Blood of Dracula [Blood Is My Heritage] * (1957, Sandra Harrison, Louise Lewis, Gail Ganley) – Classic Movie Review 3.699

Sandra Harrison stars as a schoolgirl who turns into a vampire under hypnosis, in Herbert L Strock’s 1957 horror movie Blood of Dracula.

‘She Will GIVE YOU Nightmares… FOR EVER!’

Director Herbert L Strock’s 1957 junior-league American black-and-white horror movie Blood of Dracula stars Louise Lewis as a high-schoolgirl chemistry teacher called Miss Branding who turns her new, troubled 16-year-old schoolgirl pupil Nancy Perkins (played by Sandra Harrison) into a vampire under hypnosis and a special amulet. This results in a series of full-moon murders.

With the story and screenplay co-written by Aben Kandel and Herman Cohen under the single pseudonym of Ralph Thornton, this is a silly horror remake of the same year’s (and the same producer Herman Cohen’s) pioneering I Was a Teenage Werewolf, this time with a female slant.

Also in the cast are Gail Ganley, Jerry Blaine and Malcolm Atterbury.

Blood of Dracula is made by Carmel Productions and runs 68 minutes. It is shot in black and white by cinematographer Monroe P Askins.

American International Pictures (AIP) released it to American drive-in cinemas in November 1957 in a double bill with Herbert L Strock’s I Was a Teenage Frankenstein (1957) advertising: ‘Warning! Can You Take It? Fiendish! Frenzied! Frightening! It Will Haunt You For Days Afterwards!’

The 1957 horror film I Was a Teenage Werewolf stars Michael Landon as a troubled teenager, and was one of AIP’s most successful films.

The cast are Sandra Harrison as Nancy Perkins, Louise Lewis as chemistry teacher Miss Branding, Gail Ganley as Myra, Jerry Blaine as Tab, Heather Ames as Nola, Mary Adams as Mrs. Thorndyke, Edna Holland as art teacher Miss Rivers, Thomas Browne Henry [Thomas B. Henry] as Mr. Paul Perkins, Jeanne Dean as Mrs. Doris Perkins, Don Devlin as Eddie, Malcolm Atterbury as Lt. Dunlap, Richard Devon as Det. Sgt. Stewart, Craig Duncan as police officer, Carlyle Mitchell as Stanley Mayther, Voltaire Perkins as Dr. Lawson, Paul Maxwell as young doctor Mike, Shirley De Lancey as Terry, Michael Hall as Glenn, Barbara Wilson as Ann, Jimmy Hayes as Joe, and Lynn Alden as Linda.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3,699

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