Dracula’s Bride of Horror – review

Director: Tim Lee

Release date: 2022

Contains spoilers

A few years ago, I reviewed Dracula Vampyre in Beijing a singular mess of a film that found a place in my Worst 100. This film is a sequel, with producer, star, director Tim Lee dropping his Tim Lies pseudonym. Now occasionally I’ll get a comment from a director on a review and, clearly, if I didn’t like it they can often be incredulous – I get it, your art, you think its good. But I do want to take a moment to answer the comment (or the parts directed at me) Mr Lee left on the previous review.

Tim Lee as Dracula

Firstly, addressing a positive commentator he said “To say the reviewer missed those points is an understatement.” The commentator had said that this “is the most credible and realistic Vampire I have seen in a very long time.” Just no, Mr Lee offered a singularly poor performance in that film and was not credible – as for realistic, it is a fantastical creature with no basis in reality. Mr Lee went on to say, “To the reviewer, I appreciate your time, but you lack insight, and were unkind to the actors and work overall. As Unknown knows, I will see you in Hell where I get even with negative reviewers. Lol.” Thank you, therefore, for appreciating the time took to watch and review. I don’t believe I lack insight, indeed I offered that the film was clearly a passion project. Your inability to communicate enough through cinema to offer a viewer any insight was the issue. I also pointed out that the film was in English and your actors were Chinese and that performing in a second language may have impacted performances – but they were poor. I will say that you have improved, to a degree, the communication of your concept and the performances are better in this film.

on the beach

So, in to the film. Which starts with a quote from Hamlet and then concentrates on a bottom – belonging to a woman (Rae Daniels) who is walking on a beach (presumably Venice Beach), carnival music plays, though it is interrupted by an ominous dong as the camera looks towards the underside of the pier. The woman finds a bejewelled skull in the surf and then walks under the pier, becoming more scared as she goes under the structure. We hear a growl and Dracula (Tim Lee, Dracula Vampyre in Beijing) attacks.

Mehra Park as Vivian

We the get a narration by Dracula, introducing himself and claiming the mantle Prince of Darkness. He speaks of a super-blood-moon and he returning to our realm, resurrecting his queens (named Dracula’s witches) and hunting down his latest bride, in whom he has instilled his presence since she was a child as a chosen one. He threatens, generally, witch burners and wolf killers. We then cut to a woman, Vivian Harker (Mehra Park), in a vehicle, tears filling her eyes – and later we discover that her husband Jack Harker (Kyle Colton) has been unfaithful and she has moved into a hotel. She gets out of the vehicle but gets a vision of being stabbed when close to the hotel and heads to the beach.

Rockula

The film follows her on the beach – she passes under the pier without being attacked, though she is watched by Dracula. We see her on the beach and having a swim and, eventually, leaving. She walks past a man, performing on a karaoke machine with tarot cards laid out before it. She lingers looking at the ocean and he approaches and calls himself Rockula (also Tim Lee). He suggests he produces horror movies and tries to engage her in that – she was an actress. Eventually, she makes her way back to the hotel, Rockula vanishing in a puff of smoke once she has gone.

Dracula and his witches

In the lift, Vivian clearly is apprehensive and she eventually gets to her room, which is number 1313. She again has visions of being stabbed. As the film goes on, these coalesce into a (poor looking) doll stabbing her. We discover that the room is known as a murder room. Dracula collects a further witch (Shannon Allen), taken from the street as she approaches him as a trick, and also a witch appears wearing a skull mask (Junie Hoang). We see them attack a couple of people (a preacher (Daxton Edwards) and a wolf hunter (Daniel Chidavaenzi)). We also discover that psychiatrist Jack is both sleeping with his secretary (also Junie Hoang) and Vivian’s sister, Mariam (Lacey Rae). Part way through Dracula tells Vivian the story of the previous film, during which we get black and white scenes from that film.

