Hammer Dracula...

One of the (slightly) more productive things I did this weekend was wacth 2 more of the Hammer Dracula flicks.

Very educational.

I had avoided all things Hammer when I was a kid, because I was more about a slick, expensive-looking visual style (I'm not proud of this, mind you, but what can I say? It was the '80s), and the Hammer Horror flicks just looked silly!

But a lot of my Horror heroes (writers, directors, actors & SFX Makeup cats) hailed the Hammer Horror flicks, so I figured I need to experience these for myself some day.

Plus, the only vampire flicks I like are the old '50s/'60s/'70s tradition, back when vampires were monsters, not whiny sex symbols. (Don't get me wrong, I love the Twilight series, but only because Stephenie Meyer's stories and characters are so awesome; I detest Anne Rice's so-called "vampire novels".) I mean, yeah, sexuality has always been an element of the vampire mythos since Stoker, and I'm a HUGE fan of sexuality! But Christopher Lee managed to be scarier because his victims were sexually mesmerized by him... These were still Horror movies!

So my first step in getting to know the Hammer Horror cannon was purchasing this great 4-in-1 DVD set called 4 Film Favorites: Draculas a few months back when I actually had a bit of money after the bills were paid. (It doesn't happen often, but when it does... Bliss!) The 4-pack includes:

Horror of Dracula (1958)
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968)
Taste the Blood of Dracula (1969)
Dracula AD 1972 (1972)

Hammer only made 9 Dracula films -- the first sequel doesn't have Dracula in it and the last has a different actor playing Dracula -- so this seems like a decent sample platter of the series.

I watched the first one not long after I got the series, and it was kind of cool. It's your basic adaptation of the stage play version of Stoker's tale. And I found myself strangely drawn-in by the characters. Also, you get used to the feel of the sets/locations -- the atmosphere -- of this sort of "Hammer Dracula universe", if you will, and you kind of enjoy spending time there.

So this weekend I finally got around to watching the next two.

I missed Peter Cushing as Van Helsing, but not as much as I had assumed I would! Again, I enjoyed the world, and enjoyed the new excuses the writers dreamed up as an excuse to sick Dracula on new batches of characters. (I grew up with the Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street films, so I'm not particularly put-off by contrived excuses to extend a film franchise.) I thought the flicks were fun and sort of Halloween-y! Nowhere near the scholck of an Edward D. Wood, Jr. movie! I mean, I don't imagine teen-to-adult audiences in 2009 be frightened by these flicks, either, but they're not like watching something MST3K would riff on.

Well, except that last one...

I started watching Dracula AD 1972 and it's pretty "far out, man." It's one of those aggressively groovy '70s flicks. Like the Shaft movies, but not near as cool. Like, I suspect Dracula AD 1972 was cool for, like, the first week it was in theaters, but by the time it finished its theatrical run it was already no longer cool.

You know what I mean?

I didn't get to finish Dracula AD 1972 and I actually can't say that I'm not looking forward to it, either. The story was already starting to get interesting enough so that I didn't fear I was going to puke rainbow-colored sunflowers from all the Mod With-It-ness of the main characters.

One thing I find really interesting about all 4 of these flicks, though, is the way they treat Dracula almost as though he's a demon. I mean, like, "demon" in paranormal terms, like a non-corporeal in-human entity! It fascinates me strangely.

Hmm...

OH, WAIT! I'M AT WORK! Perhaps I should go do some, then!