is absolutely iconic and, whilst not universally loved, I think it a classic of the vampire genre.

It was with some trepidation, and yet optimism, that I awaited the release of this TV series based on it. Optimism because Rodriguez was behind the project (indeed he is behind the network it was made for) but the idea that the series would follow the film’s story line (for season 1) left a nagging doubt.

You - be cool

As I sat down to watch episode 1 (cleverly the series was available on several countries’ Netflix immediately after US premier - other TV series makers take note) my doubts were displaced. The first episode is the prologue of the film extended to 45 minutes and there were changes. Richie Gecko (Zane Holtz, Vampires Suck) is not just psychologically unhinged but is clearly getting telepathic communications from Santánico Pandemonium (Eiza González). Her role in the series is vastly expanded (and yes the dance does happen) and Texas Ranger Earl McGraw (Don Johnson, Nash Bridges: Superstition) still dies, at the end of the first episode, but has a partner called Freddie Gonzalez (Jesse Garcia) who will hunt the Geckos across Texas and over the border.

Don Johnson was magnificent

However let me stop here and say just how frigging good Don Johnson was in this. He outshone everyone on screen and this was perhaps a little unfortunate as we were to get to know the Geckos in this episode but their lights were dimmed compared to his. D.J. Cotrona had his work cut out as Seth Gecko because comparisons to George Clooney’s stunning portrayal were inevitable, but whilst not as good he did a very good job. Making Richie look so clean cut and boyish was a genius move that made him stand out against Tarantino’s sinister performance.

The Geckos

Despite the differences in story the basic story remains the same. Having broken Seth out of prison, Richie and Seth rob a bank and run for Mexico, leaving a wake of bodies behind them. Meanwhile a paster, Jacob Fuller (Robert Patrick, From Dusk Till Dawn 2: Texas Blood Money) has recently lost his wife (Joanna Going, Dark Shadows: the Revival) and has taken his daughter Kate (Madison Davenport) and adopted son Scott (Brandon Soo Hoo) on a trip to Texas (en route to Mexico). The details of the death and family pressures are expanded on (and Scott gets a more substantial story). Their paths cross and the Geckos use the family to get across the border.

sex machine

One change early on is that Seth’s contact, Carlos (Wilmer Valderrama), is part of the vampires and setting the brothers up. It is through him that we discover some of the lore early on. Later on a Professor of Mesoamerican legends, Professor Aiden Tanner (Jake Busey, Frost: Portrait of a Vampire), tells us much more. Tanner is also, in this, original character Sex Machine – replete with crotch gun. The vampires are not called vampires by Tanner but, for all intents and purposes, they are a snake vampire.

snake vampire

They eat someone’s life energy (or soul, Carlos claims) through the conduit of blood and can turn a victim into one of their own by injecting venom into them (with a notable exception). This eating of the soul allows them to take the form of their victims – this also causes them to look to be wearing the clothes of the victim too. Their fangs flip down like a snake’s and they have various stages of snake form. A stake to the heart (as it is the blood organ) will kill them. They are not deterred by religious iconography (or at least not in the Titty Twister as it is their temple) and so the story of Jacob’s rocked faith isn’t as important. Despite the snake aspect they can grow giant bat wings (perhaps referencing winged serpents).

burning

The sunlight aspect is odd. We see Carlos out in the day and also see his fingers begin to burn in direct sunlight but at another point we see him walking across a highway on the Mexico border with no shade and no noticeable detriment. Santánico tells a new vampire that he can’t face sunlight yet – indicating that he will be able to eventually. The vampires are themselves the slaves of the 9 Lords – these are (not-so-)mythical God’s of the underworld and the vampires are meant to provide the lord's representatives with sustenance and them with sacrifice (this is under explored for me).

Eiza González as Santanico

So, the story diverges but holds its own. The fact that a film has been stretched to a 10 episode series wasn’t problematic. I think they made a dubious choice around language though as it was severely toned down and lost part of the atmosphere of the film in doing so. Certain iconic moments fell flat – “Richie, would you do me a favour and eat my pussy for me… please” as he hallucinates over Kate became a tame request for Bikini removal and clumsy as a result. Generally the series felt a little wussy when it came to the language, therefore. Given some of the violence and later nudity (the topless dancers are still there) it was an odd choice.

bat wings

Not too much of a score detractor though. The fact was I looked forward to each episode release and whilst I don’t think it was as good as the original it was fun. Many of the story changes were good and I did start wondering how they were going to pull the divergent (between film and series) story strands together. This was good TV overall and it deserves the second season it has got. 7 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Hide me Amongst the Graves – review

Author: Tim Powers

First Published: 2012

Contains spoilers

The Blurb: London, 1862

A city of over three-million souls, of stinking fog and winding streets.

