Jess Franco's thirty-fifth film was COUNT DRACULA aka NACHTS, WENN DRACULA ERWACHT. Written by Jess Franco and Harry Alan Towers as Peter Welbeck, based on Dracula by Bram Stoker, produced by Harry Alan Towers, music composed by Bruno Nicolai, it was film in Alicante, Comunidad Valenciana, Spain in Eastmancolour, it runs for 98 mins, in UK 97 mins and in Sweden 91 mins. It made ESP 41,278,656 in Spain, Franco's most successful film. It starred Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, Herbert Lom as Prof. Abraham Van Helsing, Klaus Kinski as R. M. Renfield, Soledad Miranda as Lucy Westernra, Maria Rohm as Mina Murray, Fred Williams as Jonathan Harker, Paul Muller as Dr. John Seward, Jack Taylor as Quincey Morris and Jess Franco as Van Helsing's Servant.
The film opens with a bell being rung to inform passengers it is time to board a train. A young man boards the train. In his carriage there is another man traveling, he asks him if the train stops at Bestwitz, which he infroms him it does. To make conversation he informs him that he is a lawyer traveling to Bestwitz to meet a client, by the name of Count Dracula. This make the other man very uneasy.
Arriving in Betwitz the young man and his traveling companion, make their way to a hotel for the night. At the hotel the young man is informed by the owner that everything has been prepared by the Count.
During the night he is disturbed by the owners wife, informing him that the following night will be St. George's Night, when all the evil of the world will be let loose. (So a bit like Halloween.)
That night the young man along with his travelling companion board a coach. During the journey he asks how far it is until the Borgas Pass. He is told, they should reach it by night fall, (even though it is already night!) And then onto Count Dracula's Castle, but his companion has no idea. At Borgas Pass, the young man disembarks from the coach and is met by another. On the journey the coach is followed by a pack of wolves, (well, alright, a pack of German Shepherds.) After a while the coach halts, the driver disembarks and silently commands the wolves to depart. He returns to the coach and resumes the journey.
The coach arrives at Count Dracula's Castle, where the young man disembarks and knocks on the main door and is greeted by Count Dracula.
Showing the young man into his room, he notices that there is no reflection of his host in the mirror. Latter on, over dinner, Dracula and the young man go over some plans for a house in London, England. While going doing so, the young man drops some photo's out of his wallet.
Intrigued, Count Dracula, asks him who the women are.
He is informed that they are his fiance and her friend Miss Lucy Westenra. After having a discussion about Count Dracula's family past and the reasons for him moving to England. The young man, whose name is Jonathan Harker, is shown to his room. After looking around the room for a while, he decides to explore, only to find that his door has been locked. After a while he realizes that he is defeated and lies down on his bed to rest.
Outside the castle a woman comes running up to the gates, crying and screaming that she wants her baby back, but receives no reply.
Harker wakes up, to find himself in a crypt, surrounded by three beautiful women.
Just as they are about to feast on him, Count Dracula appears, commanding them to step back and leave him alone. For he is his alone. They ask what do they have and Count Dracula points to a bag in the corner, containing the crying sounds of a baby. They descend onto it hungrily.
Harker wakes again, this time back in his room, wondering if he has had a bad dream. Looking out of the window, he sees Count Dracula, standing on the battlements transforming into a bat. Walking past the mirror, he notices to puncture wounds on his neck. Realizing that he can escape out of the window, he does so and makes his way down to the crypt. Here he discovers packing cases full of earth and a tomb marked DRACULA.
He lifts the lid, to find the body of Count Dracula. Tormented by what he has seen, he flees from the castle by jumping out of a window.
Some time latter, Harker wakes up in a hospital, with a doctor sitting by his bed. The doctor introduces himself as Doctor Seward and they are in Professor Van Helsing's private clinic, just outside London. Harker asks how he got there and Doctor Seward tells him, that his body was found in a mountain stream 200 km from Budapest.
