Son of Dracula
Count Downe

UK 1974
produced by
Ringo Starr, Jerry Gross, Tim Vanh Rellim for Apple Corps
directed by Freddie Francis
starring Harry Nilsson, Ringo Starr, Dennis Price, Suzanna Leigh, Freddie Jones, David Bailie, Skip Martin, Dan Meaden, Morris Bush, Rosanna Lee, Shakira Caine, Nita Lorraine, Rachelle Miller, Beth Morris, Jenny Runacre, Hedger Wallace, Lorna Wilde, Derek Woodward, and as musicians Peter Frampton, Keith Moon, John Bonham, Ricki Farr, Bobby Keyes, Jim Price, Leon Russell, Klaus Voorman
written by Jay Fairbank (= Jennifer Jayne), music by Paul Buckmaster, songs by Harry Nilsson

Dracula, Frankenstein, Van Helsing, Merlin

review by
Mike Haberfelner

Count Dracula (Dan Meaden) is dead, but not without leaving a child, Count Downe (Harry Nilsson), a rock musician who is groomed to be the next king of the netherworld by Merlin the Magician (Ringo Starr). But then he falls in love with a mortal woman, Amber (Suzanna Leigh), the assistant of well-meaning Van Helsing (Dennis Price) and wants to leave his life as a vampire behind. So Merlin hooks him up with Frankenstein (Freddie Jones), who is not only able to turn him into a human but also make him immortal - but Frankenstein actually has sinister plans, he wants to kill Count Downe and become his replacement as king of the netherworld. Luckily though, Count Downe doesn't really want to become immortal if it means surviving Amber by an eternity, and thus he lets Van Helsing perform an operation on him to make him a mere mortal - and in the end, Van Helsing, who is really Merlin, calls Frankenstein's bluff and condemns him to spend the next hundred years in a crystal ball.

This mix of horror, comedy and (rock-)musical  seems like a trailblazing film in writing, since the two films that are now considered classics of this particular genre blend, Phantom of Paradise and Rocky Horror Picture Show, were released only afterwards (if not long afterwards). Unfortunately, Son of Dracula is anything but a cinematic milestone, mainly because it simply isn't funny, it's rock music interludes seem weirdly out of place, and it's terribly written, with no highlight, no climax, no narrative tension, no nothing.

Actually, this is a pretty bad and forgettable film, and it's nothing short of a small miracle that after this one, anyone else even dared to blend horror, comedy and rock music.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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