Dracula and his Vampire Brides (1973)

The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973) also known as Count Dracula and his Vampire Brides starring Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing and Michael Coles.  The satanic name fits a lot better since there really isn't any Bride, plural or otherwise.  Lots of female vampires and a brief mention of turning Von Helsing's granddaughter into his consort but that is as close as it gets.  Wikipedia has a good write up on the movie as always.

Strangely, IMDB insists on the singular Bride, maybe because of the singular consort reference?  But watching the film, title sequence says Brides.  And there are a lot of them in the Cellar.  Brides it is.  I do want to see the engagement rings however.  There's got to be rings right?

Cudos go to The Grindhouse Cinema Database for the best Movie Posters

Love Lee and Cushing.  Though I feel that Cushing as Von Helsing, got the better deal in this movie.  He definitely was the better actor of the two in this one.  Lee was a little wooden.

The actual plot with a few modifications would make a first class modern germ horror movie.  Instead of a "real" Dracula, drugs and trickery could be used to convince and compel others to help a cult of crazies who want to destroy the world for their "dark master".  Would make quite the thriller I think.   Plenty of high tech with the security sensors and all.

I had a major objection to the concept in that why would Dracula want to kill off the human race when as a vampire, humans are his food source.  But they didn't overlook this piece of illogic and instead used it as a piece of psychoanalysis of an immortal who wants to end his soulless forever existence once and for all and wants to take the whole world with him.

Wonder if he was pissed when he was brought back to (un)life?  Did he kill off whomever brought him back to life after the last time he was destroyed by Von Helsing.  Maybe the Asian woman who does the rituals now, was not the one that brought him back.  It matters not.  The Count is tired and wants to go on to a more final eternal night. 

Now there are a couple problems.  Von Helsing makes a silver bullet, which I thought only worked on werewolves. At least it was from a cross.  But then he puts this silver bullet in a small one shot pistol.  Ummmmm, where is the bullet case and gun powder???  It wont even stop a baby werewolf, or anything for that matter, in its current incarnation.  Of course when he uses it later, it works fine.   Must be an "older" cartridge model.

And not only is silver bullets out of character, so is the running water.  That is used for witches, a la Wizard of Oz.  Not sure where else.  But not on Vampires, unless it was holy water.  So the sprinkler system should not have bothered the brides at all.

One final note, just why are all the "Brides" chained up in the basement anyway?