Through these streets walks the poet Christina Rossetti, haunted and tormented by the ghost of her uncle, John Polidori. Without him, she cannot write, but her relationship with him threatens to shake London itself to the ground.

This fascinating, clever novel vividly recreates the stews and slums of Victorian London – a city of dreadful delight. But it is the history of a hidden city, where nursery rhymes lead the adventurer through haunted tunnels and inverted spires. And where the price of poetic inspiration is blood.

Telling a secret history of passion and terror, Tim Powers recasts the tragic lives of the Romantics in a gripping and Gothic feat of imagination.

The Review: Having placed this on my wish list, Hide me Amongst the Graves was a birthday present from my better half. What I hadn’t realised was that this is actually a sequel (of sorts), the earlier novel (The Stress of Her Regard) concentrating on Byron, Shelley and Keats. Worry not, however, for this book is absolutely able to stand alone and I enjoyed it so much that I ordered the earlier book as I devoured this one.

The vampirism is very unusual – though Powers does interesting things with standard lore. The vampires are Nephilim – the stone people. There are two primary vampires in this, both of which wear the ghosts of the dead. One wears Queen Boudicca and the other John Polidori. There is also a distinction made between ghosts and souls. The vampires are possessively jealous of anyone they class as theirs and will kill any they feel are close to those they have claimed. They can make lesser vampires and the adventurer Edward John Trelawny is a bridge between the species (as he puts it) as a fragment of a Nephilim statue (the Nephilim are physically small statues) is lodged in his neck and growing within him.

I mentioned playing with traditional lore and the vampires are repelled by garlic and can be injured by silver and iron. They avoid mirrors but if they catch their reflection they can become fascinated and reduced – this can be used to imprison them. Drowning can save a person from the vampires (or prevent them turning) and whilst this may seem extreme near drowning is used effectively during the novel and the river Thames is used to escape vampiric attention. However those who are under vampiric attention become great artists.

The book is a fantastic exploration of the Romantics, the Rossetti family being a core group of characters under the baleful gaze of Polidori. The writing is strong and the atmosphere palpable, the story drags you in and makes you stay. This book comes very highly recommended. 9 out of 10.

Off for a few Days

I’m away at my Trade Union’s annual conference for a few days in sunny Brighton and so the blog will go into temporary hiatus until this coming Friday when I should be sharing my thoughts about Tim Power’s Hide me Amongst the Graves.

I’ll see you all in a few.

Friday the 13th the series – the Sweetest Sting – review

Director: David Winning

First Aired: 1989

Contains spoilers

This is the final vampire episode of the Friday the 13th series and, whilst it is a season 2 episode and so comes before the episode Night Prey, I have left it until last as it is very, very unusual.

To recap, the series was not connected to the famous film franchise it is about an antique shop. It seems the owner made a deal with the devil to sell cursed antiques. When he dies his niece Micki (Louise Robey) and her cousin Ryan (John D. LeMay) inherit the shop and together with Jack Marshak (Chris Wiggins) they try to retrieve said cursed items. In this case it is a cursed transport beehive.

attacked by vampire bees

The episode follows a pretty standard track of searching out the item and trying to get it back but what is interesting is the curse turns the bees into vampiric bees and these can be used by humans to extend life in a most unique way. At the head of the episode we see a man stop on the road to buy some honey from roadside stall. At the stall is the beekeeper, McCabe (Art Hindle, Monster Brawl), who offers a taste of his special blend and smears it on the man’s shirt. He releases the bees and they swarm the man.

transforming

He is then met at the apiary by a business man. Honey is put on his hands and they are locked into a device. The bees are let in and they start to "attack". What they are doing is injecting the blood stolen from the previous man and giving his face and body to the dying business man. However there is a catch, these bees make a blood honey and the transformed individuals will start to rapidly age and then transform back into their old selves, as they die, without regularly eating the honey. McCabe uses this as a method of control and blackmail.