Harker starts to talk about what he witnessed at Castle Dracula, by Doctor Seward, thinking that he is having delusions, tranquilizes him. Just then Professor Van Helsing enter's and asks if there has been any change. Doctor Seward mention that Harker mentioned Count Dracula. This startles Van Helsing, just as there is cry from some where else in the clinic, Doctor Seward mentions that it must be Renfield and goes to see to him, leaving Van Helsing in the room with Harker. Van Helsing goes over to Harker and looks at his neck, too see the two puncture marks.
In a padded cell, Renfield throws his food at the wall and starts to make patterns in it. He then goes over to a snuff box he keeps and takes the bodies of two fly's out, of which one he starts to eat, when Doctor Seward enters. Worried, Renfield climbs up into the window and sits there looking out.
The next day Harkers fiance and Lucy arrive in London, at the train station they are met by one of Van Helsing's servants (its Jess Franco!) who says that he has been sent to collect them.
They arrive at the clinic.
Harker's fiance is show into his room, she asks what is wrong with him and Doctor Seward, says that they think he might of had a mental breakdown, at which point the cries of Renfield are hear, which proves too much for Lucy, who faints.
During the night a voice can be heard calling Lucy's name, while a bat flies outside the window. Lucy wakes as if in a trance and makes her way over to the door and goes out. Harker's fiance enters Lucy's room to find it empty.
Lucy opens the french doors into the garden.
Lucy is followed by Harker's fiance out into the garden, where she sees Dracula feasting on her blood.
The next day, Lucy is back in bed, being examined by Doctor Seward, he notices the two puncture wounds on her neck and mentions to Harker's fiance that she has lost a lot of blood. Asking if she has any family, he is informed that she has a fiance, by the name of Quincey Morris.
Latter that day, Morris arrives at Van Helsing's clinic, where he is met by Doctor Seward. Asking what he can do for her, Van Helsing mentions that he can give her a transfusion of his blood.
That night Count Dracula again pays Lucy a visit.
Hearing a noise come from Lucy's room, Morris rushes in to find her on the floor, noticing the window open he closes it and then places Lucy in the bed.
Harker has left his room and started to wonder the corridors of Van Helsing's clinic, in so doing so he comes across Renfield's room, where he is spotted by Van Helsing's servant and taking into Van Helsings study, where he is in conference with his fiance and Morris.
That night, Renfield is once again looking out of his window.
In the house that Count Dracula is renting, he awakes in his coffin, opens the french windows and appears to communicate with Renfield, forcing him to break the bars and his window and jump out.
Later on Harker's fiance is looking after Lucy, when she hears a noise and goes to investigate, giving Count Dracula the chance to visit her again.
Just then Harker's fiance walks back into the room and catches them at it, so too speak.
Count Dracula flees, leaving Lucy dead. With Lucy's death, but still having Harker's fiance alive, galvanizes Van Helsing into action. He calls a meeting in his study with Harker, Doctor Seward and Morris. Telling them of the legend of Dracula.
Lucy is laid to rest in Highgate Cemetery.
The next day, some children are playing the park near by. A little girl is walking around the park, when she meets Lucy.
The next day Van Helsing sees in the paper that a child has been found dead near the church, knowing this is the deed of the vampire Lucy, he informs Harker and Morris that, that night he wants them to accompany him to Lucy's grave.
He takes them to the crypt and opens her coffin, to revel that it is empty. They wait through out the night and at dawn they return to the crypt, to find Lucy's coffin occupied. Van Helsing takes out a stake, a mallet and proceeds to hammer the stake into Lucy's heart, he then tells Morris to decapitate her with a spade.
Back at the clinic Refield wakes up after his fall.
Doctor Seward, tries to get him too relax. Renfield revels that Count Dracula has bought the house next door to Van Helsing's clinic.
Van Helsing sends Harker and Morris to the house, while Harker's fiance asks to see Renfield. After leaving Van Helsing he has a fit.
Harker, Doctor Seward and Morris enter Count Dracula's house. There they find a strange collection of stuffed animals. They discover that a case has been moved. Just then the stuffed animals begin to come to life, (well lots of close up zooms and someone moving them by hand off camera).
