The Return of Dracula (1958)

Good concept, poorly executed.

Yo, there's no way for me to review this film without saying, take your *insert ethnicity + "ass" here* to see this film,like now. You have to see it in order to know what you're really messing with.

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

In small-town America of the 50's, it doesn't pay to trust your Old World relatives. They're just not right over there: if it isn't one thing, it'll be another. Creepy, authentic vampire messes with creepy, authentic people during a creepy, authentic era.

This is not a sequel to the Bela Dracula. Actual, I re-watched the Bela Dracula and there are only a couple of parts that are great, the castle scene was one. The rest of the movie sucks, in a bad way. I also re-watched the Horror of Christoper Lee's Dracula and that movie also sucks, in a bad way. I have fond memories of watching the Hammer horror films as a kid. But watching now, the best parts are the sets/colors/cinematography and the music. The stories, dialogue, acting are all poor. Christopher Lee's first line in the movie is about, wait for it, cataloging his library. His freaking LIBRARY! Lee's acting, his dialogue are pretty freaking lame. Gary Oldman in the 1992 Dracula was great. Unfortunately, his acting was placed in a garbage cartoon comic movie with lousy actors including Anthony Hopkin, Keanu Reeves, Winona Ryder and others. So, what are we left with. A patchwork of Dracula movies. Non of them great. Maybe Nosferatu the original. The 1979 remake with Klause Kinsky, I could not even watch. Maybe someone someday will make a serious Dracula movie and have Gary Oldman revise the character.Now for this movie, Leave it to Draculas Beaver, the Dracula actor is very good, but his dialogue and the story sucks. The Van Helsing character was good as well. And the girl was decent. All the other characters were just there. Nothing much happens. The movie is in black and white except for 2 seconds of blood, when one of Draculas brides gets staked. That was a nice touch. And when Dracula gets killed at the end that was decent.It's on youtube, so it's free to check out. Rating is a C, or 4 stars. Mostly for the acting. At least better acting that Chris Lee's Dracula. But the story sucked.

It's odd how my reaction to this film seems not to sync with the quality of the film itself. This is a film with great acting, great photography, a nicely evocative story...and it's even got a clever twist in the mythos to keep things fresh.I could see the quality and care that went into every scene. I enjoyed the way Lederer played the count as a world-weary, well- spoken, decadent aristocrat - far more "Peter Lorre" than "Christopher Lee". And I appreciated the subtlety and crispness with which he and the director showed the audience his hidden evil and shifting moods. At some points, Lederer even seems to be acting on a couple levels at once, a surface courtliness combined with a contempt for his future victims that only the audience can see.The actress playing "Rachel Mayberry" was perfect for the part, and she was gorgeous and desirable. And there was hardly a moment of dead air in the movie. I even liked the way the movie wrapped up. Usually one of my complaints with the Hammer "Dracula" and "Frankenstein" films was that they just...stop...short...seconds after the monster's demise. That's what happens here...but it didn't bother me as much for some reason, maybe because the young hero's assertions somehow are just what is needed, and there really aren't any other plot threads to look after.So this was a very well made movie with some killer performances...and yet my reaction was lukewarm. I guess I just prefer my Dracula somewhat more feral, and working over in Eastern Europe, rather than "Leave It To Beaversville" California. Still, if anyone asks, I will tell them this was a GOOD movie.

