We have no nudity but there are sexual overtones. There is some debate within the film of faith versus atheism, apparently staking a vampire does not work if the person doing the staking lacks religious belief. No Peter Cushing here, which makes the vampire hunter aspect interesting. Good cast, nice to see Hammer's most prolific actor Michael Ripper have a larger part than normal. The sets are great, I felt like I was almost in the mountain village. He goes on his usual round of terror and bloodsucking, his target of desire being the beautiful Veronica Carlson. Move forward a year and Count Dracula is accidentally revived. Great opening for this installment, a deaf altar boy discovers a young woman hanging upside down from the church bell, blood dripping from her neck. This is hardly Hammer's finest hour, however the film is relatively slow to start, and the story isn't the most inventive ever to come from the studio - but Hammer fans will enjoy it, and I would have no qualms with recommending this as a decent waste of your time. The camp style that the studio is famous for is here by the bucket load too, and that can only be a good thing. The film is stylishly shot, and features some of the best use of lighting ever seen in a Hammer film. Freddie Francis (Dr Terror, The Creeping Flesh) directs this film and succeeds in creating a morbid and fascinating atmosphere that bodes well with the subject material on hand. Unfortunately, Christopher Lee doesn't have a great deal of screen time in this flick but every moment he is on screen is a highlight and, as usual, he does well with the role and proves that he is the only man other than Bela Lugosi to do it right. Dracula doesn't take this sort of behaviour lightly, and so decides to take on revenge on the holy man - by taking his niece as his bride! Dracula is one of the greatest characters ever to be written and portrayed on screen, and it's also one that Christopher Lee has become famous for playing. This film follows Count Dracula as he is resurrected shortly after the priest, Ernst Muller, exorcises his castle. Even if the idea behind is less than brilliant and most studios would have shied away, Hammer approach it with gusto, and the results are always good natured, easy viewing that's hard to dislike. What I love about Hammer is that they aren't afraid to take an existing story and play around with it to create something new. With this short and relatively simple introduction the viewer quickly understands that Count Dracula is one of the "Children of the night" who, like the vermin that scurry on the floor, hunts his prey in a cold and calculating manner so that he may feed on them.Sporting the ultra camp title - "Dracula Has Risen From the Grave", this is a solid entry in Hammer's Dracula series. Finally the Count appears standing upright, his black cape draped over his body, and then Browning pushes the camera towards the Count's face, drawing the audience's attention to his eyes which appear to be looking right at us as we sit and watch him. Then Browning cuts between several shots of rats crawling on the cellar floor, possums creeping around on the dirt, and even a bug which emerges from its own coffin. Followed by a cut of a hand slowly reaching out of a coffin lid. An example of this is the Count's introduction in his castle cellar, which begins with the camera moving towards several coffins on the ground. With the help of his cinematographer, Karl Freund, Browning creates a very atmospheric film about vampires that never veers to far from reality.
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