The Return of Dracula

 1958 seemed to have been a good year for Dracula. Perhaps the time was right for a return of the Count, after having been relegated to largely supporting roles for years. The last time Dracula actually headlined a Hollywood film was in 1943's Son of Dracula with Lon Chaney, and after that he was relegated to a supporting character in the Universal 'Monster Rallies' of the rest of the 40s, culminating in his wonderful appearance in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. The only other appearance is in the rarely seen Turkish adaptation Drakula Istanbul'da or Dracula in Istanbul. But 1958 saw renewed interest in the character when Hammer released Horror of Dracula with Christopher Lee. 

But that's not the 1958 version I want to talk about today.

No, I want to talk about the film that came out a month before the the Hammer version, which was Gramercy Pictures' The Return of Dracula. Its a film that has been overshadowed by the bright colors and gothic swashbuckling of the British film, but I think maybe its been a bit unfairly overlooked.

The story is pretty basic, but seeks to update Dracula to a more modern (at the time) setting; that of 1958 California. It keeps the basic premise behind the previous versions of Dracula, that of the Count coming to a foreign land in search of new feeding grounds. However, this film put me much in mind of Orson Welles 1948 film The Stranger, in that its less that he is looking for new blood, but he is fleeing those who would hunt him. 

In the opening scenes of The Return of Dracula, an investigator named John Meierman has tracked Dracula to a cemetery with his crew and uncover his coffin, ready to stake him. This scene is actually really wonderful, as it evokes a gathering of killers from a film noir, as they very professionally scout the area, check their weapons (crosses and stakes), and count down to the proper time to strike. As Meierman walks across the cemetery, his men fall in behind him in formation like a well honed military patrol, in which each person seeming to know exactly what his role is. Dialogue here is minimal, but effective. They are shocked to find the coffin empty.

Meanwhile, poor Czech artist Bellack Gordal is saying goodbye to his family as he is going to visit his distant cousin in America. He boards a train, and is nearly instantly murdered by Dracula, who steals his passport and identity and travels to America having assumed the name of Bellack Gordal, apparently to escape Meierman and his hunters. 

And this is why I kept thinking of The Stranger. It echoed the themes of pursuit from Welles' film with vampire hunters replacing Nazi hunters. Some critics apparently see undertones of Cold War paranoia in this film, but that is less apparent to me than the Nazi Hunting angle. 

Lets talk for a moment about Dracula, portrayed here by the suave Francis Lederer. Lederer was born in Prague in 1899 and eventually moved to the United States in the 1930s. He was apparently tricked by his agent into playing this role, and resented it. Nevertheless, he is actually pretty effective as Dracula. When we look at the actors who have previously portrayed the Count, he does seem to stand out. Lugosi set the standard, of course, with someone who was aristocratic, but a bit alien, and Lee brought to it a sort of bestial energy. Lon Chaney's Count was melancholy and somewhat tragic, and John Carradine was more abrupt and spooky. Lederer though is restrained, aristocratic, suave and mysterious, and plays the vampire as a sort of antichrist. He ditches the old fashioned clothes, tailed tuxedos, and capes, in favor of a modern, elegant suit and tie, with a long, black overcoat thrown over his shoulders calling to mind the capes of old. He blends in, but still presents as elegantly attired and sophisticated. One nice touch is that he does a lot of acting with just his face. He moves stiffly, and his face is frequently blank... but several times, there are closeups of his face where he seems to be concentrating, and shifting the expression on his face to suit the people and the occasion. Its like he has to consciously decide what is the appropriate expression to take. He has to remember how to smile or how to look concerned. Its subtle, but gives his characterization a certain sense of disconnection from humanity. It reminded me of Willem Dafoe's speech in Shadow of the Vampire (2000) where he talks about how sad it must be for Orlock to try and remember what it was like to be human

One other thing I noticed was the rather powerful soundtrack. It seemed familiar... and then I realized why. It was Dies Irae, which was also used in an arrangement by Wendy Carlos in Kubrick's The Shining (1980). Its an ominous theme, especially combined with Lederer's purposeful striding as he leaves the place where his coffin in concealed.

Finally, it must be noted that this was a 'gimmick' film. So much so that William Castle sued the producers for offering life insurance to audience members, which was one of his own gimmicks. There is also a sequence towards the end, when the secondary vampire is staked, that a closeup is offered of the stake penetrating the chest, and suddenly the film switches for just a few seconds to full color, allowing you to see a gout of bright red blood burst forth. Its a startling scene if you're not expecting it. This was apparently cut from television copies as the color would have been too hard to reproduce (to say nothing of the fact that black and white televisions were still the norm, going into the 1970s.) 

One peculiar this about this film... take a close look at the closeup of the leading lady's face; Norma Eberhardt had heterochromia... each eye is a different color. Its subtle, but the difference can be seen, even in black and white. I just find this interesting. Eberhardt's Rachel is the central protagonist of the film, and I find her somewhat intriguing. She represents something of a departure in vampire film heroine's, in that she is given a lot more agency than many. So often in vampire films, the heroine is literally "too pure" for this world. They are innocent and even when they have a love interest, they seem chaste and fragile and somewhat angelic. An exception to this might be Katherine Caldwell (Louise Allbritton) in Son of Dracula (1943) or even perhaps Sandra Mornay (Lenore Aubert) in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948), but those seemed more unusual. But in this one, Rachel is portrayed as being a bit more 'worldly', and is heavily implied to be far from virginal. She attempts to throw off the influence of Dracula whenever she becomes aware of it, and is instrumental in protecting HERSELF. At the climax of the film, she takes advantage of Dracula's distraction to get away, and then helps to dispel the vampire's influence over her boyfriend Tim (Ray Stricklyn)... all while our ersatz Van Helsing and his crew are busy elsewhere. She SAVES HERSELF and the "hero" at the climax of the film. 

This film is not without its flaws. Meierman is severely under-developed, and the local authorities seem awfully quick to accept his stories of vampires, with the local sheriff and minister signing up almost immediately. The heroine's little brother, Mickey, vanishes from the narrative shortly after he reports that his cat has been killed (offscreen, thankfully). When Meierman's colleague is lured into the woods, I presume Jennifer is supposed to turn into a wolf to maul him, however, they used a rather friendly looking dog in place of a wolf. The ending is abrupt and somewhat head scratching as Dracula is undone ... apparently by his own clumsiness and lack of spatial awareness of his own lair. 

But its still definitely worth a look. Its an obscure film, but I wasn't disappointed to have to track it down.