the apiary

And that is the strange lore that sits at the heart of this episode. Bees that sting and suck out blood through their stingers, who can inject blood on command (presumably different honey on the target suggested suck or inject but the episode was unclear) and who can use any other blood to make a rejuvenating honey. If I was giving scores for the unusual nature of the concept it would have to get a high score just for the unusual factor. I am not, however. The episode did work as a standalone, it had a very TV feel to the acting and directing (appropriately as it was a TV episode) and there was some nice atmosphere around the apiary. The actual concept might have been unusual but it did stretch credulity. 4.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Friday the 13th the Series – Night Prey – review

Director: Armand Mastroianni

First Aired: 1989

Contains spoilers

When I reviewed the season 1 episode of this series, the Baron’s Bride, I admitted that I wasn’t too familiar with the series. That hasn’t changed and I let looking at the other two vampire episodes from the series that I had heard of lie fallow.

Recently Alex queried whether the review for the season 3 episode Night Prey was missing. It wasn’t, it had never been done. Through this conversation I discovered that the episodes had all been uploaded to YouTube – time to look at the other vampire episodes then – starting with this one.

Louise Robey as Micki

Now the series was not connected to the famous film franchise it is about an antique shop. It seems the owner made a deal with the devil to sell cursed antiques. When he dies his niece Micki (Louise Robey) and her cousin Ryan inherit the shop and together with Jack Marshak (Chris Wiggins) they try to retrieve said cursed items. By season three Micki and Jack are still there but Ryan was not – in this episode at least – rather there was a new young man named Johnny Ventura (Steve Monarque).

Chris Wiggins as Jack

Honestly I’m still not sure about the character dynamics (nor too bothered to tell the truth) however some knowledge of them might have been useful in this as the episode opens with Jack musing about *him* - the object of his musing is a vampire hunter named Kurt Bachman (Michael Burgess) and Jack wonders about the blurred lines between good and evil. It is clear, as the episode develops, that he is having some form of in-series crisis of conscience.

the attack

We see Kurt, twenty years before, on his honeymoon with his bride Michele (Genevieve Langlois). They are happy but observed by a vampire, Evan Van Hellier (Eric Murphy). As they walk from the restaurant they had been in, he descends from them from the sky, knocking Kurt down and then drawing Michele to him. He bites her and then flies away with her – Kurt dedicates his life to killing vampires and this takes us to the now where a vampire woman attacks a young man.

glowing cross

Kurt steps in with crucifix held aloft and is knocked away but, as she leaps at him, he raises a stake and she impales herself. The air is filled with the noises of the undead and Kurt runs. He reaches a church, breaks in and then sees a cross in a display. He smashes the glass and steals it but is interrupted by a priest (Dan MacDonald). The cross has a concealed blade and he stabs the priest, killing him. Vampires are against the windows but the cross glows and, as he gets out of the church (observed by a younger priest) day is dawning.

stream of fire

So, we discover that the priest was a friend of Jack’s and the cross is an object they are seeking for the shop – the cross of fire. Not only does the cross glow, it emits a stream of fire at the undead – making them crispy critters. Beyond this, the standard garlic and crosses apotropaic rules apply. A vampire staked will age and decay rapidly (but as one doesn’t, I assume it depends on the age of the vampire). They don’t reflect and holy water seems to act like a hyper-accelerator for mystical flames. As for the show, well Michele is still around and Evan uses the shop staff to help remove the cross so he can get to Kurt.

denture fangs

Now I thought the Baron’s Bride was awful but this wasn’t too bad. As I suggested earlier, it probably made more sense if you had watched all the series but the actual vampire story was a nice little story of revenge and blurred moral lines. There was an unfortunate scene with Evan snarling and the camera pointing up that clearly showed the denture parts of the fangs he was wearing. All in all I have seen much worse. 5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Harry Dickson: The Heir of Dracula

Author: Unknown

Adaption: Jean-Marc & Randy Lofficer

First Published: 1933 – 1936

Contains Spoilers

The Blurb: Miloska, white as a sheet, pressed herself against the portrait of the saint as if she was begging for her protection. From out of the brush, a man slowly approached her. A man! No, it was a wraith! It had a dark, hate-filled face in which burned two hideous red eyes!
"The man from the portrait," muttered Tom Wills.
"Count Ion Nedelcu Dragomin, the Heir of Dracula, the Red-Eyed Vampire!" said Dickson.

When inhuman monsters walk the Earth, threatening the good and the helpless, Justice has no stronger defenders than Harry Dickson and his assistant Tom Wills, who fight the forces of evil and cast them back into the Darkness from whence they came.

