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Il Cav. Costante Nicosia Demoniaco, ovvero: Dracula in Brianza
Young Dracula
Dracula in the Provinces
Italy 1975
produced by Coralta Cinematografica
directed by Lucio Fulci
starring Lando Buzzanca, Rossano Brazzi, Sylva Koscina, Moira Orfei, Christa Linder, John Steiner, Francesca Romana Coluzzi, Grazia Di Marzà, Antonio Allocca, Grazia Spadaro, Franco Nebbia, Michele Cimarosa, Giampaolo Rossi, Ciccio Ingrassia, Valentina Cortese, Franca Martelli, Barbara Musci, Ilona Staller, Mauro Vestri, Ugo Fangareggi, Carlo Bagno, Renato Malavasi, John Bartha, Gianfranco Bocca, Belsana Arfenone, Dori Dorika
story by Lucio Fulci, screenplay by Pupi Avati, Bruno Corbucci, Mario Amendola, Lucio Fulci, additional dialogue by Enzo Jannacci, Giuseppe Viola, music by Bixio-Frizzi Tempera
Dracula
review by Mike Haberfelner
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Toothpaste businessman Costante (Lando Buzzanca) is doing alright - but
he could do a lot better if it wasn't for his superstitions. Then he
travels to Romania, where he meets up with Count Draculescu (John
Steiner), the last of the Draculas, who throws a party in his honour, at
which Costante drinks a whole lot - and thus despite the presence of three
attractive naked ladies (Franca Martelli, Barbara Musci, Ilona Staller),
he lands in bed with Draculescu himself. Costante leaves Romania in a
rush and now panics he might have become gay - until his mistress (Christa
Linder) cuts herself and he sucks out her wound - and feels not only
envigorated by it, he also becomes the mean person he has always kept
himself from becoming. And he soon feels a thirst for more and more blood,
which can only mean one thing: He has become a vampire - not only in the
traditional sense but also in the metaphorical sense first suggested by
Karl Marx (vampirism = capitalism). After various encounters he has when
either trying to get rid of the curse or quench his thirst for blood, he
finds a solution to make everybody happy, even the unions: Obligatory but
paid blood donations. Then though he learns his wife (Sylva Koscina) is
pregnant, and figures he's not a vampire after all, because vamprires
can't have children. Then his son is born with fangs though ... Rossano
Brazzi plays Costante's psychiatrist, Moira Orfei an S/M prostitute in a
weird costume in what's probably the film's funniest scene. A
comedy that just doesn't seem to know what it's about: Is it a shallow
vampire comedy or socio-political satire, or just a movie about a
henpecked husband, or even an erotic comedy. This lack of direction,
plotwise, is mirrored in the film's actual narrative, which totally lacks
stringency and seems to be made up of isolated episodes of varying quality
rather than supported by an actual storyline. Add to this leading man
Lando Buzzanca, who's certainly likeable but not exactly particularly
funny, and one of Lucio Fulci's lazier directorial efforts, and you are
left with ... well, not pretty much.
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