Short Film: Ghost Bride of Dracula

It is perhaps lucky that I changed the policy on short films and stopped rating them as this would have scored very low indeed...

A little background to this would be useful, I feel. In 2014 there was a softcore porn film by Jake Kane entitled An Erotic Tale of Ms. Dracula. This has then been taken by director David Zani, the softcore sex firmly expunged and made into a short film. It has then found its way onto Amazon Prime.

The film comes in at 33 minutes but there really wasn’t 33 minutes of footage and what Zani has done becomes evident in the title sequence as the camera roams over a large house that would appear to be (firstly stock footage, but secondly) a manor house in Britain, complete with overcast skies. The title sequence had a horrible, unsuitable electronica piece over it but also some very interesting dialogue (and I’ll come to the source of that soon enough).

Not LA

He has then cut in footage of the house as establishing footage. However the main film looks like it has been shot in Los Angeles. Certainly, the exterior shots have that sharp LA sunshine, which jars against the overcast establishing shots. The vegetation turns from atypically English to palm trees. It is simply a mess. He has then also cut in scenes, showing on a flat screen TV, from the Paul Naschy film Count Dracula’s Great Love. This is the source of the initial voice overs and presumably included because some of the dialogue talks about Dracula searching for a virgin who will fall for him and one of the characters, Ashley (Allie James), doesn’t want to die a virgin. There is also at least one scene lifted from The Devil’s Wedding Night.

the brides

So, story… very little really when your story scenes are the wraparound for a porn film but, such as it is... Ms Dracula (Alexis Texas) lives in a mansion with Renfield (Romeo Price) and three vampire brides and has kidnapped Ashley. Renfield has created a potion that allows them to walk in daylight and has made them more powerful. Van Helsing (Chad White) has put a reward of $1M for Ashley’s rescue. This has led husband and wife Jonathan Harker (Billy Chappell) and Meena (Anna Morna) – yes they spelt it incorrectly – to infiltrate the mansion, posing as masseuses, and sexual shenanigans follows.

fangs on show

It’s as thin as tissue and the acting… well it’s a wraparound for a porn film, what do you think? I suspect the original version had more integrity in its absolute honesty (it is what it is). This was almost recycling at its worst until I realised that the distributors had gone on to recycle the whole of this version into the 56 minute long anthology film (and for anthology read mess) Halloween Horror at Midnight. The imdb page for Ghost Bride of Dracula is here.