Since I know the Spirit Halloween shops have been open back in the U.S. for at least a month, I figure we're well into the Halloween season. I've been in the mood for vampire movies lately so I watched 1970's Scars of Dracula again. This is a Hammer film starring Christopher Lee in the title role, his fifth Dracula movie for Hammer studios, and the second to be released that same year.
I often want to watch Scars of Dracula but end up watching the wrong film because I forget the title and all I remember is that Patrick Troughton plays his assistant. So it's been a few years since I watched it instead of Taste the Blood of Dracula or Dracula Has Risen from the Grave. It's certainly an interesting role for Troughton who here plays a hideous henchman who constantly lusts after the female lead, Jenny Hanley, who's gorgeous but kind of boring. 1970 was just a year after Troughton had retired from Doctor Who. One of the differences between modern and classic Who is that some of the new actors seem to get more of a boost to their careers. Troughton's name isn't even mentioned in the trailer.
Scars of Dracula was directed by Roy Ward Baker who also directed The Vampire Lovers, also released in 1970. What a year for Hammer. The Vampire Lovers is a far more interesting film but Scars has one of Lee's best, most understated performances as Dracula. I like the scenes where he meets his unexpected guests at the castle. Lee never leers for whines. He seems slightly distracted but intense, as though he's constantly calculating the risks and the quickest ways he can get to arteries.
Unfortunately, the movie prominently features fake bats. It's amazing how many decades went by in which rubber bats on wires were a special effect that somehow contented audiences. It's hard to imagine how they could've done it better with the technology at hand. I feel like animated bats would've been an improvement but that would likely have required more of a budget.
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