Dracula and Vivian

So, what’s going on? There are several readings. It could be that Dracula has appeared to make Vivian his bride. It could be that he is a delusion created as her mind breaks, through betrayal and depression, and she is attacked and killed in room 1313 (either by a toy doll or that the doll, equally, is also a delusion). The dialogue of a police detective (Brittany Wilson) suggests either homicide or suicide. The communication of narrative in this is better than the previous film but it is still not great, with Tim Lee clearly having a vision but that vision not being delivered well. In some respects, it reminds me of Jess Franco, the Venice Beach setting is reminiscent of Franco’s Spanish beach settings but, more so, Franco might be beloved by horror fans but many of his films struggled to offer a cohesive narrative, especially his later films. Comparatively Jean Rollin created his own visual language but he was adept at imparting that language and thus the narrative.

two witches

The acting in this is much better than the previous film but the fractured narrative was not actor friendly. The dialogue itself was sometimes too blunt (so the police detective just spilling to random person, claiming to be the victim’s sister, about the goriness of the scene and it being either homicide or suicide was too on the nose to be realistic). The weakest link, acting-wise, was Lee himself and that may have much to the difficulties both being star and director can offer, removing a more objective eye. This is not a great film, but it is certainly better, by an order of magnitude, than his previous vampire film. 2.5 out of 10. In the UK this is available to view on Plex.

The imdb page is here.

On DVD @ Amazon US

On DVD @ Amazon UK

Honourable Mention: Girls Gone Gangsta

Released in 2007 and directed by John & Joseph Swider, the core part of this film wouldn’t so much as ping the radar for TMtV. It is the tale of three ladies who are the daughters of a legendary assassin and who get drawn into a violent confrontation with the various gangs associated with head honcho baddie Von Drago (Joseph Swider) after the latter decides he is purchasing their garage, whether they like it or not, as part of his planned casino development.

It mixes action with surrealness (he hires a troupe of clown henchmen at one point) and a performance by Joseph Swider who really does channel his inner Nicolas Cage. At no point in the proceedings, however, do we get anything resembling vampires – so why the mention?

infomercial

Well, it’s the opening of the film, where we get Mortimer J Hamm (John Goodman), a self-proclaimed vampire hunter running an infomercial selling vampire hunting material. Another part of the same infomercial appears within film and we get a moment in the end credits. Why? Its not clear, one character does watch it and there is a brief discussion dialogue around it but it means nothing to the full film – though as mentioned there is a surrealism that this does fit into. And that’s it, a fleeting visitation of John Goodman as a vampire hunter.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

Short film: Dracula's Daughters VS the Space Brains

Running at just under 6 minutes, this little gem was directed by Frank Ippolito and Ezekiel Zabrowski, released in 2010 and was based on a feature script (and we can but hope),

This was an ode to 50s sci-fi, if ever I saw it, and well shot for a little short that I assume was a proof of concept.

It starts with a couple walking along. Dan (Neil Patrick Harris) had never been to the ballet before and his companion, Marketa (Aprella), is one of the ballerinas. She holds a rose, which he threw at curtain call; something she has not seen for a hundred years. He lets that comment slip. She also wants to know what’s inside him (blood obviously) but she is leaving tomorrow.

fangs

Perhaps he can go with her, he knows business practices – though he is still in school – but when she says that the troupe leader prefers to run things his way, he suggests that he has some experience with a spotlight and maybe that would be enough. Marketa takes him to where her sister Marya (Erica Taylor) is but things are too quick for Dan. Some eye mojo and he is keen again. Fangs appear and Marya bites him but the blood spurts green…

brain

The blood is poisonous, it seems, and Dan rips his head open to reveal the alien brain in control, bat-winged and ready to attack Marketa. What will the blood do to her sister though? This was fab, the filming was nicely gothic, the effects fab with the head tearing effective and the brain was like something out of the 50s (indeed it sort of reminded me of Fiend Without a Face). Great fun.

The imdb page is here.