They are being controlled by an amazingly young Count Dracula.
Harker's fiance enters Renfield's cell.
As she nears him, Count Dracula orders Renfield to kill her, he reaches out and grabs her by the neck, twisting her onto the bed.
In the house, Harker raises a crucifix to protect himself, in doing so this breaks Dracula's hold on Renfield, saving his fiance's life and stopping the assault by the stuffed animals.
Later that night Harker's fiance goes to the opera, while Dracula walks through the streets of London and is seen by Harker, but Morris dismisses it. Harker and Morris have joined Van Helsing, only to be informed that Mina, Harker's fiance has left Van Helsing's clinic and gone to the opera, without anyone's permission.
At the opera, in a private box, Mina is attacked by Count Dracula.
Harker and Morris race to the opera house and discover Mina on the floor, with wounds to her neck.
Down at the harbour, Count Dracula employs the services of ships captain to sail him to Varner.
Using the physic link between Dracula and Renfield, Doctor Seward is able to discover that Dracula is to sell to Varner. Van Helsing works out that it will take Dracula two weeks to sail to Varner with his cargo, but if Harker and Morris take a faster route, it would only take them a week and then they could every grave unusable by Dracula.
This last physic link has been too much for Refield and he has died.
At Van Helsing's clinic, Dracula pays him a visit. Van Helsing prevents Dracula from getting nearer to Mina, by inscribing a crucifix on the floor of the living room with a red hot poker.
At Castle Dracula, Harker and Morris have arrived and enter the crypt. Making their way over to the coffins of the three vampiric women, they open each one, staking and beheading as they go. They then make their way to Dracula's tomb and place a crucifix within.
Making their way outside the watch a procession of people bring Dracula back to the castle. Attacking them with boulders, they flee, leaving Dracula unattended. Harker and Morris force open Dracula's crate and set him on fire.
Count Dracula is another one of the films that Jess Franco made with Harry Alan Towers, that is really very good. Featuring a few members of the same cast as their previous effort THE BLOODY JUDGE, this one also stands up very well. Some times the effects are a bit ropey, like the attack by the stuffed animals, but over all it is not a bad adaptation of Bram Stokers' novel.
The DVD that I watched was the German release by Kinowelt under the title NACHTS, WENN DRACULA ERWACHT. It is a 2 disc set, which allows you to watch the film in English, thank God and feature a wealth of extras. On disc 1 you get an audio commentary by Fred William, Beloved Count with Jess Franco, Interview with Jack Taylor, Jess Franco over Kalus Kinski, Star info on Soledad Miranda, a photo gallery, international plates, the restoration of the film and other films in the series.
On disc 2 you get an interview with Jess Franco, Christopher Lee Reads Bram Stoker's Dracula and the German Super 8 version of NACHTS WENN DRACULA ERWACHT.
Harry Towers wanted to make an adaptation of Bram Stokers Dracula and asked Jess Franco to direct. He decided that the only person who could play Dracula was Christopher Lee, which pleased him, because it meant that he could play him in the way, that he should be portrayed and not in the direction he had gone with the Hammer films.
The film was shot in Barcelona, Spain, with a second unit filming the exterior shots of the castle in France. A lot of the film was shot in and around General Franco's Palace. Jess Franco was told by the producers to compromise the novel, but he decided that if he could get Christopher Lee too film the novel as complete as possible, then the producers might have a hard time editing the film.
Klaus Kinski did not want to appear in a Dracula film, so Harry Alan Towers gave him a script with no reference to Dracula and had him playing a mad man in a cell. When it came to the scene with him attacking Maria Rohm, he said to her "Maria. I think that bastard of a husband of yours, has got me in a Dracula picture." Maria replied "Oh, no no. You are mistaken Klaus."
Originally Franco wanted to cast Vincent Price in the role of Van Helsing, but Vincent Price was busy making SCREAM AND SCREAM AGAIN (1970), so instead he went for his second choice, Herbert Lom. The scene where Van Helsing and Count Dracula meet, was shot with neither actor present, because Herbert Lom filmed all his scenes before Christopher Lee arrived.
