THE SATANIC RITES OF DRACULA - John Cacavas - "Count Dracula And His Vampire Bride" (1973)

 I did a search of our blog to see how many vampire movies we have done, and the list went something like this: VAMPIRE, THE VAMPIRE, THE VAMPIRE LOVERS, BLOOD OF THE VAMPIRE, ROBO VAMPIRE, THE SLAUGHTER OF THE VAMPIRES, THE VAMPIRE'S COFFIN, COUNT YORGA, VAMPIRE,  CRYPT OF THE VAMPIRE, THE VAMPIRE'S GHOST, FRANKENSTEIN, THE VAMPIRE AND CO, VAMPIRE CIRCUS, I VAMPIRI, THE VAMPIRE BAT, BLOODLUST: THE VAMPIRE OF NUREMBERG, THE KISS OF THE VAMPIRE, FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS, THE VAMPIRE IS ALIVE, BLOOD BATH (TRACK OF THE VAMPIRE), GRAVE OF THE VAMPIRE, THE NUDE VAMPIRE, MARK OF THE VAMPIRE, MY SON THE VAMPIRE, THE VAMPIRE GIRLS, THE VAMPIRE AND THE BALLERINA, BRING ME THE VAMPIRE, ATOM AGE VAMPIRE, THE VAMPIRE HAPPENING, and now tonight, COUNT DRACULA AND HIS VAMPIRE BRIDE! And that doesn't even include all the Dracula movies, just the ones with vampire in the title!

I wish I was equally impressed with this movie, but then that's a different story! "Count Dracula And His Vampire Bride," is probably not the best Hammer vampire movie ever made, but then again, it's not a big enough turkey to be thrown into a 50 Pack with "Black Hooker," "Night Train To Terror," and  "Prisoner Of The Lost Universe" either!

Originally released as "The Satanic Rites Of Dracula," a title that is a much more accurate description of what's happening in this film, "Count Dracula And His Vampire Bride" is kind of an interesting movie on a couple of different levels, and even though it has some tediously long and totally unnecessary bullshit, I didn't fall asleep while watching it, and that says a lot these days!

There's some Satanic rites, and a human sacrifice taking place, and the members of the sect are some very powerful, and influential characters! Investigating people like this who are above the law, takes a lot of dedication, determination, and fortitude!

If anybody can get to the bottom of this, it's going to be Peter Cushing as Van Helsing, a role Peter has had more than a couple of times!

Freddie (Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed) Jones, who had the disposable role of Professor Keeley is still working today......

..........As is Joanna (Corpse Bride) Lumley as Van Helsing's Granddaughter Jessica!

Dracula has five or six brides stashed in the basement, which leads me to the conclusion that he must be a mamón Mormon!

Valerie (The Insomniac) Van Ost is Jane, Drac's latest girlfriend!

Cool portrait of Dracula, and a good place to say that the orchestrated but hip music in "Count Dracula And His Vampire Bride" was composed by John (Horror Express) Cacavas in his third outing! Among a host of other things, John also composed the theme song and all the music for the TV series "Kojak!" He also had a penchant for composing songs with moon in the title like "Moonstruck," "Touch O' The Moon," and "The Other Side Of The Moon!" Like what's going to happen to all of us eventually, John just passed away last year!

Peter Cushing is always entertaining, even when the movie is not that great, he usually still is!

William (Quatermass II) Franklyn has an equally disposable role as Torrence! He seems like one of the main characters until he gets ambushed, and then he's just gone!

They spent a few minutes on a scene of Van Helsing melting down a silver crucifix and making it into a silver bullet, then when he gets a chance to use it, it's lamely knocked out of his hand and fogotten! Some time spent in a bar, a club, or a pub somewhere would have been some time better spent!

I dig this shot of Drac's chilly modern office complex!

Now that's a finger you definitely do not want to pull!!!

This is the first Dracula movie that I know of where Dracula actually wants to use his otherworldly powers for world domination instead of slinking around in dark alleys and cemeteries!

Michael (Dracula A.D. 1972) Coles as Murray has got some problems of his own with some of Drac's girls!

There are moments of brilliance like this when I would give this film a 5 star rating, and then there are times when I wouldn't even give it one and a half stars! It's all over the place!

