Dracula

Colour, 35 mm
United Kingdom, 1958, 82 min
Section: Midnight Screenings

Synopsis

Jonathan Harker infiltrates Dracula’s castle, intent on destroying the undead Count. But when he falls prey to the ancient vampire, Dr Van Helsing must take over his mission. Elegantly directed by Fisher, the first Dracula film in colour emphasised the sexual undertones of the vampire myth, and linked them to the blood-red violence on screen – horrifying critics, but delighting the public, who flocked to see this, and the sequels it inspired. Here the Count is a sexual liberator, infiltrating the confines of the Victorian household, satisfying women in a way their stuffy husbands cannot. Lee’s stately, debonair Dracula says little, and does not transmute into a bat. He has no need of special effects. Awe-inspiring and aloof, from the moment he appears, he is the Count. Cushing’s lantern-jawed Van Helsing, embodying all that is upright and decent, is similarly definitive. When the two meet for their first great screen battle, it really does have the portentous air of an elemental conflict between good and evil.

About the director

Terence Fisher (b.1904, Maida Vale, London; d. 1980) was a merchant seaman before becoming a film editor in the 1930s. He directed short dramas at the Highbury Studio, notably To the Public Danger (1948), an adaptation of a Patrick Hamilton play, before graduating to features at Gainsborough, where he made the atmospheric So Long at the Fair (1950). He made a variety of supporting features for Hammer before the studio focused specifically on horror; then Fisher’s skill at producing stylish visuals on a moderate budget was central to their successful formula. He launched the ‘Hammer Horrors’ with The Curse of Frankenstein (1957); he was still there to shoot Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974), his last feature. Critical interest in Fisher’s work, scant while he was active, has increased dramatically since his death.