While Jess Franco was making COUNT DRACULA, a Catalan filmmaker Pere Portabella, made an experimental black & white film called VAMPIR CUADECUC (1970), which is a film within a film, recording the making of Franco film.
The film can be watched on Youtube in full by clicking below.
The DVD can by bought from Amazon.co.uk, (please note that it is the German version), by clicking the link below.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bram-Stokers-Count-Dracula-uncut/dp/B006RT5CWO/ref=sr_1_6?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1344463067&sr=1-6
The film opens with a bell being rung to inform passengers it is time to board a train. A young man boards the train. In his carriage there is another man traveling, he asks him if the train stops at Bestwitz, which he infroms him it does. To make conversation he informs him that he is a lawyer traveling to Bestwitz to meet a client, by the name of Count Dracula. This make the other man very uneasy.
Arriving in Betwitz the young man and his traveling companion, make their way to a hotel for the night. At the hotel the young man is informed by the owner that everything has been prepared by the Count.
During the night he is disturbed by the owners wife, informing him that the following night will be St. George's Night, when all the evil of the world will be let loose. (So a bit like Halloween.)
That night the young man along with his travelling companion board a coach. During the journey he asks how far it is until the Borgas Pass. He is told, they should reach it by night fall, (even though it is already night!) And then onto Count Dracula's Castle, but his companion has no idea. At Borgas Pass, the young man disembarks from the coach and is met by another. On the journey the coach is followed by a pack of wolves, (well, alright, a pack of German Shepherds.) After a while the coach halts, the driver disembarks and silently commands the wolves to depart. He returns to the coach and resumes the journey.
The coach arrives at Count Dracula's Castle, where the young man disembarks and knocks on the main door and is greeted by Count Dracula.
Showing the young man into his room, he notices that there is no reflection of his host in the mirror. Latter on, over dinner, Dracula and the young man go over some plans for a house in London, England. While going doing so, the young man drops some photo's out of his wallet.
Intrigued, Count Dracula, asks him who the women are.
He is informed that they are his fiance and her friend Miss Lucy Westenra. After having a discussion about Count Dracula's family past and the reasons for him moving to England. The young man, whose name is Jonathan Harker, is shown to his room. After looking around the room for a while, he decides to explore, only to find that his door has been locked. After a while he realizes that he is defeated and lies down on his bed to rest.
Outside the castle a woman comes running up to the gates, crying and screaming that she wants her baby back, but receives no reply.
Harker wakes up, to find himself in a crypt, surrounded by three beautiful women.
Just as they are about to feast on him, Count Dracula appears, commanding them to step back and leave him alone. For he is his alone. They ask what do they have and Count Dracula points to a bag in the corner, containing the crying sounds of a baby. They descend onto it hungrily.
Harker wakes again, this time back in his room, wondering if he has had a bad dream. Looking out of the window, he sees Count Dracula, standing on the battlements transforming into a bat. Walking past the mirror, he notices to puncture wounds on his neck. Realizing that he can escape out of the window, he does so and makes his way down to the crypt. Here he discovers packing cases full of earth and a tomb marked DRACULA.
He lifts the lid, to find the body of Count Dracula. Tormented by what he has seen, he flees from the castle by jumping out of a window.
Some time latter, Harker wakes up in a hospital, with a doctor sitting by his bed. The doctor introduces himself as Doctor Seward and they are in Professor Van Helsing's private clinic, just outside London. Harker asks how he got there and Doctor Seward tells him, that his body was found in a mountain stream 200 km from Budapest.
Harker starts to talk about what he witnessed at Castle Dracula, by Doctor Seward, thinking that he is having delusions, tranquilizes him. Just then Professor Van Helsing enter's and asks if there has been any change. Doctor Seward mention that Harker mentioned Count Dracula. This startles Van Helsing, just as there is cry from some where else in the clinic, Doctor Seward mentions that it must be Renfield and goes to see to him, leaving Van Helsing in the room with Harker. Van Helsing goes over to Harker and looks at his neck, too see the two puncture marks.
