Blood of Dracula's Castle (1969)

Castle of Dracula
Dracula's Castle

Cast:

John "David Carradine's father" Carradine is George, the butler
Paula Raymond is Countess Townsend
Alexander D'Arcy is Count Dracula, alias Count Charles Townsend
Robert Dix is Johnny
Gene Otis Shayne is Glen Cannon

What the box says:

A chilling, blood-curdling tale about a young couple that inherits an old castle but finds it already inhabited by a crusty old butler, an obsessed killer, and a couple of vampires, who kidnap and sacrifice young girls in order to live on and on...

Plot:

Ann is driving down the road when of course her cart breaks down in the middle of nowhere. If car troubles weren’t bad enough running into a werewolf certainly is. She gets carried away…

Elsewhere at Marine World, Glen, the photographer, is taking photos of Liz, girlfriend/model. He learns that his uncle Thomas died and left him a castle. Glen only knows that a couple has rented the castle for the last 60 years. However, Glen and Liz decide to move into the castle and evict the couple.

Castle, the Townsend couple is sitting around wondering what will happen with the castle since Glen has inherited it.

In the dungeon, Ann and several other women are chained to the wall while George, the butler, and Mango, the hulking handyman, take a blood sample.

Don't worry, we only need to transfusions from you for the rest of your very short life... George takes the sample to the Count and Countess who are waiting for their friend Johnny to return.
I say the blood in these young people today is quite delictable..

At an asylum, Johnny escapes and heads off into the woods. Even with a posse including hunting dogs after him, Johnny manages to choke a few people. Stealing a car, he evades the posse. Returning to the castle, Johnny talks with George.

Good evening, I'll be the creepy butler for the rest of your short life...........

Glen and Liz finally get to the castle and look around until the Townsend’s get up.

Even with housing prices, people still can't sell creepy castles in the middle o0f nowhere very easily... They claim that the lease was originally for the Count’s father, and he kept the lease going.

Later, Johnny talks with the Count, who is 300 years old, and went by the name Dracula.

Felt, like I slept like the undead, more than usual.. The count claims that drinking certain blood types is healthier for vampires and in fact the blood of young women is even better. They may need Johnny to take care of Glen and Liz.

That night, Liz hears a scream. Snooping around, she spots Mango. George explains how everything isn’t strange.

The next day, Glen and Liz stumble across the dungeon and find the chained women. Spotting the coffins of the couple, things are looking awfully peculiar. George and Johnny grab the heroes and chain Liz to the wall.

I'm a little teapot, short and stout...

With the full moon tonight, the couple and George are ready for a sacrifice to their moon god, Luna. They want Glen to sign the castle over to them.

Johnny is about to let Ann loose early so he can kill her. However, George talks him down how killing Ann would keep him from being turned into a vampire.

That night, the group marches outside. They tie Ann to the stake.

Who knew tailgate parties had many burning stakes? George does the creepy invocation before setting Ann aflame.

Back at the castle, the couple, George, and Johnny force Glen and Liz to drink a toast. Glen grabs Johnny’s gun and shoots him. Glen ties the couple up and leaves the gun with Liz as he goes after George. The greatest photographer versus butler battle of 1969 ends with a dead butler. Glen frees the chained girls.

Returning to Liz, Glen hears the couple plead to be allowed to return to their coffins. The coming sunlight ages the vampires to dust. Mango charges after our heroes and the rescued girls who head out of the castle.

Mango keeps chasing after Glen and Liz. Knocking Glen out, Mango carries Liz away to tie her to the stake. Things look like she’ll be set afire when Glen rushes to the rescue by axe-mauling Mango and setting him afire. The flaming Mango falls off the nearby cliff. Glen frees Liz.

What I say:

After the vampire and werewolf battles from Underworld last week, I wasn't planning on another vampire movie for a couple of weeks. However, one of the good things about B-movies is there is always something else left. Every reviewer has some things they've not actually watched. Be it because they're horrible movies or just never stumbled across them. No b-movie fan can have seen every genre movie. OK, confession time, I've never seen anything by Al Adamson before. In fact, Al Adamson's probably best known movie is probably Dracula vs. Frankenstein.

Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Vincent Price, Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing are some of the biggest names in horror. John Carradine is another. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to get quite the same kind of name recognition as they do. Carradine was the gambler in 1939's Stagecoach with John Wayne.

Count Dracula has been living in a castle on the Pacific coast for 60 years. That makes more sense than him having an army of dirty hippies in Satanic Rites of Dracula. These aren't vampires full of angst and black mascara. Good to see vampires that aren't dressed as gothic as in movies today but more as an urbane, trendy group. Imagine the Howells from Gilligan's Island as vampires and you'll get a good idea of what this Count Dracula and his bride are like. These vampires have chained captives bled for their use. In fact, these vampires don't ever bite anyone. They do even mention the idea of maybe synthetic blood being created one day.

This is one of the kitchen sink monster movies. Practically every monster gets thrown into the plot. We have vampires, werewolf, disfigured servant, psycho killer, and a creepy butler. It's a shame that a Frankenstein's monster or a mad scientist was missing. Well, they got counted in Dracula vs. Frankenstein. It's ashame that the infamous Chinese hopping vampires from Robo Vampire failed to make an appearance.

What happens when a castle is in the American southwest or on the Pacific coast? Car trouble nearby is a given fact of horror movies. However, I kept thinking the castle almost had me expecting Torgo from Manos: the Hands of Fate would pop up to borrow a cup of sugar or visit his buddy Mango. You have no idea how hard it is to avoid doing any Mango jokes. OK, Chris Kattan's Mango from late 90s SNL.

The run time according to the IMDB has it listed at 84 minutes and a TV version for 91 minutes. The longer version with the few extra minutes which may make a bit more sense to explain why the castle has a couple of vampires, a mute giant handyman, a deranged butler, and homicidal maniac (who might be a werewolf that wants to become a vampire...) Was Johnny actually a werewolf or not? Apparently, the longer version has Johnny turning into a werwolf with a really lame mask rather than just talking about how the full moon compelled him. He was continually mentioned about how a Full Moon changed him. However,in the short version, we never saw his wolf out. In fact, the werewolf popped up before Johnny had escaped. Aw, the power of bad movie editing...

Quotable Dialogue
"Proves all men are sex fiends."
"I think you will enjoy this vintage."
"We'll be supplied with new vintages all the time."
"I understand from the count you escaped a necktie party."
"How about your psychopathic nature to kill?"
"I think I'm on the verge of hysteria."
"I just killed the butler."
Morals of the Story
High heels are necessary on nature walks.
All castles have dungeons.
Changing clothes while driving is easy.
Plenty of castles on the American Pacific coast.
Scarves can tie up vampires easily.
Sunlit dying vampires turn into bats.