I’m going to seize the opportunity here and shamelessly rip off Phil Farrand and his Star Trek Nitpicker’s Guides. If you missed them back in the early-mid 90s, Farrand is a serious-ass Jesus freak who wrote books about the original Star Trek series, and the pathetic Next Generation, wherein he humorously, and entertainingly (despite being a nerd-boy who doesn’t know, and doesn’t care to know, anything about the actors, writers, and directors who worked on the shows) pointed out all the bloopers, plot oversights, and continuity problems in Star Trek. Geeked-out Trekkies from all over the globe responded enthusiastically, and Farrand now maintains www.nitcentral.com, carrying on the tradition begun in his now out-of-print books.
Despite Farrand’s annoying lack of knowledge about anything not associated with computer programming or Jesus, the books were pretty damn funny. What caught my eye more than going episode by episode and rattling off the bloopers were Phil’s Tote Boards, lists of seemingly mundane events in the Star Trek universe that reoccurred so many times in the course of the series that they became clichés. E.g., “Number of times Spock says ‘fascinating’: 49”; “Number of episodes in which Scotty worries over the Enterprise’s engines: 19”; “Number of times Kirk’s shirt is torn: 7.” Each tote board then sites the exact episodes and moments where the events took place. It’s kind of a guilty pleasure for me, but damned if I didn’t read and re-read the tote boards, chuckling all the while.
I try not to do shit like this too often, but a few years back whilst watching every Dracula movie Christopher Lee made for Hammer Studios in England, I inexplicably morphed into Phil Farrand and drew up my own Hammer Dracula Tote Board. Seemed a pity to not inflict on the world, so here ‘tis.
ABBREVIATIONS FOR THE SEVEN CHRISTOPHER LEE HAMMER DRACULA MOVIES:
Horror of Dracula (1958): Horror
Dracula, Prince of Darkness (1965): Prince
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968): Risen
Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970): Taste
Scars of Dracula (1970): Scars
Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972): A.D.
The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1974): Satanic
(Note to Hammer nerds: 1960’s Brides of Dracula isn’t included here, as Christopher Lee sat that one out.)
1) Total number of victims Dracula bites onscreen: 11
2) Number of times Dracula is about to bite a victim when someone, or something, thwarts him at the last second: 7
3) Number of times Dracula is killed: 8
4) Number of times Dracula is miraculously resurrected: 6
5) Number of times the fearful, tight-lipped locals offer no help whatsoever: 7
6) Number of times characters approach creepy looking carriages, only to be shanghaied to Dracula’s castle: 6
7) Number of faithful lackeys Dracula brings under his spell, only to treat with utter contempt: 12
8) Number of characters named "Paul": 3
9) Number of girls Paul Carlson makes time with in Scars of Dracula: 3
10) Consecutive movies in which Hammer character actor Michael Ripper appears: 3
11) Number of times a victim’s blood looks suspiciously unlike blood: 10
12) Number of times the hipster kids in A.D. 1972 engage in embarrassingly dated hipster lingo: too many times to count
13) Number of times in Scars of Dracula when Christopher Lee is about to explain “the fire” before inexplicably trailing off: 2
14) Number of movies Christopher Lee publicly griped about: at least 4
15) Number of moments of sheer poetic beauty: 1
***
1) Violates Lucy and Mina in their bedrooms in Horror. Corners Helen, after she discovers her dead husband, in Prince. Surprises Zena in the forest in Risen. Defiles Maria in her bed in Risen. Does away with Zena in the bakery cellar in Risen. Lures Lucy into the old church in Taste. Debases Julie in Scars. Mauls Tania in Scars. Feasts on Laura after being resurrected in A.D. Finishes off a drugged Gaynor in A.D. Appears out of the mist for a kidnapped Jane in Satanic.
2) Flees after Charles and Father Sander barge through Diana’s door in Prince. Shrinks away after Paul frustrates his efforts in the bakery cellar with Maria in Risen. Smashes through Maria’s window after Paul and the Monsignor foil him in Risen. Slips into the dark after Alice’s drunken father (“Alice! You’re gonna be whipped!”) spoils the garden setting in Taste. Concentration is broken by a rooster in Taste. Recoils in horror seeing Sarah’s crucifix necklace in Scars. Gives up on Jessica after Van Helsing invades the church in A.D.
3) Burns to ashes by sunlight in Horror. Drowns in running water in Prince. Impaled on a large metal cross in Risen. Caught in the light of a stained glass window, and falls onto an alter cross in Taste. Electrocuted and set on fire in Scars. Skewered on a carriage wheel’s spoke at the beginning of A.D.; takes holy water in the face and falls on a stake at the end. Entangled by a Hawthorne tree and then driven through by Van Helsing in Satanic.