In a padded cell, Renfield throws his food at the wall and starts to make patterns in it. He then goes over to a snuff box he keeps and takes the bodies of two fly's out, of which one he starts to eat, when Doctor Seward enters. Worried, Renfield climbs up into the window and sits there looking out.
The next day Harkers fiance and Lucy arrive in London, at the train station they are met by one of Van Helsing's servants (its Jess Franco!) who says that he has been sent to collect them.
They arrive at the clinic.
Harker's fiance is show into his room, she asks what is wrong with him and Doctor Seward, says that they think he might of had a mental breakdown, at which point the cries of Renfield are hear, which proves too much for Lucy, who faints.
During the night a voice can be heard calling Lucy's name, while a bat flies outside the window. Lucy wakes as if in a trance and makes her way over to the door and goes out. Harker's fiance enters Lucy's room to find it empty.
Lucy opens the french doors into the garden.
Lucy is followed by Harker's fiance out into the garden, where she sees Dracula feasting on her blood.
The next day, Lucy is back in bed, being examined by Doctor Seward, he notices the two puncture wounds on her neck and mentions to Harker's fiance that she has lost a lot of blood. Asking if she has any family, he is informed that she has a fiance, by the name of Quincey Morris.
Latter that day, Morris arrives at Van Helsing's clinic, where he is met by Doctor Seward. Asking what he can do for her, Van Helsing mentions that he can give her a transfusion of his blood.
That night Count Dracula again pays Lucy a visit.
Hearing a noise come from Lucy's room, Morris rushes in to find her on the floor, noticing the window open he closes it and then places Lucy in the bed.
Harker has left his room and started to wonder the corridors of Van Helsing's clinic, in so doing so he comes across Renfield's room, where he is spotted by Van Helsing's servant and taking into Van Helsings study, where he is in conference with his fiance and Morris.
That night, Renfield is once again looking out of his window.
In the house that Count Dracula is renting, he awakes in his coffin, opens the french windows and appears to communicate with Renfield, forcing him to break the bars and his window and jump out.
Later on Harker's fiance is looking after Lucy, when she hears a noise and goes to investigate, giving Count Dracula the chance to visit her again.
Just then Harker's fiance walks back into the room and catches them at it, so too speak.
Count Dracula flees, leaving Lucy dead. With Lucy's death, but still having Harker's fiance alive, galvanizes Van Helsing into action. He calls a meeting in his study with Harker, Doctor Seward and Morris. Telling them of the legend of Dracula.
Lucy is laid to rest in Highgate Cemetery.
The next day, some children are playing the park near by. A little girl is walking around the park, when she meets Lucy.
The next day Van Helsing sees in the paper that a child has been found dead near the church, knowing this is the deed of the vampire Lucy, he informs Harker and Morris that, that night he wants them to accompany him to Lucy's grave.
He takes them to the crypt and opens her coffin, to revel that it is empty. They wait through out the night and at dawn they return to the crypt, to find Lucy's coffin occupied. Van Helsing takes out a stake, a mallet and proceeds to hammer the stake into Lucy's heart, he then tells Morris to decapitate her with a spade.
Back at the clinic Refield wakes up after his fall.
Doctor Seward, tries to get him too relax. Renfield revels that Count Dracula has bought the house next door to Van Helsing's clinic.
Van Helsing sends Harker and Morris to the house, while Harker's fiance asks to see Renfield. After leaving Van Helsing he has a fit.
Harker, Doctor Seward and Morris enter Count Dracula's house. There they find a strange collection of stuffed animals. They discover that a case has been moved. Just then the stuffed animals begin to come to life, (well lots of close up zooms and someone moving them by hand off camera).
They are being controlled by an amazingly young Count Dracula.
Harker's fiance enters Renfield's cell.
As she nears him, Count Dracula orders Renfield to kill her, he reaches out and grabs her by the neck, twisting her onto the bed.
In the house, Harker raises a crucifix to protect himself, in doing so this breaks Dracula's hold on Renfield, saving his fiance's life and stopping the assault by the stuffed animals.