No, "Square Dance Jubilee" director Paul Landres' "The Return of Dracula" has nothing to do with either the Universal Pictures franchise or the Hammer Film series. Instead, United Artists distributed this Gramercy Pictures theatrical release, and "The Return of Dracula" qualifies as an imaginative but minor chiller on a low budget. Landres and scenarist Pat Fielder, who collaborated earlier on the lackluster movie "The Vampire," have taken liberties with the formulaic Bram Stoker story while channeling the Alfred Hitchcock serial killer thriller "Shadow of a Doubt" as an American family opens their doors to the infamous Count who is masquerading as their immigrant cousin. Surprisingly, the filmmakers do not acknowledge Stoker during the opening credits, though the name of Stoker's memorable vampire is mentioned three times. Dracula rides in a contemporary train at one point and later crosses the Atlantic Ocean on a luxury liner. This is the kind of vampire movie where the undead one can freely enter any rooms without an invitation. Some vampire lore dictates that the vampire cannot enter a room without the permission of its host. One of the neatest things about this micro-budget effort is the use of dry ice inside the coffins when we gaze upon the vampires. "The Return of Dracula" opens with the following narration as two cars cruise through the countryside in route to a cemetery: "It is a known fact that there existed in Central Europe a Count Dracula. Though human in appearance and cultured in manner, he was, in truth, a thing undead, a force of evil, a vampire feeding on the blood of innocent people, he turned them into his own kind, thus spreading his evil domination even wider. The attempts to find and destroy this evil were never proved completely successful. And so the search continues to this very day." Like Bram Stoker's novel, "The Return of Dracula" finds our undead protagonist looking for somewhere different to stalk his prey. Several men led by John Merriman (John Wengraf of "The Pride and the Passion") climb out of the two cars, drape pedants with crosses at their throats, and enter Dracula's tomb to kill him. Imagine their surprise when they find an empty coffin! The action shifts to a railway station as Bellac Gordal (Norbert Schiller of "Sign of the Pagan") explains that living in the Balkans stifles his artistic freedom, so he bids his immediate family farewell to board a train to America. Bellac plans to stay with his cousin, Cora Mayberry (Greta Granstedt of "Nocturne"), and her family in Carleton, California. Fortunately for Dracula, Cora hasn't laid eyes on her Bellac since he was a little boy. When Bellac enters his coach, the artist meets a mysterious gentleman perusing a Berlin newspaper. Not long after he puts his luggage in an upper berth, Bellac turns to the other passenger. A look of horror suffuses Bellac's face the man assaults him. Director Paul Landres edits Bellac's death scene so when Bellac screams, the action cuts to an exterior shot of the locomotive as its eldritch whistle pierces the night with a hair-raising shriek, the perfect visual and aural metaphor for Bellac's terror. What makes this set-up so interesting is that Dracula later confides to Cora's daughter Rachel (Norma Eberhardt of "Live Fast, Die Young") that he left Central Europe because he felt that "My life has been confined. That's why I came here . . . for freedom. I must have it." These lines of dialogue make "The Return of Dracula" a Cold War era vampire chiller. Unmistakably, the Count is bailing out of the Balkans because of Communism. Of course, the Mayberry family is anxious to welcome cousin Bellac and make him as comfortable as possible. Nobody is more excited to see her cousin than Rachel. Rachel wants to be an artist like Bellac, but she fears that she will end up working as a nurse. She spends time already in a nearby religious facility that takes care of sick people. She tends a blind girl, Jennie Blake (Virginia Vincent of "Tony Rome"), at the parish house. Initially, the Mayberry's aren't sure about their cousin. He rarely comes out of his room during the day, and he loathes mirrors. Dracula goes after Jennie and makes her his bride. Before she goes to school the next day, Rachel is summoned to parish house and watches in horror as Jennie dies. Jennie slips Rachel the crucifix before she dies. A U.S. Department of Immigration official, Mack Bryant (Charles Tannen of "The Rack"), shows up at the Mayberry house. He makes inquiries about Bellac. Bryant is cooperating with Merriman, and Dracula suspects as much so he kills Bryant.Francis Lederer makes an effectively villainous Dracula with a conspicuous foreign accent, but he cannot bare his fangs any more than his predecessors could. Indeed, nobody ever addresses him as Dracula to his face, and he has no crazy mad assistant. He hails from the Balkans area of eastern Europe. He doesn't dress as fashionably as either Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee, but he is not a derelict. He likes to materialize out of a cloud of mist and the same is true of the poor girl that he transforms into his vampire bride. This Dracula is also shape-shifter, and he appears as a white wolf but there is no transformation scene. Although "Isle of the Dead" lenser Jack Mackenzie photographed the film predominantly in black and white, Landres inserts an interesting shot that is in color when our heroes stake Jennie. The last-minute ending is quite ironic, too! The cool thing about this Dracula movie is that nobody actually kills the evil Count. He lures Rachel to the cave where he has concealed his coffin, while Merriman has mobilized the town authorities and they kill Jennie. Dracula falls into pit in the cave and lands on a stake that kills him.