Count Dracula and His Vampire Bride (1978)

[written June 18, 2011]

Sitting down to watch Count Dracula and his Vampire Bride the other night, I got a sense of déjà vu.  I sensed that I had seen this movie before.  I waved it off, after all the late Christopher Lee played Count Dracula many times.  But something was nagging at me. 

Yes!, I finally said.  I HAVE seen this movie before on a UHF station when I was a kid under the title The Satanic Rites of Dracula.  In doing research for this review, I now find that it has been released under the title: Dracula and His Brides, The Brides of Dracula, The Rites of Dracula, and Dracula is Alive and Well and Living in London.  There was even one VHS distributor that called it Disco Dracula and tacked on an ersatz disco score, I suppose to confuse it with the much better Frank Langela movie.  Not that you would want to.

The story is beside the point but here goes: The movie is a sequel to Dracula 1972, and picks up with some strange goings on involving disappearing girls, some of whom are important because they are the personal assistants to some important people.  Their investigation turns up information that London’s elite are pouring their fortunes into a foundation headed by a man who never appears in photographs.

Where the story goes is pretty obvious, but I’ll be honest, I didn’t see the ending.  Actually, I fell asleep just before the third act and woke up just in time to see ol’ Drac get his comeuppance.  Did I miss anything?  I seriously doubt it.  In the interest of completion, I read a synopsis online of the parts that I missed and I can assure you that I didn’t miss anything.  When I was asleep, I didn’t dream about it, and when I woke up, I didn’t think about it.  I’m struggling now to even remember it.