Remember Remember – review

Director: Mark Hindman Smith

Release date: 2021

Contains spoilers

Let’s aim for the elephant in the room first, the very idea of Guy Fawkes as a vampire hunter brings Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter immediately to mind – Fawkes would seem to be as prevalent in the UK collective psyche as Lincoln is in the US, though seen as a challenge to authority rather than an exemplar of it. This anti-establishment re-write (in reality Fawkes did not want to end the British monarchy, rather replace it with a pro-Catholic branch) has an international relevance thanks to the Fawkes masks in V for Vendetta.

fangs a lot

Of course, the big difference between this and the aforementioned Lincoln vehicle is one of studio vs indie, big budget vs shoestring. This does have heart but it also makes some fundamental story errors along the way. It also is the first part of the story – whether the filmmakers have plans to continue is unknown as I write this.

ferals

The film starts in Black and White as we see a fight between a group of hunters led by Guy Fawkes (Mark Hindman Smith) and a horde of vampires that seem to pour from a house. We later discover these are feral vampires; humans who are bitten, consume blood and go mad (though there does seem to be some level of cognitive ability left). There is fight choreography, though the action direction does occasionally pull a punch and this is probably down to there being a varied level of skill amongst the actors.

Ruth Stapleton as Mercy

We then get a narration from Fawkes, mentioning the issue (in the future for the film’s timeframe) of being caught under Parliament. He mentions being part of a secret society that hunt the equally secret vampires. The film moves to a tavern and Mercy (Ruth Stapleton, Bite Night) sings until Fawkes enters and she suddenly stops. Her sister, Grace (Gemma-Louise Keane), runs up to Fawkes to greet “uncle Guy”. He has noticed Mercy’s mood and she vanishes off to speak to her mother (Amelie Leroy, Nest of Vampires). In that conversation we hear that tavern owner and father to the girls, Byron (Mark Ward), and their mother are vampires, as are the girls and the family have been enacting a charade with Fawkes and his hunters for ten years.

Mark Hindman Smith as Fawkes

How are they getting away with that? Firstly, by not hunting – they feed on pig’s blood. Mostly, however, we hear through another hunting unit that Fawkes’ unit may have the highest kill tally in the society but they are in the dark about certain aspects of the creatures they hunt. They know about ferals but have not been told that there are born vampires (and purebloods – the two seemed to be mentioned as separate things but without an obvious distinction) who are not feral and can pass for human. Sunlight in this can weaken, disorientate and, if direct, cause collapse and eventual death.

Rachel Brownstein as Glover

This other group of hunters is led by Captain Glover (Rachel Brownstein, also Bite Night) who has a disagreement with her second in command Sergeant Parsons (Maria Lee Metheringham, also Bite Night) who wants to tell Fawkes what is going on. Their unit is tracking a vampire and they have noticed non-feral vampires moving North. The vampire they track is Isaac (Damian Freddi). He happens to be looking for a pureblood to breed with and sets his eyes on Mercy. He slips her human blood but she turns feral and runs off, killing one of Fawkes’ brethren hunters (Richard Carter) and revealing the innkeeper family’s nature – this was one of the feral moments that suggested they were not devoid of human knowledge or drive as she clearly headed towards the tavern, and after feeding returned to Issac (and was imprisoned).

Fawkes and Parsons

The film was clearly on a small budget but also showed a lot of heart and ambition. There were, however, issues. The dialogue sometimes strayed into either feeling a tad too modern or beyond the social status (some of Mercy’s dialogue seemed too book smart for a tavern-keeper’s daughter). Delivery was often rather stagey as well. Action sequences, as mentioned, suggested different levels of skill/experience. It was story moments, however, that caused the film to stumble. Aspects seemed off – Byron, discovered by Fawkes, manages to choke him into unconsciousness and tie him in the cellar (there is some confusion as to location, with scenes concerning Isaac and barmaid, and Fawkes’ love interest, Maria (Caroline Dunne) in a cellar that one would assume to be the same place but Fawkes is mysteriously not there). This is all well and good but why spare him and then lead him to a cave full of ferals, and likely death, when it is clear he would try and track the vampire family down? Why did Isaac let the feral Mercy leave his mansion, knowing she would likely kill and draw attention? Why would a commanding officer keep his unit in the dark about the threat the enemy poses (there may have been reasons but the narrative didn’t suggest any)?

