Director: Freddie Francis
Writers: Anthony Hinds
Stars: Christopher Lee, Rupert Davies, Veronica Carlson
Run Time: 1 Hour, 32 Minutes
Link:
Commentary
A boy rides his bicycle to the church; he’s the janitor. He goes to ring the church bell and notices that the rope is covered in blood. The priest comes in and climbs the long, winding stairs to the bell tower to find a dead girl hanging inside the bell with bite marks on her neck. “When shall we be free of his evil?” The priest cries. Time passes, and we see that winter has come and gone.
A year has passed since Dracula was destroyed in the previous film. The monsignor comes to town, and he says he wants to “clean” the castle of its evil influence. The local priest is terrified to even talk about it and refuses to walk all the way up the mountain to the castle. It’s dark by the time he arrives at the castle and begins his blessing. The terrified priest runs away and falls down the mountain, injuring himself and cracking open the ice that has trapped Dracula. The priest looks and finds that… Dracula Has Risen From the Grave!
The Monsignor returns to the town and says everything is fine now, the castle has been exorcised. We soon see that Dracula has enslaved the priest. Dracula and the priest hop on a carriage and high-tail it to the nearest town, which just happens to be where the monsignor lives. Dracula has dinner on the way there, picking on Maria’s waitress friend Zena for a first course.
The Monsignor returns to his own city. He is raising his niece Maria, his ward, and her mother. Maria’s boyfriend gets soaked in beer, which doesn’t impress the Monsignor. When he mentions that he’s an atheist, that impresses the monsignor even less.
The priest rents a room at the inn, and in the basement is a secret area where he hides Dracula and his coffin. Dracula tells Zena to bring Maria to him; he wants revenge on the monsignor. Zena does her job, and Maria is brought in before Dracula. He’s ready to bite her, but Paul interrupts and runs Dracula off. He enters her bedroom later that night, uninvited, and finally bites her.
The Monsignor finds the bite marks and knows immediately what has happened. Dracula comes back the next night, and the monsignor runs him off with a cross and chases him across the rooftops. The evil priest bashes the monsignor in the head with a rock. The monsignor calls for Paul to help, and he explains everything to him before he dies.
Paul catches on to the evil priest and makes him lead Paul to Dracula, who is in his coffin. Paul places the stake above his heart and stakes him. It’s still not enough because Paul is an atheist and will not pray. Dracula grabs Maria as he escapes. They both board a carriage driven by the priest, and once again head out of town.
They all run to the castle. Maria pulls the big cross off the door and throws it down the mountain. Paul and Dracula wrestle, and Dracula gets thrown down the mountain and impaled on the cross. The evil priest comes to his senses and prays, causing the final death of Dracula. When we look again, Dracula is gone. Did he get away? Did he turn to dust? We don’t see what happened.
Synopsis
Several interior sets from previous Hammer films are noticeable here, from the previous Dracula film as well as Frankenstein Created Woman.
It looks good and has a good story. Dracula actually gets lines this time, and not only that, but he also has a plan for revenge.