Visit the official Doctor Who website

Visit the official Doctor Who website
Look to the future

Asylum seekers...

Asylum seekers...
Refuge of the Daleks

Doctor Who picture resource

Doctor Who picture resource
Roam the space lanes!

Explore the Doctor Who classic series website

Explore the Doctor Who classic series website
Step back in time

Infiltrate The Hub of Doctor Who spin-off Torchwood

Infiltrate The Hub of Doctor Who spin-off Torchwood
Armed and extremely dangerous

Investigate The Sarah Jane Adventures

Investigate The Sarah Jane Adventures
Fearless in the face of adversity

Call on Dani’s House

Call on Dani’s House
Harmer’s a charmer

Intercept the UFO fabsite

Intercept the UFO fabsite
Defending the Earth against alien invaders!

Uncover the secrets of the Dollhouse

Uncover the secrets of the Dollhouse
Programmable agent Echo exposed!

Hell’s belles

Hell’s belles
Naughty but nice

Love Exposure

Love Exposure
Flash photography!

Primeval portal

Primeval portal
Dressed to kill or damsels in distress?

Charmed, to be sure!

Charmed, to be sure!
The witches of San Francisco

Take on t.A.T.u.

Take on t.A.T.u.
All the way from Moscow

Proceed to the Luther website

Proceed to the Luther website
John and Jenny discuss their next move

DCI Banks is on the case

DCI Banks is on the case
You can bet on it!

On The Grid with Spooks

On The Grid with Spooks
Secret agents of Section D

Bridge to Hustle

Bridge to Hustle
Shady characters

Life on Ashes To Ashes

Life on Ashes To Ashes
Coppers with a chequered past

Claire’s no Exile

Claire’s no Exile
Goose steps

Vexed is back on the beat!

Vexed is back on the beat!
Mismatched DI Armstrong and bright fast-tracker Georgina Dixon

Medium, both super and natural

Medium, both super and natural
Open the door to your dreams

Who’s that girl? (350-picture Slideshow)

Thursday 12 May 2005

Chronicling Hammer's "Dracula" Movies!


It's open to debate, and that's part of the problem and fun with cataloguing such things accurately, but I've always believed there to be seven films in the Hammer "Dracula" cycle. Although "Brides of Dracula" has Dracula in its title, and good though it is, the Count's absence from this film surely excludes it from being part of the canon, strictly speaking. I include the two "modern" takes that Hammer took on the story. They reunite Lee as Dracula with Cushing as nemesis Van Helsing for the first time in the series since its début and thus give the feel of the cycle having come full circle.

Based on the aforementioned, this would make my personal favourite, "Taste the Blood of Dracula", the fourth of the seven and thus the middle film of the cycle. The "Frankenstein" series also comprises seven and its middle film, "Frankenstein Created Woman", covers the same territory as this Dracula movie, namely Victorian values and three aristocrats who get what's coming to them!!! I'm sure it wasn't planned this way, at least not from the outset, but there is a kind of beauty to viewing them with this sequence in mind. There is no lumbering monster in this Frankenstein film which makes it atypical of its series just as, without many of the familiar trappings we have come to expect such as priests, suspicious villagers and disgruntled coach drivers, "Taste the Blood of Dracula" is also atypical.

Alas, my argument isn't watertight! Although Dracula isn't mentioned in the title, in "The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires", released by Hammer after their last "official" Dracula movie "The Satanic Rites of Dracula", the character is included although this time not played by Christopher Lee. Therefore, it could be argued there are eight films in the cycle, nine if one still wishes to include "Brides of Dracula", and therein lies the problem. It is impossible, however desirable, to pin an exact number of films to the sequence!