Mercy feral

The primary lore – beyond purebloods and ferals and the sunlight that I have already mentioned – includes a bite turns (though it is the imbibing of human blood that sends the turned person feral) and stabbing the heart seems to be the primary kill method (Fawkes uses his skills with gunpowder to hide evidence of the vampires – thus blowing up the house at the start of the film). Purebloods span all levels of society, ferals hide away from towns and cities (though given the numbers we see it feels plot weak that the populace do not know of the existence of vampires). Byron has discovered that the blood of different animals offer different skills to the vampire (cat, for instance, seems to be speed).

blood spattered

Despite the issues I have mentioned, this film did have heart and star/director Mark Hindman Smith looked to be enjoying himself. It is the feeling of loose narrative direction and the questions this raises that causes me to depress the score down to 4 out of 10. A good script edit would have done wonders for this. The imdb page is here.

Upyr – review

Director: Sergey Vinokurov

Release date: 1997

Contains spoilers

This is going to be a review with no score, once again, as I managed to see Upyr but with very rubbish subtitles – to the point that it was sometimes unintelligible, and yet it was a film that had a certain something and made me wish that more meaningful subs had been available.

This is a Russia of desolate towns and empty streets, of organised crime and corrupt police and, above all else, vampires.

the hunters

The film starts aboard a ship with an older man (Nikolay Lavrov) speaking to a younger one (Aleksey Serebryakov). It was here that my problems with the subtitles began as some of the conversation makes very little sense as translated. However it is clear that these are killers and the younger man has been in the business three years. They have a device to help them but both prefer more old-fashioned methods. Their conversation continues as they dock and go into a café.

death of a hunter

The older man excuses himself to go to the toilet. Eventually the younger follows after him and he is sat against the wall – he has been bitten, he says. The younger one knows what to do and retrieving a stake, stakes the older one. He continues his journey, intending to meet their customer, but instead one of the customer's associates meets the young slayer (for that is what he is) and suggests that he has rescinded the contract and recommends he gets the ferry before it leaves (stranding him there for two days). He beats the associate up.

staking

He eventually gets to the customer's home but he won’t let him in – until he suggests he will take his fee and leave. Once the door is open, he turns against the customer and forces him to admit that his daughter is being used as leverage to make him rescind the contract. As things develop, we discover that the customer has been turned (though the daughter hasn’t). There is a dangerous nature drawn around the young slayer and the action sequences are energetic but in short, accurate bursts.

staked

So we get quite a bit of staking and discover that vampires cast no reflection – and thus he can distinguish organised crime thugs from vampires. I have seen the end sequence, where he meets the primary upyr, described as Tarkovskian and that is a lofty description but fair, I think. The film has a rollicking soundtrack provided by Tequilajazzz, I just wish I had been able to follow the dialogue better than I could.

The imdb page is here.

Martin (Second Sight Films 2023 release) – review

Martin is, of course, George Romero’s foray into the vampire genre, which was released in 1976 (in festivals). The film has been reviewed here, and the score remains the same, and so this review is for this Second Sight UK release and not the actual film. Note that there are both Blu-Ray and HD releases, as well as a limited release with slipcase, soundtrack, art cards and book. I am concentrating on the general release.

The film itself looks as great as I think it will. The transfer is beautiful but the grain within the film stock remains (and rightly so). It is a new 4k restoration, which was supervised by the film’s original DP Michael Gornick. As to the version, this is the standard US/UK version of Martin. It does not contain the fabled 3-hour cut (though it is mentioned several times in the extras) nor does it contain the Italian Wampyr cut – which I have on my older DVD and that version, due to the re-edit and the Goblin soundtrack, honestly, is awful and so no loss there.

Martin in vampire costume

The disc carries 4 commentaries. The first two sees George A Romero, John Amplas and Tom Savini on the first, and George A Romero, Richard P Rubinstein, Tom Savini, Michael Gornick and Donald Rubinstein on the second, and they are archival commentaries. I think the first of the two is the better but both are rich with anecdote. Of the new ones, Travis Crawford’s goes more into the input of various crew, whilst Kat Ellinger’s has a bit more media studies theory, often around the Gothic and with an interesting take on the differences between American and European Gothic.

John Amplas

Other extras are Taste the Blood of Martin, which is a feature length documentary about the film and a location tour – with a prominent appearance from star John Amplas. Making Martin: a Recounting, which is a film that does what the title suggests. Scoring the Shadows is a short but satisfying interview with film-score composer Donald Rubinstein. There is a short film by Tony Buba, ‘J Roy - New And Used Furniture’ – Buba’s family home was the location for Cuda’s house in the film and this is a short documentary film, contemporary with Martin, from a series he did about the town of Braddock (J Roy, who is the focus of the film, played the church Deacon in Martin). Finally, we get the trailer, TV and radio spots. As you can see, this is packed with extras.