Harry Dickson began as an unauthorized Sherlock Holmes pulp series in Germany in 1907, before changing its name and morphing into a hugely popular saga in Holland, Belgium and France, with 178 issues published between 1927 and 1938, especially after it was entrusted to the editorship of Belgian horrormeister Jean Ray.

This volume includes three original episodes and one short story:

The Heir of Dracula: From the rat-infested swers of Limehouse to the dark forests of Bavaria, Dickson hunts for the mysterious red-eyed vampire, Count Dragomin.
The Iron Temple: Deep beneath London, monstrous creatures engage in bloody sacrifices in their amazing, futuristic lair.
The Return of the Gorgon: A beautiful but deadly woman who may be a reincarnation of Medusa has the power to turn men to stone.
The Curse of the Crimson Heart: Meet Dickson's mentor, armchair detective Mortimer Triggs.

This famous Holmesian pastiche has been translated by award-winning authors Jean-Marc & Randy Lofficier and includes original cover illustrations and a foreword about the Harry Dickson phenomenon.

The Review: Harry Dickson – the American Sherlock Holmes – was a pastiche of the great detective, whose stories were popular through Holland, Belgium and France (and, I understand, Dickson is still popular in France). Indeed he started life out as Sherlock Holmes, in a flagrant disregard of copyright, and elements remain in the Dickson stories of the 30s such as his address being 221B Baker Street.

This volume, by the wonderful Blackcoat Press, contains three longer stories and a short and – from a TMtV point of view – we are interested in the first (and title) story: The Heir of Dracula.

The story begins after Dickson has captured Ebenezer Grump – the serial killer dubbed by the press as the Red-Eyed Vampire. Gump is in prison in the small town of Hildesheim awaiting execution but Dickson has doubts about the case and when the Warden asks him to come the detective is quick to answer the summons.

Dickson believes that, after showing devastating cunning during the chase from England, Gump suddenly became too easy to capture in Hildesheim and wonders if another intelligence was guiding him? When Dickson and his young protégé Tom get to the town – that has its own “haunted house” owned by a Transylvanian family – they discover that Gump has asked for garlic flowers and is terrified.

We discover that someone can become a vampire is they are killed by a vampire, and this means killed in any way, not just bitten. Thus the vampire tries to take the place of the executioner in order that he might curse Gump but Dickson foils his plan. The chase eventually leads to the edge of the forest of Bohemia as they look for the two hundred years old grave of Count Ion Nedelcu Dragomin (the heir of Dracula). Is he really a two hundred years undead vampire? For that information you will have to read the story but there was a cracking piece of lore in the book.

I have already mentioned the turning principles and we discover that staking is a way to stop a vampire’s predations and garlic a way of warding them. However it is the grave dirt they put in their shoes I was taken with, or more exactly why they put it in their shoes. It is suggested that the cross of a headstone locks a vampire in its grave and so, by putting dirt from their grave in their shoes they remain (technically) in the grave and thus can travel abroad.

The stories are pulp – make no mistake – the detective work is almost secondary to the fantastique elements. There are, in other stories, people being turned to stone, human monstrosities, underground bases made of unknown materials and a plethora of semi-supernatural and science fiction elements. It makes it all a great diversion if you remember that it is only supposed to be pulpy fun. 6 out of 10.

The Blackcoat Press page is here.

Mockingbird Lane – review

Directed by: Bryan Singer

Release date: 2012

Contains spoilers

I loved the original Munsters, hated what I saw of the Munsters Today (which doesn’t stop me wanting to see it on DVD at some point) and waited for this with trepidation. Released as a pilot for the 2012 Halloween it finally appeared on DVD on eBay (though I suspect it isn’t overtly kosher). Given the time that has passed it is as well to ask why it wasn’t picked up as a series and I shall offer some thoughts later.

Jerry O'Connell as Herman

I had known, before it actually aired, that a lot of the ‘old school monster’ look was going to be removed. This wasn’t actually the Munsters but a modern reboot, a reimagining. So whilst the oddly normal Marilyn (Charity Wakefield) looks much as she did in the original show, Herman (Jerry O'Connell, Sliders - Stoker, Room 6 & Crossing Jordan - revealed) looks normal, barring the vicious stitches (visible above his collar line). This would make sense given that Grandpa (Eddie Izzard, Shadow of the Vampire) made him for daughter Lily (Portia de Rossi) as no single man was good enough for her. Lily and Herman’s kid Eddie (Mason Cook) is a werewolf and we begin with him.

