Watching an old interview with Ingrid Pitt recently (she died in 2010), I just had to weigh in on these two films especially THE VAMPIRE LOVERS (1969) as it had quite an impact on me when I first saw it in 1970 at a drive-in theatre. It was October of that year, I was a freshman at the University of South Carolina, and already a Hammer devotee. I had read the Sheridan Le Fanu story CARMILLA in high school and had seen an earlier film version called TERROR IN THE CRYPT with Christopher Lee.
At that time I was not prepared for how R rated this film would be thanks to Ms Pitt’s lack of clothing. Roy Ward Baker’s solid direction enhanced the film’s atmospheric qualities as well as the explicit nature of some of the material. Of course LOVERS seems quite tame compared to what you see in horror films today but back in 1970 it was really something else and the movie still has the power to occasionally grab you thanks to Ms Pitt. Peter Cushing has a small but significant role to play in the proceedings.
COUNTESS DRACULA I didn’t see until a few years later when it played second hand at another drive-in (I really do miss the drive-ins as I saw so many interesting films there from 1969-1975 before the X rated material took over). COUNTESS DRACULA is a totally misleading title as the title character is not a vampire and is in no way related to Dracula. She was based on an early 17th century Hungarian countess (Elisabeth Bathory) who reportedly bathed in the blood of young women which she believed kept her looking young and fair (for a more graphic version of this story, run down the Spanish/Italian co-production THE LEGEND OF BLOOD CASTLE with Ewa Aulin).
Once again Pitt has a commanding presence and she is ably assisted by familiar British character actor Nigel Green as her captain of the guard. A very young Lesley-Anne Down appears briefly as Pitt’s daughter. Hungarian Peter Sasdy’s direction is atmospheric with some occasional knockout camerawork but overall COUNTESS is not as good as LOVERS. It does make for an ideal pairing of the two big Hammer films that Ingrid Pitt made for them and will remain the movies on which her reputation will always rest.
The Capsule Critic 