Not one of the better Dracula films, Son Of Dracula stars Lon Chaney Jr as Count Alucard, who comes to the States and marries Katherine, a plantation owners daughter. She however, has done it so she can nibble on and then spend eternity with Frank, her true love. Obviously things don't go to plan, and the Count is killed in the end.
The first Dracula film to have the transformation into a bat, but it's still pretty damn dated.
toodle pip
2 comments:
It's true it shows it age to some extent, but this could be said of many by now clssic vampire movies such as "Dracula's Daughter"(1936) and "Dracula:AD1972"
What stands the test of time is the psychological reason for Kay Caldwell( Louise Albritton)'s seeking eternal life in the form of being a vampiric consort to "Count Alucard". next to the scene in which Alucard's coffin slowly emerges from the depths of the Louisiana bayou and a white mist oozes from within, quickly reforming into the Count's physical (if undead) body, I like best the discourse between the(by now a vampire)Kay Caldwell and her former paramour Frank, in which she reiterates her love for him and mildly scolds him for using the word "vampire"- we don;t like that- we prefer to be called the undead!" before revealing her plans for them together as part of the undead( she reveals that she has already drunk some of his blood, presumably making him putty in her hands) before turning into mist and floating out of the cell!
I think you're being TOO hard on this film. Granted, Lon Chaney Jr looks too well fed and plump to make a convincing Dracula(or his son), but remember-unlike Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee, Chaney is an AMERICAN and Americans to my mind do not"do aristocracy/nobility" well unlike britons or Continentals. It has its moments- such as the scene in which Alucard/Dracula's coffin arises from the depths of the Louisiana(presumably; we just know the film is set in the American Deep South- not any given state in particular) and a whitish mist oozes from inside, rapidly reforming into Alucard's physical body which then glides towards his American paramour Kay Caldwell as she watches smiling from the other side, or when Kay(by now a vampire) enters her former swain Frank's cell in the form of a bat, surreptitiously drinks a portion of his blood(not to kill him or even to change him but to make him more amenable to her desires that they should live together as (albeit undead) man and wife for all eternity!
The high point of the film is the confrontation between Frank and Alucard in which t showing some foresight and strategy, Frank sets the latter's coffin alight, providing the immortal catchphrase "Put it out, I tell ya, put it out" from Alucard before the sun's rays reduce him to a skeleton, and then when Frank goes to Kay'c coffin and sadly places a wedding ring on her finger before setting fire to her body- the body must be destroyed so that her soul can be saved!
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