4) Alan’s blood is poured into his ashes in Prince. A priest’s blood trickles into his mouth in Risen. Lord Courtney drinks his blood, transmogrifying into Dracula in Taste. A giant rubber bat vomits blood on his ashes in Scars. Resurrected by hippies via black magic ritual in A.D. Reincarnated by a Chinese woman in Satanic.
5) Van Helsing butts heads with the innkeeper (“Look sir, you’re a stranger here in Klaussenberg – some things are best left alone.") in Horror. The carriage driver abandons Charles and his three companions, refusing to go any further at night, in Prince. Resigned patrons at the tavern watch the despondent priest get loaded in Risen. Local pub-crawlers duke it with Paul rather than help him storm the castle in Risen. Julie plays dumb about why Paul can’t go to the castle in Scars. Another boorish carriage driver strands Sarah and Simon (“I wouldn’t advise you to stay here much longer, anyway.”) in Scars. The landlord and his blue-collar buddies forcibly eject Sarah and Simon from the inn (not once, but twice) in Scars.
6) Charles and his companions board a driverless carriage in Prince. Klove takes naïve Diana back to the castle in Prince. Maria follows the drunken priest to Dracula’s carriage in Risen. Hypnotized Alice leads Lucy to the driverless carriage that takes them both on a joyride to the dilapidated church in Taste (the church in this movie is, for intents and purposes, Dracula’s castle). Paul falls asleep in Klove’s carriage after being given the heave-ho from the inn in Scars. Klove chucks Julie into his carriage in Scars.
7) Growls at and then shoves the vampire woman in Horror. Hisses at Helen and manhandles her (twice) in Prince. Slaps Zena to the ground in Risen. Throws Maria at the castle doors in Risen. Gives Alice the cold shoulder ("I have no further use for you.”) in Taste. Ditches Lucy in a pond in Taste. Repeatedly stabs Tania with a knife in Scars. Whips Klove and later brands him with an antique sword in Scars. Verbally berates Johnny Alucard (“I promised you nothing.”) in A.D. Shackles Jane to the basement wall in Satanic. Reveals to his three partners he’s going to infect them with the plague in Satanic.
8) Barry Andrews plays the atheist Paul (“I don’t deny his existence, I just don’t believe it.”) in Risen. Anthony Corlan plays the love-struck Paul Paxton in Taste. Christopher Matthews plays the ladies’ man Paul Carlson in Scars.
9) Wakes up in bed with the Burgomaster’s daughter; makes out with the inn’s waitress mere seconds after meeting her in the dead of night; hops into bed with Tania in Dracula’s castle.
10) As the lovable innkeeper Max in Risen. As the no-nonsense, alcoholic Detective Cobb in Taste. As the paranoid, broken-spirited landlord in Scars.
11) Red water paint stains the dress of the Vampire Woman after Harker stakes her in Horror. Cherry soda gushes out of Alan’s neck after Klove slits it in Prince. Unidentifiable light red liquid discolors Helen’s dress in Prince. Halloween blood bubbles out of Dracula’s chest after Paul stakes him in Risen. Cups of blood look like cherry slushies in Taste; ditto for Lord Courtley’s blood when he cuts himself. Red food coloring is smeared on Joanna’s neck in Scars; the same food coloring appears later on the floor of the church. Red ink spills out of Alucard during the ritual in A.D., and then again from Dracula after he falls on the stake.
12) This being Hammer’s ill-advised attempt to “update” the series, all the kids naturally talk like a bunch of groovy 70s swingers throughout the movie, man. However, the four main offenders are: Jessica explaining to Van Helsing why she’s reading his book Treatise on the Black Mass (“Just a quiet bit of mind blowing.”); Johnny Alucard setting the mood at the black magic ritual (“Dig the music, kids!”); Alucard’s goofy crony who dresses like a monk (“Hey, you’re a sight for sore eyes, man!” and “It was too way out for it to be real, wasn’t it?”)
13) In front of Paul, and then later in front of Sarah and Simon.
14) On Risen: “…Made with a complete absence of style, taste, and production quality.” On Prince: “… The dialog Dracula was to speak was so appalling that I said, ‘Look, if we can’t do better than this, let’s have him not speak at all.’” On A.D.: “All I get to do is stand around on unhallowed ground, sweep down corridors and make the odd pounce or two.” On Satanic: “…fatuous, pointless, absurd.”
15) Whether you dig ‘em or not, the movies had, by virtue of sheer numbers, built up a unique momentum by the series’ swansong, The Satanic Rites of Dracula. In the last third of that movie, to the strains of an ominous, beautiful score, Lorimer Van Helsing (Peter Cushing, as always), the great grandson of the original Doctor Van Helsing, fashions a silver bullet out of a small cross as prepares for the final showdown with millionaire recluse D.D. Denham, whom he suspects is actually Dracula. The gorgeous music and Cushing’s typically – and brilliantly – understated performance lend the scene a poignant air of destiny and finality, whether intentional or not.