The Blu-Ray release deserves a solid 9 out of 10 (as a Blu-Ray/4K release) with headroom for the limited set and the additional physical material it contains.

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon US

On Blu-Ray @ Amazon UK

The Things We Cannot Change – review

Director: Joshua Nelson

Release date: 2022

Contains spoilers

The correlation between vampire and addict is quite a common use of the vampire as metaphor, possibly most famously in the Addiction. It is therefore not too much of a leap to tie the vampire into self-help groups and this occurs in films such as Vampires Anonymous or Jonathon Nasaw’s novel the World on Blood.

This then is a vehicle that looks at vampirism within the bounds of a 12-step programme, the title coming from the prayer associated with such programmes that goes, “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, The courage to change the things I can, And wisdom to know the difference.” Vampirism, within the film, is a metaphor, which is why I dislike the ending and that’s a shame because the film itself was a great little budget genre piece to that point.

Kristen in session

We get the stories of various vampires through the 12-step programme in vignettes and meet characters such as Kristen (Jenn Nobile) she attends the group, run by Dr. Abraham (Richard Rampolla), and her story is one of keeping her condition hidden – especially from her husband, living with a loathing of what she had become. She describes how a friend of her husband came over, and when her husband left the room, he excused himself to go to the bathroom but winked at her suggestively.

caught feeding

Angry that he would flirt so openly with her, in her marital home, she followed him into the bathroom. Hubby goes looking for them (as they are gone from the living room, of course) and hears noises, which he clearly interprets as sexual, from the bathroom. Opening the door, he sees the friend in the tub, a wound at neck and her with clouded eyes and fangs. He is, of course, shocked, not knowing whether to call the cops or a divorce lawyer. This is a woman he thought he knew and yet she had kept the addiction hidden so well. She goes to group and he actually attends at times with her.

it seemed so cool

We also get a young girl, whose mother discovers both where her attitude had come from and a cadaver in her closet, as well as two attendees who decide to be each other’s support and fall off the wagon together, one of these actually sought out being a vampire because it seemed so cool but now regrets her choice. We meet two corporate workers who vow to only eat the guys who are douches and one ends up eating her boss, at work, when he sexually harasses her, and many more. We also meet Veronica (Laura Lemire), silent at meetings until she makes unhelpful comments and eventually is barred. She believes that vampires should embrace their needs and lifestyle. She also knows how to kill a vampire.

Richard Rampolla as Dr Abraham

This brings us neatly to lore. These vampires can go out in the sun and, whilst there is a comment about them not being among God’s favourites, it is unlikely that religious paraphernalia will impact them – after all they say the prayer quoted above. Most are unaware of how a vampire can die – there is comment about trying to stake oneself in the heart failing. Addicted to blood as they are, they cannot imbibe vampire blood and it will kill them – in fact being injected with it will kill them.

licking a severed limb

The effects are minimal. The vampire look of fangs and clouded eyes is effective enough. We do see the vampires with body parts, licking the blood and, at one point, a flesh stripped torso. These effects were perhaps less than good but they are used sparingly. The film relies on the actors and dialogue more than anything else. The dialogue is well written and the acting solid throughout. My issue came at the end.

in pain

The film used vampirism as a metaphor and this is great but, right at the very end, the film turns that around and shows us the characters again as a variety of different addicts (be it painkillers, alcohol or varieties of illegal narcotics). This felt too on the nose, that the power of the message had been in the metaphor and by stripping that back the film undermined itself. Perhaps for some audiences that on the nose nature is needed? It was too unsubtle for my liking. The film does return to its metaphor very briefly, following this, and I wouldn’t damn the film for the last few minutes but it was an issue in my book. 6 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

On Demand @ Amazon US

On Demand @ Amazon UK

Classic Literature: Der Vampyr (1835)

I was recently involved in editing a paper by Álvaro García Marín for a future edition of the Journal of Vampire Studies, regarding a remarkable story find. The story that was the focus of the paper is not this one – and I will not undermine Marín’s discovery or paper by elaborating on that story further – however this story was mentioned within the paper in passing and it warrants looking at here for the singular piece of astounding lore it would seem to have introduced into the genre (albeit that the story seems to have vanished into obscurity after publication). First published in 1835 in Wiener Zeitschrift für Kunst, Literatur, Theater und Mode, and written by Franz Seraph Chrismar, the story has been recently translated into English and published by Christian Nikolaus Opitz and released as a thin volume, with an introduction and the short story itself. Opitz renames the story Vlad the Devil, which indicates why this is so exciting.

