DRACULA'S DAUGHTER (1936) Starring Gloria Holden, Otto Kruger, Marguerite Churchill, Edward Van Sloane, Irving Pichel Directed by Lambert Hillyer
Picking up exactly where its predecessor left off, DRACULA'S DAUGHTER opens with two policemen descending the stone staircase of Carfax Abbey. AT the bottom, they find the body of the hapless Renfield. Immediately following this discovery, they find Dr. Van Helsing (Van Sloane), caught red-handed, as it were, having just driven a stake through the heart of Count Dracula. The good Doctor is arrested and of course his story is not believed, so he asks for Dr. Garth (Kruger), a former student, to be sent for. Meanwhile, the mysterious Countess Marya Zaleska appears. She steals Dracula's body and burns it, thinking she's finally free of her family's curse. The Countess, who is actually the daughter of Dracula, is wrong. She still has to sleep in a coffin during the day and drink human blood to survive. When Dr. Garth arrives to help his friend Van Helsing, the vampiress thinks he may be able to help her as well...
A follow-up to DRACULA without Bela Lugosi generates pretty low expectations, and that fact actually helps this film. It is by no means the classic that the original was, but it is a surprisingly good little film just the same. This is especially true when you consider the fact that Edward Van Sloane was the only member of the cast known as a horror actor. Gloria Holden brings a cool sophistication to the vampire role. While not a particularly "pretty" woman, she did have very large, dark, beautiful eyes and when she appears shrouded in black, with only those eyes showing, she presents quite a striking figure. Otto Kruger, a fine actor not usually associated with this type of film, is brilliant as the hero. Incidentally, it is Kruger, not Holden, who gets top billing in the opening credits. Irving Pichel, who appeared in a good number of westerns, is great as the freaky Sandor, Countess Zaleska's manservant.
There are a great many creepy scenes in DRACULA'S DAUGHTER; I've already mentioned Holden's hypnotic gaze. There is also an especially nice scene where Holden and Pichel burn Dracula's body on the dark, foggy moors - very atmospheric. Another nice touch is the revisiting of Castle Dracula from the original film...the same spider web on the staircase and everything! Some not-so-subtle hints at lesbianism provide some interesting moments, as well. Director Hillyer, best known for the many westerns he made, does a much better job here than on his previous horror film MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE. He obviously has a penchant for humor and, unlike MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE, where Hillyer's attempts at humor were heavy-handed and inappropriate, the humor in DRACULA'S DAUGHTER is confined to a couple of scenes and is appropriate to the story.
Picking up exactly where its predecessor left off, DRACULA'S DAUGHTER opens with two policemen descending the stone staircase of Carfax Abbey. AT the bottom, they find the body of the hapless Renfield. Immediately following this discovery, they find Dr. Van Helsing (Van Sloane), caught red-handed, as it were, having just driven a stake through the heart of Count Dracula. The good Doctor is arrested and of course his story is not believed, so he asks for Dr. Garth (Kruger), a former student, to be sent for. Meanwhile, the mysterious Countess Marya Zaleska appears. She steals Dracula's body and burns it, thinking she's finally free of her family's curse. The Countess, who is actually the daughter of Dracula, is wrong. She still has to sleep in a coffin during the day and drink human blood to survive. When Dr. Garth arrives to help his friend Van Helsing, the vampiress thinks he may be able to help her as well...
A follow-up to DRACULA without Bela Lugosi generates pretty low expectations, and that fact actually helps this film. It is by no means the classic that the original was, but it is a surprisingly good little film just the same. This is especially true when you consider the fact that Edward Van Sloane was the only member of the cast known as a horror actor. Gloria Holden brings a cool sophistication to the vampire role. While not a particularly "pretty" woman, she did have very large, dark, beautiful eyes and when she appears shrouded in black, with only those eyes showing, she presents quite a striking figure. Otto Kruger, a fine actor not usually associated with this type of film, is brilliant as the hero. Incidentally, it is Kruger, not Holden, who gets top billing in the opening credits. Irving Pichel, who appeared in a good number of westerns, is great as the freaky Sandor, Countess Zaleska's manservant.
There are a great many creepy scenes in DRACULA'S DAUGHTER; I've already mentioned Holden's hypnotic gaze. There is also an especially nice scene where Holden and Pichel burn Dracula's body on the dark, foggy moors - very atmospheric. Another nice touch is the revisiting of Castle Dracula from the original film...the same spider web on the staircase and everything! Some not-so-subtle hints at lesbianism provide some interesting moments, as well. Director Hillyer, best known for the many westerns he made, does a much better job here than on his previous horror film MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE. He obviously has a penchant for humor and, unlike MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE, where Hillyer's attempts at humor were heavy-handed and inappropriate, the humor in DRACULA'S DAUGHTER is confined to a couple of scenes and is appropriate to the story.