Eddie as a wolf

Or rather, with his wolf form, at a scout camp. The next day, with the troop scared but unharmed, Eddie is unaware of the fact that he is a werewolf (it was his first turn) and the attack is put down to a baby bear. The family move away from the area and buy a (soon to be demolished) home of a serial killer; number 1313 Mockingbird Road. And it is here that the episode faltered and failed to get picked up. I loved the premise, I loved some of the ideas – for instance when the family arrive grandpa’s crate splits depositing a horde of rats that then transform into him, Lily emerges from her crate in mist form. When she takes on human form she is naked and spiders drop down and weave her a dress.

Eddioe Izzard as Grandpa

We have the issue of Eddie discovering what he is, of Herman’s (original) heart breaking through loving too much and needing replacing – and all this gets resolved around a scout master named Steve (Cheyenne Jackson). However it is storyline fluff, background material that is good to have but has no substantive bite. The comedy is still there but less overt and more subtle – often centred around Grandpa, Izzard clearly having a great time – but not strong enough to make this a comedy, it is more a comedy drama and that (of course) relies on the drama to work. For this reason, I can understand why it didn’t get picked up… there just wasn’t enough there. Perhaps it would have developed well (I like to think so) but it didn’t grab from the first instance.

manbat form

As for vampiric aspects. When Grandpa is “drinking” (human that is rather than animal blood) he becomes younger looking. His blood makes mortals his blood slaves. He is seen at different times with Nosferatu-like front fangs and side fangs. He can go out in daylight and transform shape. His manbat form was disappointing as the cgi seemed a little un-textured, making it almost appear rubbery.

So, a nice start but not good enough to let us see if they could have made it work over a long run and, of course, we will never know. The pilot itself is too short and, as I said above, is lacking in substantive storyline. 5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Honourable Mentions: Rivers of London

The Blurb: My name is Peter Grant and until January I was just probationary constable in that mighty army for justice known to all right-thinking people as the Metropolitan Police Service (as the Filth to everybody else). My only concerns in life were how to avoid a transfer to the Case Progression Unit - we do paperwork so real coppers don't have to - and finding a way to climb into the panties of the outrageously perky WPC Leslie May. Then one night, in pursuance of a murder inquiry, I tried to take a witness statement from someone who was dead but disturbingly voluable, and that brought me to the attention of Inspector Nightingale, the last wizard in England.

Now I'm a Detective Constable and a trainee wizard, the first apprentice in fifty years, and my world has become somewhat more complicated: nests of vampires in Purley, negotiating a truce between the warring god and goddess of the Thames, and digging up graves in Covent Garden . . . and there's something festering at the heart of the city I love, a malicious vengeful spirit that takes ordinary Londoners and twists them into grotesque mannequins to act out its drama of violence and despair.

The spirit of riot and rebellion has awakened in the city, and it's falling to me to bring order out of chaos - or die trying.

The Mention: It is almost shameful that this book by Ben Aaronovitch (called Midnight Riot in America) sat languishing in my “To Read” pile for over two years. Not for any other reason than I didn’t get around to reading it. As you can tell from the blurb, vampires do appear in the book but they only have a bit role.

The book itself follows Peter Grant, policeman and – having spotted a ghost at a murder site – the newest recruit into the Metropolitan Police’s occult section. This section is made up of Grant (as the apprentice) and Detective Chief Inspector Thomas Nightingale, Britain’s last officially sanctioned wizard. The book can’t help but garner comparisons with a certain boy wizard’s series as it has a quintessentially English soul that sets it apart from more standard urban fantasy. It also reminded my tonally of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere.

As for the vampires, they are an enigma not studied but we discover that, “According to Nightingale, vampires were ordinary people who became ‘infected’, no one was sure how or why, and started feeding off the magic potential, including the vestigial, of their surroundings.” This includes sucking the energy out of electronic devices and reducing the silicon inside to sand. They are dealt with via phosphorus grenades and a cover story by the local fire chief.

There is also a character, Molly, who is an enigma but does have some more traditionally vampiric traits – or perhaps even the traits of a lamia but, from what I can gather, Aaronovitch has so far kept her genus secret through the ensuing series.