The story sees an international group of travellers crossing Wallachia and forced to camp for the night. There is a thunderstorm approaching from the distance and, after food and wine, one of the Wallachians starts to tell a campfire tale. He suggests that, in the immediate area, a vampire is known to be abroad and recounts a visit to a village nearby, which stood beneath a Boyar's manor house, which he happened to approach for shelter on a previous trip. On reaching the village he noticed that the place was up and about as there was to be a wedding between the Boyar’s daughter and a visiting Count. The Wallachian joins the festivities and then falls asleep, only to wake and, leaving the house he is in, sees the manor on fire and the fire had spread to the village, including the house he was in.

The village was burned to the ground and he blames the conflagration on a vampire. This seems underscored by the fact that the Boyar’s daughter is found murdered the next day in a pool of her own blood, the Count nowhere to be found. The conclusion was the Count was a vampire. The Boyar and villagers moved to another estate owned by the Boyar… The story is interrupted by a stranger, who has arrived at the camp, calling it a fairy tale. The storyteller seems shaken by the man’s appearance; “a deadly paleness spread across his cheeks, and his eyes gaped fixedly” suggested to me that he might recognise the stranger. The others note the stranger as invoking an uncanny feeling. The stranger says he is from, “Where the owl dwells, and the bat,” which is the description that the Wallachian gave of the only life that resides in the burned-out village.

With the storyteller silent, the stranger begins a tale and tells them of “the Voivode whom his contemporaries called Vlad the Devil”, and recounts several points of Vlad III’s story, including nailing turbans to heads, the beggars feast and dining beneath impaled victims. There is also a suggestion that he would chop people into slaw. The storm hits, a bolt of lightning hitting close by and then the rains drenching the fire and plunging the frightened travellers into darkness. As they panic (and the Wallachian cries that there is a vampire), the stranger says “‘Vlad the Devil is making game of you!’” Could this imply the ability to control of the weather? Perhaps, though the storm was coming anyway. In the morning, with the storm passed, the stranger is gone but the Wallachian is convinced that he “was Vlad the Devil who, as punishment for his enormous misdeeds, still walked the earth as a vampire, since hell itself must refuse to accept the villain.”

None of the travellers are actually harmed, though the Wallachian discovers they are virtually on the site of the burned-out village. Of course, this is a conflation of Vlad III and vampires long before Stoker borrowed the name Dracula (note that only Vlad is used in this) and it also implies the use of the rank of Count by the Voivode, also. Opitz, in the introduction, does find it unlikely that Stoker would be aware of this obscure Viennese story written and published before his birth, amounting to the one fiction story that Chrismar wrote (he wrote two books best described as travelogues also). I do disagree with the suggestion in the introduction that Stoker combined the strands of Dracula with the figure of Vlad III, it seems very clear to me that Stoker essentially borrowed a name and the tiniest bit of biographical detail and there is little evidence to suggest he was any more aware of Vlad III’s history and folklore. Nor was the connection first pointed out by McNally and Florescu. Ali Riza Seyfi’s reworking of the Dracula novel in 1929, entitled Kaziki Voyvoda, explicitly linked the Count and the Voivode and Bacil F Kirtley suggested a connection in his 1956 volume Dracula, the Monastic Chronicles and Slavic Folklore. However, I do understand how the McNally and Florescu book has pervaded the collective awareness.

I have to thank Opitz for translating this remarkable addition to the 19th Century vampire lore and Marín for making me aware of it within his paper. I will put the Amazon links for the translated story below, but the scan of the original can be found here.

