Blood for Dracula [Andy Warhol’s Dracula] *** (1974, Udo Kier, Joe Dallesandro, Maxime McKendry, Stefania Casini, Arno Juerging, Vittorio De Sica, Roman Polanski) – Classic Movie Review 3355

Udo Kier’s dying Count Dracula must of course drink the blood of virgins to survive in writer-director Paul Morrissey’s often stylish and amusing 1974 horror movie companion piece to his 1973 Flesh for Frankenstein [Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein].

In the early 1920s, the sickly vampire Dracula travels with his servant Anton from Transylvania to Italy, thinking he will surely find a virgin bride in a Catholic country. They encounter the Marchese di Fiore, a hard-up Italian landowner whose lavish estate is falling into decline. He has a family with not one but four virgins ready for marriage, though it turns out the girls are not as pure as they say they are.

But the estate handyman, the Marxist servant Mario Balato, observes strange behaviour by the girls after spending the night with the Count, who must find a real virgin before he dies from lack of blood or from Mario’s wooden stake.

It also stars Joe Dallesandro as the handsome servant Mario Balato and Arno Juerging as the Count’s servant Anton, both actors returning from Flesh for Frankenstein. Vittorio De Sica plays Il Marchese di Fiore, Maxime McKendry plays La Marchesa Di Fiore, Milena Vukotic is Esmeralda, Dominique Darel is Saphiria, Stefania Casini is Rubinia and Silvia Dionisio is Perla. Roman Polanski, who was shooting What? on a nearby set appears in a cameo, playing a gambling guest in a pub. 

Kier makes a splendidly sickly but luxurious and handsome young Dracula and the movie is highly diverting, though a little blood transfusion might have turned the script into a classic like Love at First Bite or Young Frankenstein. 

It is not too pornographic or stomach-churning, so it didn’t stir up the controversy of Flesh for Frankenstein and had far fewer cuts for its initial UK cinema release.

It had a US cinema release in 1975, retitled Andy Warhol’s Dracula. It runs 103 minutes with an X rating by the MPAA due to its violence and strong sexual content/nudity. But a later cut version runs 94 minutes, with an R rating for re-release under the title Young Dracula. In the UK it was passed fully uncut for video in 1995. The original uncut version has been released on DVD several times, now unrated, and now digitally remastered and widescreen.

The Italian title was ‘Dracula cerca sangue di vergine e…mori di sete!!!’, literally ‘Dracula is searching for virgins’ blood, and… he’s dying of thirst!’

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3355

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/