Mixing up the game and adding new elements, that's what "Dracula And His Vampire Bride" is all about! Before he was hanged, Professor Keeley was working on a project for Drac where he slathered some Bubonic Plague samples he had with radioactive rays to produce a new and stronger plague that eats right through your skin in a matter of minutes! It's science working overtime for a better future like in "The Flesh Eaters"!

Dracula's disciples are a bunch of dudes with long hair, motorbikes, and fuzzy/furry lumberjack hippie vests! They blindly serve their master for whatever reason I don't know, not style for sure!

By my reckoning, this would be the 10th time Sir Christopher Lee would don the cape and teeth for the role of Dracula!

PETER CUSHING!

I've always known about the mirrors and the cameras, the daylight, the silver bullets, the garlic, the holy water, the crosses, and the stakes through the heart, but I have to admit I was ignorant about the effect that the hawthorne bush had on Dracula! The hawthorne was what the crown of thorns was made of that was placed on Jesus' head when he was crucified, so that makes sense!

Irregardless, it really fucked with Dracula in this closing scene!!!

THE SHADOW OF THE CAT - Hammer Studios - "That Damn Cat!" (1961)

Great title, Good movie, Bad copy, so it goes, and welcome to another classic Saturday Night Special pretty damn deep down in The Dungeon!

"The Shadow Of The Cat" is so obscure I could only find a copy in England! Who knows now, it might stream any number of places, but at the time, I couldn't find it anywhere, hence the quality of tonight's feature!

Catherine (The Sorcerers, The Mummy's Shroud) Lacey is the not very well liked but very rich Ella Venable! You don't need to know much more about her, she's about to be murdered! She's reading Edgar Allen Poe's "The Raven" to her beloved cat.........

TABITHA!!

A high percentage of the films we've written about here have had a gimmick of some sorts, and what makes "The Shadow Of The Cat" stand out from a ton of other movies of the same ilk is what I'm going to call "Cat-O-Vision," or shots from the cat's perspective!

This print was so bad, I wasn't sure at first if it was just a bad video transfer or an actual planned effect, but it became pretty obvious fairly soon!

The storyline is that Ella Venable's husband has solicited the help of his servants to kill off his mean and spiteful wife and share the profit, but the problem lies in the fact that Tabitha has witnessed the whole thing, and it worries everybody a lot!

Another shot through Tabitha's eyes shows them burying Ella in a shallow grave in the swamp!

André (Professor Bernard Quatermass) Morell is Ella's vile husband Walter Venable, and he has got some bad feelings about that cat! He knows she knows, and he's really worried about it!

The beloved UK "First Lady Of Horror" Barbara Shelley is Ella's niece Beth Venable! Beth along with other family members were summoned to the Venable home after Ella's disappearance, and although Tabitha won't have anything to do with anyone else in the house for good reasons, she doesn't have a problem being normal and affectionate to Beth because Beth is the only nice person in the whole house!!

They're chasing poor Tabitha all over the place without any success, but she eventually gets hungry, and they trap her!

Andrew (The Gay Lady) Crawford plays the killer butler Andrew! Besides being a murderer, Andrew is also an idiot! He is left with the task of disposing the bagged cat in the swamp, but as he was merrily running off to do the nasty task, Tabitha fell out of the loosely tied bag! The cat runs off into the swamp and onto a small floating branch where Andrew follows her, and almost immediately gets sucked up into some quicksand and his deserved departure!

The maid Clara who was also in on the whole deal freaks out when when she spots some muddy cat tracks from the recently deceased feline! Clara was played by Freda (Brides Of Dracula, Monster Of Terror) Jackson!

Tabitha just keeps watching and waiting!

Walter never admits to the rest of the family members that he is responsible for Ella's murder, but he solicits their assistance to kill that damned cat, and he will share a large portion of the re-written will with them! Ella's original will left everything to niece Beth, but before she was murdered, Ella was coerced into re-writing her will leaving everything to asshole Walter! This shot shows the group looking at the body of the maid Clara who just fell down the stairs and died after she tripped over the cat! William (Island Of The Burning Damned) Lucas is Jacob Venable, Richard (Village Of The Damned) Warner is Edgar Venable, and last but not least, bitchy Vanda (The Earth Dies Screaming) Godsell (Not Goodsell) is Louise Venable! What a pack of cards!

Maybe I can get some guvment money if I do a public service announcement! Kids! Do you really need a good reason to never smoke? Just take a good look at this picture! Unless you'd like to look like this for the rest of your life, never start, but if you have, then stop smoking right now! It's never too late!!