In Paperback @ Amazon US

In Paperback @ Amazon UK

Honourable Mention: Magic Girl

Magic Girl, or Ling Huan Shao Nu, was released in 1992 and was directed by Wang Cheng. It’s technically Hello Dracula 6, given it is the sixth film with Chin Tu (Magic of Spell) as Grandfather and a return of Shadow Liu Chih-Yu as Tien Tien (translated to Candy in the subtitles that I saw). She played her character as a younger version in Hello Dracula 4 (King of the Children) but the character was primarily played by an older actress. The character became younger again in The 3D Army but was played by a different actress altogether. To confuse things more, the HKMDb lists this as Hello Dracula 5, ignoring 3D-Army’s place in the series. The familial background story is again changed.

However, unlike the other films, which all had a large amount of kyonsi activity, this has a single scene at the beginning, making it a fleeting visitation and an honourable mention.

held by the tree

The film starts with Tien Tien in bed; she is woken and thinks her father is moving through the house. A Taoist artefact placed by her flashes a light, and so she gets up to see a figure passing through the outside door and she decides to follow by flying. She lands in the woods and a tree sends out tendrils and grabs her. This causes some creatures to emerge (perhaps spirits, non-vampiric revenants or something else) who are going to eat her. She fights back breaking from the tree and defeating her foes.

kyonsi

They run off but it is likely that their retreat had more to do with the figure emerging from the forest. Tien Tien believes it to be her father but, when she approaches it, she realises it is a vampire and she has to fight it. She eventually punches it and actually punches her adopted older sister Yuan Yuan in the eyes, giving her black eyes. It was a dream and, as it is later implied that her father is dead, could only have been such. That is the only fleeting vampiric activity in the film.

The imdb page is here.

The 3-D Army – review

Director: Chen Chun-Liang

Release date: 1989

Contains spoilers

Although it isn’t titled as such, this could be classed as Hello Dracula 5. It does not follow the previous films but it does have kyonsi and Chin Tu (Magic of Spell) reprising his role of Grandpa Chin (sometimes subtitled as Grandpa Gold), along with his ward Tien Tien – who has become a young girl again. In this he seems to be responsible for two boys, Blackie and Dragonfly, whose background and status are not explained.

the race

The film starts with the kids racing, as part of a rite, in two teams. There are both the wards (plus another couple of kids) of Grandpa Chin and also a group of kids under the tutelage of Magician An (Huang Chung-Yu), including his son An An. The final race sees the teams riding the street on unicycles (with the ability to push and grapple, but not hurt) until reaching a small assault course of some netting and a climbing frame. The first to have a team member reach the flag at the top of the frame wins. It is Grandpa Chin’s kids who win, though An An accuses them of cheating and challenges them to meet him that night.

Tien Tien

The three main kids do enter the forest that night but before they get to the meeting point they hear what sounds like a girl crying. They find a cage, covered in spell scrolls, with a fox in it and so release the fox. They get to the meeting point and An An challenges them to fight (but not Tien Tien, who he has a crush on) and has 4 older fighters with him. They do fight and, eventually, An An comes off worse, his defeat helped by a young girl who fires fabric at him.

kyonsi

The girl is clearly a spirit but the kids don’t realise as they speak to her – her name is Mimi and later she admits to being the fox. Elsewhere Magician An goes to his master, a morally dubious sorcerer, and admits that he had captured the fox but someone released it. The sorcerer is not really bothered, he will get her eventually and is focused on getting hold of another magician called Hung Kun… who is already dead. Cut to a corpse herder (and Chin’s brother) who is taking 7 corpses to the mortuary. One is chained with bells as well as having a spell scroll, he is Hung Kun and is so powerful that they need the extra resource to control him.

the little vampire skimming 

To avenge An An for his beating in the forest, one of Magician An’s household steals one of the corpses from the mortuary, so as to make Grandpa Chin look bad. Of course, he choses Hung Kun and the kyonsi gets out of control and kills. The kids try to cover up the vampire being missing, so they can retrieve it, but it is eventually discovered. A remorseful An An admits it was down to him. Following this An An and the other kids hang out together. Mimi also makes herself known to the kids and she has a little vampire friend who she also introduces them to. However the sorcerer still wants Mimi, Hung Kun and, when he finds out about him, the little vampire. He captures them in a spirit house, eventually, and it’s down to the kids to rescue them, and An An being in danger also puts Magician An onto a redemption arc.

