A Note about the DVD
This is a very good film from Hammer. My issue is with the print they used for the anchor bay DVD release. The color is off. When they have shown this film on Turner Classic Movies, they show a different print. The color is deeper and richer. If you check the end of the film, the print used on cable was originally distributed by Warner-Pathe. The print on the DVD was originally a 20th Century Fox Distribution.
Anchor Bay(or SOMEONE) should release the Warner-Pathe version on DVD. It is a big improvement visually.
CAVEAT EMPTOR - BUYER BEWARE!!!
I was so glad when on a whim one day I noticed that old Hammer horror titles previously released by Anchor Bay Entertainment appeared to be getting a re-release. Boy, was I wrong about that! Don't be fooled. DVD-R's are no substitute for a real factory manufactured product. The pictures appear murky, bleeding and washed out even though its obviously a direct burn from a genuine Anchor Bay DVD. The sound drops in and out. I played each disc on 3 different players manufactured by 3 different companies. In all I wasted $20 dollars a piece on 3 of these pathetic knock offs. Originally when I purchased these titles there was NO mention of them being bootleg quality DVD-R's. I don't know who's ingenious idea it was to propose such a gross misuse of wasted effort. Either shame on Anchor Bay or shame on Amazon for perpetuating such poor quality knock offs at such an absurd price. They even use the original Anchor Bay DVD's cover art printed by a laser printer however most of the special...
Gothic Masterpiece
This is the third and best instalment in Hammer's Dracula-series, it ignores the second one and continues where the first one left off. Actually, knowledge of any of the other movies is not required at all, each one of them a ritual reviving the important elements, this one being the most ceremonial. The main theme seems to be the disproportion between rationality and sexuality, the former represented by Victorian morals, the latter by the vampire, stoic nobleman and hissing animal in one, he comes off as a diabolic high-priest of passion. Thus the beautiful Barbara Shelley, who enters Dracula's castle together with her boring husband, is transformed from uptight pedant to sexy vamp in lingerie, the actress mastering both roles accordingly. The scene in which she begs the heroine to let her in because "it's cold out here", sniveling like a child, but truly menacing at the same time, is one of the iconographic highlights of the genre.
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