Walter's got a bad ticker, so maybe the other Venables will get a better cash out if a window is left open and the cat is accidently allowed to enter his room!

This dumbfuck Venable chases Tabitha all the way up onto the roof!

"The Shadow Of The Cat" is a great movie for people who love cats and despise stupid greedy people, and I think that was the intention!

BUNNY LAKE IS MISSING - The Zombies - "A Conspiracy Of Madness" (1965)

"Bunny Lake Is Missing" is a great little film made in 1965 from a big man in film making, Otto Preminger! Otto will of course be known throughout cinema history as the man responsible for such real classics as "Anatomy Of A Murder," "Exodus," "The Man With The Golden Arm" and more!

So what's going on here? A woman and her brother have just moved to jolly olde England from America and the film begins with her dropping her daughter Bunny off at the pre-school, BUT, you never actually see the kid! After her first day at work, she returns to pick up her child, and nobody seems to know anything about her or much of anything else either!

The panic begins! Carol Lynley is Bunny's Mother, Ann Lake! Carol always exudes that cuteness in a woman that you just want to cuddle with, the kind of a girl you want to take to the Fair, or on a picnic! In 1959 Carol starred in "Blue Denim," a movie that always bothered me, followed by "Hound-Dog Man" starring Fabian! She's been in quite a few strange films like "Shock Treatment," "The Shuttered Room," and "Beware! The Blob!" It's been a few years now since she's done any more acting, but Carol is still around and doing well, we hope!

Keir Dullea has the role of Steven Lake, Ann's brother, and the Bunny's uncle! What do I need to say about Keir Dullea except "2001: A Space Odyssey?" Keir has remained very active over the years and continues to work, and was in at least two movies this year! I also just wanted to show this street sign that says "Frogmore End!!" That's right up there with a place we have around here called "Brown Material Road!"

Considered by many to be the first Brit pop star, the multi-talented Noël Coward is magnificent in the role of Ann Lake's landlord, the über creepy Wilson!

Just in case by some remote possibility you don't know who Noël Coward is, here's a cut from a various artists tribute album by Marianne Faithfull doing one of his most popular songs, "Mad About The Boy!"

I love these scenes of mass confusion! This is when the Mothers come to pick all their kids up at the school, but there's no Bunny in sight!

The school officials are no help at all. The teacher for the class that Bunny was in left immediately at the end of the day because she had a toothache, and nobody else seems to have even seen the little girl, and they can't even find a record of her being checked in!

Ann Lake pays a visit to the retired founder of the school Ada Ford as played by Martita (Brides Of Dracula) Hunt, but that doesn't help things out any at all either!

Asking the children if any of them have seen Bunny doesn't yield any results!

At least Ann has her loving brother Steven to comfort her in her real time of need!

Now has come the time to report this whole mess to the proper authorities! Sir Laurence Olivier is Superintendent Newhouse, the man who will be in charge of the whole investigation!

The movie keeps getting darker and darker, as everyone questions Ann Lake's mental state, which doesn't exactly make her feel any better! It doesn't help matters to know that as a little girl, Ann Lake had an imaginary friend named Bunny too!

And that brings us to this point in the film where Superintendent Newhouse offers to meet Ann Lake at a local pub to further discuss the problem and any possible solutions!  Predominately featured on the poster, I was wondering how the very popular band of the time The Zombies was going to fit into this whole equation! It didn't seem like Ann Lake was going to be heading to a club any time soon to celebrate the loss of her daughter, but as it turns out, at the pub where she is meeting the Superintendent, the TV is on, and guess who is on the screen?

The Zombies had just had two of their biggest hit songs released a year earlier in 1964, "She's Not There" which went to number two in the U.S. and "Tell Her No" which topped out at number six on the charts! Here's just a small taste of their performance from the pub scene!  The Zombies popularity waned a bit  for a few years after this, but in 1968 they roared back with the number three smash hit "Time Of The Season" that has persevered for decades!

Even more mass confusion!

For just sheer creepiness, there's hardly anything that can outdo disembodied doll heads!

Personally, I had one Helluva time tracking down a copy of this movie, and once again as it has happened so many times before, just as I'm writing one of these things, I find the super rare movie I'm writing about streaming somewhere on the internet, and that is indeed the case with "Bunny Lake Is Mssing," so if you want to find out what happened to or whether even if there was a Bunny Lake, this awesome film can be found streaming on Amazon!