Hing Kun

This suffered from not backgrounding the characters well. Of course those who know the series will recognise the general strokes and the main characters but, especially as this is not listed as part of the series, it needed more character exposition. The spirit house section pushes the film further into strange – the ghost kids are not utilised in this but the sorcerer has constructed life-sized dolls that come alive and fight and these are kind of the equivalent (but villainous). The kyonsi has the additional power of being able to become invisible – it takes child urine or black dog’s blood to force him to become visible (and the urine damages him). Otherwise it is fairly standard lore. 4 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.

Hello Dracula 4 (Hai zi wang) – review

Directors: Chen Chun-Liang & Ulysses Au-Yeung Jun

Release date: 1988

Contains spoilers

I have, as I post this, jumped the third Hello Dracula film as, although I have access to it, I have never found subtitles for it and so we move to the fourth film of the series and it is kind of a reinvention or reboot almost. The Chinese title in English is King of the Children.

The film starts with kids on a beach and the sands start moving. From them jumps… I want to say Vampire Thor, but actually he is a demon (Chiang Long-Sheng). He goes around stealing children and killing parents. He is challenged by Yu Tien (Ku Kuan-Chung) though the ritual he uses does not succeed…

one of the thieves

Elsewhere his pregnant wife is worried about Yu Tien. She is the daughter of Grandpa Chin (Chin Tu, Magic of Spell) and he has been entrusted with the Golden Shield Vampires, who he has in the mortuary. Two thieves have broken in, dressed like the vampires (they wear colourful armour-like robes, rather than the traditional funeral garb), trying to steal the controls for the vampires (and thus the vampires themselves). They work out what the controls are as Grandpa manipulates the vampires.

the demon

However, Yu Tien returns and he is possessed by the demon who turns its attention to his wife and the baby in her womb. Grandpa fights for his daughter and manages to stick a sacred nail into the demon’s head, but not far enough (it seems) and the demon gets away dragging Yu Tien into a portal. The daughter has died but Grandpa knows that, as a pregnant woman who has died at full term, her spirit will remain with her body for one hour so that Taoist magic can be employed to allow the baby to be born. He delivers Tien Tien (an alternate spelling from the earlier films' subtitles) but, in the chaos, the thieves have stolen the Golden Shield Vampires.

Lin Hsiao-Lu as Tien Tien

So, this is a new origin story for the pair of Grandpa and Tien Tien. We see her growing up played by Shadow Liu Chih-Yu, who plays her in the earlier films, but the core film has her older and played by Lin Hsiao-Lu. Even as a new born baby she demonstrates that she has powers and as she grows Grandpa trains her to temper the use of them. She also befriends a little vampire child (Hong Ching-Yuan) behind his back. When she is older they hear of a vampire sighting (which is the thieves using the Golden Shield Vampires to rob people) and they go out to find them.

the con man goes looking for kyonsi

Into the mix comes a con man (Chu Ke-Liang) who has a troop of martial arts kids (three boys and two girls who, mostly, are not drawn as characters beyond being martial arts kids). After the snake oil scheme he's running goes wrong, he decides to dress himself and the kids as vampires to rob people (during the day – this works once but the second attempted victim is Grandpa). Also, without his memory, Yu Tien reappears, still host to the demon who, when he manifests, is trying to get the nail removed (though only grandpa can actually do this). There is also a hotel/restaurant where the lady owner is romantically sort after by both a guard captain and the chief robber.

Chin Tu as Grandpa

These disparate threads do come together at the end but feel a bit convoluted through the running time. The con man is drawn for comedy mostly and the kung fu kids are turned into ghosts, as in previous films, to help fight the demon – however no explanation is given as to how and why, and what the dangers are, and I guess the filmmakers just assumed that four films in the audience would get the gist. Of course, as explained, this reboots the story and ignores the already drawn life of Tien Tien, Grandpa and the previous orphans. There is some slapstick, some comedy and a whole lot of the martial art vampire fighting one would expect. In some respects, it is derivative of itself but, then again, it is certainly entertaining enough. 6 out of 10.

The imdb page is here.