While getting a head start on refreshers for this year's upcoming run of essays for October's annual 31 DAYS OF HORROR run, last night I as through DRACULA: PRINCE OF DARKNESS (1966) for the first time in over four decades, and I have to ask this:
If you were a British tourist in the Carpathian mountains in the late 19th Century and were vehemently warned by all of the locals to avoid the ominous castle in the distance, a place that does not exist on your map of the area but there it is nonetheless, would you still insist on going there? And when you got there and found the table set for dinner as though they were expecting you and your companions, and you were attended to by this savory-looking dude, would you stick around?
Seriously, even by horror movie standards, the hapless tourists in this story are among the all-time stupidest in cinema history. I was actually rooting for Dracula to get all of them and do the rest of the world a favor.
Personally I can't stand Father Sandor in that movie. His knowledge of vampires is all over the place. He acts like the peasants are idiots for fearing them, then turns around and warns the tourists not to go anywhere near Dracula's castle. He acts like they're totally safe in his monastery, and then Dracula gets in and kidnaps Suzan Farmer anyway. When Dracula's fighting the guy at the end, Sandor's all "He's doomed, nothing we can do" until Suzan grabs the rifle and starts shooting. That guy's just worthless.
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