The Monster Club – review

Author: R. Chetwynd-Hayes

First Published: 1976

Contains spoilers

The blurb: Hidden beneath the streets of London is a dark and dreadful establishment known as The Monster Club, where vampires indulge in a rather different kind of Bloody Mary and ghouls tear into their gruesome repasts. Here, along with the usual monsters - vampires, werewolves, ghouls, and some of Dr Frankenstein's more freakish creations - you'll find other, less familiar ones. You'll meet the frightening Fly-by-Night, the hideous shaddy, the horrible mock, and the dreaded shadmock, perhaps the most terrible of all.

When Donald McCloud offers a starving man a meal, he unexpectedly discovers that the man is a vampire - and he's the main course! Accompanying the vampire, Eramus, to The Monster Club, Donald encounters a whole host of strange monsters, who, in a series of five linked stories, recount to Donald their monstrous exploits. But as Donald is regaled with these tales of monsters and their unfortunate human victims, it gradually dawns on him that as the only human in a club full of bloodthirsty monsters, he might be in a bit of a predicament. . . .

First published as a paperback original in 1976, R. Chetwynd-Hayes's The Monster Club was adapted for a 1981 film starring Vincent Price, John Carradine and Donald Pleasence, and both book and film have gone on to become cult classics. Told in a wry, tongue-in-cheek style, the tales in The Monster Club are simultaneously horrific, comical, and curiously moving. This edition is the first in more than twenty years and features a new introduction by Stephen Jones and a reproduction of John Bolton's painting from the comic book adaptation of the film.

The review: Though I gave the vampire section of the film the Monster Club a respectable 6 out of 10, the film as a whole is a favourite from my youth and is more than the sum of its parts. Readers may not be aware, however, that the film was based on this book. Or should I say in part based, whilst the film section the Village of Momsters was a rather accurate filming of the story in the book the Humgoo, the Shadmock section of the film was more a very loose adaptation seemed to borrow elements of a couple of the stories within as well as make much up and the above mentioned My Mother Married a Vampire was actually based on a story from a different Chetwynd-Hayes anthology.

The book takes the form of a portmanteau, with prologue, epilogue and interludes introducing human Douglas to vampire Eramus and then to the monster club itself. Within are five stories. The first is the story of the Vampire and the Werewolf, told by their hybrid offspring Manfred the werevamp. The next three stories centre on hybrids of one sort or another (though the story of the Mock involves some full on vampire characters too) and the final story is of the Fly-by-night, an Australian monster now found as an immigrant in Britain.

The joy of R. Chetwynd-Hayes is in his inventiveness and also in the actual prose. It is a sprightly style with an ever present undercurrent of humour that works especially well for its dark nature. The book was devoured by me in a day and left me hungry for more of Chetwynd-Hayes’ prose.

The vampire lore is fairly standard – sunlight burns, crosses repel and a stake through the heart followed by decapitation finishes one off. The main piece of lore however is a cross-monster rule that suggests “vampires sup, werewolves hunt, ghouls tear, shaddies lick, maddies yawn, mocks blow, but shadmocks only whistle”. To get to the bottom of that lore I’ll direct you to the book and say no more as I really don’t want to spoil the stories at all. Of course the book does come highly recommended. 9 out of 10.

Crowd Sourcing News

A couple of projects to tell you about, as always these are for information only and backing is done at your own risk.

The first is a film being made by Richard Griffin called Sins of Dracula and the plot looks a little like:

As the star of his church choir, there’s nothing that brings Billy more joy than the opportunity to sing for an audience. However, as his desire to perform grows, the stalwart youth finds that waiting until Sunday to get his fix just simply isn’t enough. Going against the advice of his pastor, Billy follows his girlfriend into the world of secular entertainment, joining the local community theatre troupe. There, Billy is introduced to a whole new world, where his fellow thespians dabble in drugs, sexual perversion, and table-top game-play. Yet, for all the newly minted depravities Billy encounters, none could prepare him for the darkest truth of them all: The theatre group is actually a front for a Satanic cult intent on raising Dracula from the grave!

A tongue-in-cheek tale that satirizes the Christian scare films of the 70s and 80s, The Sins of Dracula is a story of sex, sacrilege, and sin. It’s a world where Sondheim is Satan, Broadway means blasphemy, and where taking the stage just might mean curtains…for your eternal soul

The film has a Facebook and can be backed at Go Fund Me.

The second is a little unusual as it isn’t a film but a whole film festival.

