This is a bad movie and a knockoff of other vampire movies, but the filmmakers clearly knew that, so it might be worth checking out for those interested in intentionally bad movies. "The Vampire Happening" mostly rips off Roman Polanski's far-better vampire farce "Dance of the Vampires" (1967), retitled "The Fearless Vampire Killers" in the U.S. Like that film, there's animation in the opening credits. There's a blabbering old man. The monk turned nymphomaniacal vampire is like the Jewish vampire in Polanski's film. Both films are full of sex jokes, but "The Vampire Happening" also has lots of topless women. Polanski depicted, perhaps, mainstream cinema's first explicitly gay vampire and did so in a rather inoffensive way; "The Vampire Happening" has several gags based on stereotypical homosexual characters. Both films bare some resemblance to Hammer's vampire films, and "The Vampire Happening" is even directed by Freddie Francis, who also directed one of Hammer's Dracula sequels, "Dracula has Risen from the Grave" (1968)--in my estimation, the worst entry in the series. And, in both films, there's a debauched vampire party crashed by a few humans (which is originally taken from Hammer's "The Kiss of the Vampire" (1963)) and where the head Count is portrayed by the same Ferdy Mayne. This time, Mayne plays Count Dracula, which is the reason I watched the film, as I've been watching a bunch of Dracula movies since reading Bram Stoker's novel.
Of course, "The Vampire Happening" has next to nothing to do with Stoker's tale. Dracula doesn't even appear in the movie until over an hour into it. This Count has the first name of "Christopher"--a gag referencing frequent Dracula actor Christopher Lee. He also travels by a helicopter with a bat painted on it, he nibbles on a banana, stares at a female vampire's breasts, and literally toots his own horn during a tickling session in bed with some other fem vamps. Superficially, the film resembles a couple other parts from Stoker. A Westerner travels to a Transylvania castle and encounters vampires; instead of Stoker's Jonathan Harker, this time it's a Hollywood actress who inherits the property and the title of Baroness. There's also the theme of vampirism exposing human society's sexual repression, but this is done in the obnoxious fashion of a trashy sex comedy here, such as with the monk turned vampire character. The castle is located next to both a Catholic monastery and a girls' school, both of which are rampant in anti-clerical horniness.
Besides the bad English-language voiceovers of the version I saw and the aforementioned sex stuff, most of the film's humor relies on mistaken identity, as the American actress looks like her vampire ancestor. Both characters trade hair colors by use of blonde and black-haired wigs, which may be confusing, but isn't funny. There are also many shots of a painting of the topless ancestor. Even after the human male characters learn about the switcheroo shenanigans going on between the two women, they still somehow mistake the two again in an ending that makes no sense.
One of the best parts of "The Vampire Happening" is its beginning in-flight movie, as the actress watches herself on screen in a sex scene. The sex scene, like the outer movie of "The Vampire Happening," features nude breasts and a lot of absurd, sexual-sounding panting, which is enough to confuse one child passenger into believing she's watching her first adult movie, but there's nothing explicit, or even anything that faithfully represents real sex--and, if anything, it's immature. At least the filmmakers knew that, though, I guess. The self-reflexive in-flight movie essentially admits what kind of movie "The Vampire Happening" is, and its doubling theme of the Countess alludes to the movie being a knockoff of other movies--although nobody is going to mistake this one for the better movies it imitates.
Of course, "The Vampire Happening" has next to nothing to do with Stoker's tale. Dracula doesn't even appear in the movie until over an hour into it. This Count has the first name of "Christopher"--a gag referencing frequent Dracula actor Christopher Lee. He also travels by a helicopter with a bat painted on it, he nibbles on a banana, stares at a female vampire's breasts, and literally toots his own horn during a tickling session in bed with some other fem vamps. Superficially, the film resembles a couple other parts from Stoker. A Westerner travels to a Transylvania castle and encounters vampires; instead of Stoker's Jonathan Harker, this time it's a Hollywood actress who inherits the property and the title of Baroness. There's also the theme of vampirism exposing human society's sexual repression, but this is done in the obnoxious fashion of a trashy sex comedy here, such as with the monk turned vampire character. The castle is located next to both a Catholic monastery and a girls' school, both of which are rampant in anti-clerical horniness.
Besides the bad English-language voiceovers of the version I saw and the aforementioned sex stuff, most of the film's humor relies on mistaken identity, as the American actress looks like her vampire ancestor. Both characters trade hair colors by use of blonde and black-haired wigs, which may be confusing, but isn't funny. There are also many shots of a painting of the topless ancestor. Even after the human male characters learn about the switcheroo shenanigans going on between the two women, they still somehow mistake the two again in an ending that makes no sense.
One of the best parts of "The Vampire Happening" is its beginning in-flight movie, as the actress watches herself on screen in a sex scene. The sex scene, like the outer movie of "The Vampire Happening," features nude breasts and a lot of absurd, sexual-sounding panting, which is enough to confuse one child passenger into believing she's watching her first adult movie, but there's nothing explicit, or even anything that faithfully represents real sex--and, if anything, it's immature. At least the filmmakers knew that, though, I guess. The self-reflexive in-flight movie essentially admits what kind of movie "The Vampire Happening" is, and its doubling theme of the Countess alludes to the movie being a knockoff of other movies--although nobody is going to mistake this one for the better movies it imitates.