Watched this 1958 British Hammer movie, Horror of Dracula, on Svengoolie. It is a good version of the Dracula stories and I give it 3.5 out of 5.
[From Wikipedia] Dracula is a 1958 British supernatural horror film directed by Terence Fisher and written by Jimmy Sangster based on Bram Stoker‘s novel of the same name. The first in the series of Hammer Horror films starring Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, the film also features Peter Cushing as Doctor Van Helsing, along with Michael Gough, Melissa Stribling, Carol Marsh, and John Van Eyssen.
In the United States the film was released as a double feature with the Universal Pictures film The Thing That Couldn’t Die, and was retitled Horror of Dracula to avoid confusion with the US original by Universal, 1931’s Dracula. Production began at Bray Studios on 17 November 1957 with an investment of £81,000.
As Count Dracula, Lee fixed the image of the fanged vampire in popular culture.Christopher Frayling writes, “Dracula introduced fangs, red contact lenses, décolletage, ready-prepared wooden stakes and – in the celebrated credits sequence – blood being spattered from off-screen over the Count’s coffin.”[5] Lee also introduced a dark, brooding sexuality to the character, with Tim Stanley stating, “Lee’s sensuality was subversive in that it hinted that women might quite like having their neck chewed on by a stud”.