I was contacted by the organisers of the 5th Annual New York City Independent Film Festival, who asked whether I could mention them on TMtV. They are looking for funding to support a higher number of free film submissions and to bring selected filmmakers to the festival. They also suggest that funding will help them pay for theatre space, office space, screening equipment and advertisements. It will let them hire crews and technicians to film the festival events, and buy coffee for the volunteers who work long shifts making the festival happen. It will enable them to give out better awards and it will keep them in business for the next year!

The campaign can be found at Indigogo and I have embedded a short video about the event below:

Pretty Dead Things – review

Director: Richard Griffin

Release date: 2006

Contains spoilers

This is a low budget film that hasn’t, perhaps, had the greatest distribution. I found it on a US DVD two movie set. It is a comedy, the humour sometimes straying into the not too PC arena (a joke about retard porn for instance). Indeed, talking about porn – it is set in the porn scene (though is tame when it comes to sexual imagery).

All that sounds bad but I was really taken by it. Despite some over the top moments – the performance by Salvatore Marchese (Raving Maniacs) as the Mayor, for instance, walked a line between poorly played histrionics and genius performance and didn’t always stay on the correct side of the line – it certainly tickled my funny bone.

eating the pizza... guy

It begins with a voice over, reading a letter to an adult magazine, about a pizza delivery. The delivery guy (Patrick Pitu, also Raving Maniacs) takes the pizza to a hotel room – his encounter with the clerk and denizens of the hotel leaving us in no doubt as to the comedic nature of the film – where the girl, Shelby St. Exxmin (Ashley Eaton), admits she has no money. Payment in kind by her and her friend Jennifer Bond (Danielle Lozeau, the Black Water Vampire) is the order of the day but then they bite – Jennifer bites the neck, whilst Shelby apparently bobbits the young man with her teeth. They keep him alive awhile to play with, the man crucified against the wall, and Shelby feeds him some of her blood and tells him to look her up when he returns.

the vampires

Jennifer and Shelby go to a club to meet up with their friends. Rex Van Horn (Ross Kelly) has a girl he is discretely feeding on whilst Shane Starkweather (Jason Witter) dances with a young man. The man recognises Shane, he has the gay porn tapes Shane made – these are all retro but the fact that people seem so nonplussed when they realise the porn films the vampires made were thirty years ago that they just accept their maintained youth actually fits with the undercurrent of the film. Shane takes the guy to a toilet and kills him in a stall.

Shane and Shelby play with food

So, we have a group of vampires, all who were porn stars thirty years before. Jennifer, approaching her fiftieth birthday, is unhappy with her lot – at one point carving a stake. The others are very comfortable in their vampirism and the trail of bodies they are leaving (being attributed in the press to a Providence Ripper) have the beleaguered mayor hot under the collar. Jennifer misses her boyfriend, porn director John Welles (William DeCoff, Lesser of Two Evils). He hasn’t worked for some time and is looking for a new angle to make his comeback.

The pizza delivery guy wants revenge on the vampires for turning him. Presumably this is down to his major injury pre-turning, as much as anything. Whilst the film never explicitly states that his tackle is missing, he does still have the holes in his hands from the crucifixion and so we assume he didn't regrow his manhood. That’s about it for story, it is fairly simple in its own way and I think, more than anything, it is the performances that made me enjoy the film before as the actors playing the vampires are clearly having a whale of a time. Special mention goes to Ashley Eaton as Shelby and Jason Witter as Shane as those characters really came off as great fun.

back foul beast

The lore is fairly standard. The vampires feed on blood, blood must be imbibed two ways to turn and they do reflect in the mirror. There is a cross moment that carried a Jewish vampire punchline – though the joke itself was nicely understated in the dialogue – and holy water burns. Sunlight is deadly but decapitation isn’t. The film addresses the idea that a decapitated vampire can speak without lungs by simply brushing over it.

staked

The primary way of killing a vampire is a stake to the heart (actually any amount of wood – even a cocktail stick – penetrating the heart). We do get a vampire who is saved from the stake by a breast implant! In fact fire will only kill a vampire if it consumes the heart. The blood of a vampire can be used to make someone their slave also. That about covers the lore (despite the bats on the DVD cover, they do not come into it) and with the lore covered that’s about us… simply put the film is genuinely funny and this flows through good comedic performances. It isn't the greatest film in the world and some of the jokes fall back on shock humour but, all in all, it gets a respectable 5.5 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.