This Hammer horror made during the company's swansong years is based on the real life tale of the Hungarian Countess Bathory who bathed in the blood of young virgins in order to preserve her youth. Here the character has been renamed the Countess Nadasdy and is excellently portrayed by Ingrid Pitt. Director Peter Sasdy (who was Hungarian) manages to extract some period detail (not the pleasant kind) from the Jeremy Paul script such as the treatment of peasants by the aristocracy and he is aided by the rich lighting of Cinematographer Ken Talbot. Sasdy was without doubt one of the best Hammer or British horror film directors alongside Terence Fisher, Roy Ward Baker, Freddie Francis and John Gilling. Indeed Sasdy was the only other director than Terence Fisher who was able to relate the attitudes of society and the eerie atmospheric poetry to the vampire myth. While this is no criticism against Sasdy, it would of been interesting to see how Terence Fisher would have approached the film. The material would have given him many opportunities to place emphasis on character and setting, which was the main features of his style. Other delights include the able support from the always reliable Nigel Green who plays a faithful servant who supplies Pitt with suitable victims and Maurice Denham is fun as the ill-fated inquisitive librarian Master Fabio. The film has now been reissued on DVD with "Twins Of Evil" and "Vampire Circus" by Carlton as a box set entitled, "Hammer House Of Horror: The Vampire Collection".
Review of Countess Dracula