Later that night Harker's fiance goes to the opera, while Dracula walks through the streets of London and is seen by Harker, but Morris dismisses it. Harker and Morris have joined Van Helsing, only to be informed that Mina, Harker's fiance has left Van Helsing's clinic and gone to the opera, without anyone's permission.
At the opera, in a private box, Mina is attacked by Count Dracula.
Harker and Morris race to the opera house and discover Mina on the floor, with wounds to her neck.
Down at the harbour, Count Dracula employs the services of ships captain to sail him to Varner.
Using the physic link between Dracula and Renfield, Doctor Seward is able to discover that Dracula is to sell to Varner. Van Helsing works out that it will take Dracula two weeks to sail to Varner with his cargo, but if Harker and Morris take a faster route, it would only take them a week and then they could every grave unusable by Dracula.
This last physic link has been too much for Refield and he has died.
At Van Helsing's clinic, Dracula pays him a visit. Van Helsing prevents Dracula from getting nearer to Mina, by inscribing a crucifix on the floor of the living room with a red hot poker.
At Castle Dracula, Harker and Morris have arrived and enter the crypt. Making their way over to the coffins of the three vampiric women, they open each one, staking and beheading as they go. They then make their way to Dracula's tomb and place a crucifix within.
Making their way outside the watch a procession of people bring Dracula back to the castle. Attacking them with boulders, they flee, leaving Dracula unattended. Harker and Morris force open Dracula's crate and set him on fire.
Count Dracula is another one of the films that Jess Franco made with Harry Alan Towers, that is really very good. Featuring a few members of the same cast as their previous effort THE BLOODY JUDGE, this one also stands up very well. Some times the effects are a bit ropey, like the attack by the stuffed animals, but over all it is not a bad adaptation of Bram Stokers' novel.
The DVD that I watched was the German release by Kinowelt under the title NACHTS, WENN DRACULA ERWACHT. It is a 2 disc set, which allows you to watch the film in English, thank God and feature a wealth of extras. On disc 1 you get an audio commentary by Fred William, Beloved Count with Jess Franco, Interview with Jack Taylor, Jess Franco over Kalus Kinski, Star info on Soledad Miranda, a photo gallery, international plates, the restoration of the film and other films in the series.
On disc 2 you get an interview with Jess Franco, Christopher Lee Reads Bram Stoker's Dracula and the German Super 8 version of NACHTS WENN DRACULA ERWACHT.
Harry Towers wanted to make an adaptation of Bram Stokers Dracula and asked Jess Franco to direct. He decided that the only person who could play Dracula was Christopher Lee, which pleased him, because it meant that he could play him in the way, that he should be portrayed and not in the direction he had gone with the Hammer films.
The film was shot in Barcelona, Spain, with a second unit filming the exterior shots of the castle in France. A lot of the film was shot in and around General Franco's Palace. Jess Franco was told by the producers to compromise the novel, but he decided that if he could get Christopher Lee too film the novel as complete as possible, then the producers might have a hard time editing the film.
Klaus Kinski did not want to appear in a Dracula film, so Harry Alan Towers gave him a script with no reference to Dracula and had him playing a mad man in a cell. When it came to the scene with him attacking Maria Rohm, he said to her "Maria. I think that bastard of a husband of yours, has got me in a Dracula picture." Maria replied "Oh, no no. You are mistaken Klaus."
Originally Franco wanted to cast Vincent Price in the role of Van Helsing, but Vincent Price was busy making SCREAM AND SCREAM AGAIN (1970), so instead he went for his second choice, Herbert Lom. The scene where Van Helsing and Count Dracula meet, was shot with neither actor present, because Herbert Lom filmed all his scenes before Christopher Lee arrived.
While Jess Franco was making COUNT DRACULA, a Catalan filmmaker Pere Portabella, made an experimental black & white film called VAMPIR CUADECUC (1970), which is a film within a film, recording the making of Franco film.
The film can be watched on Youtube in full by clicking below.
The DVD can by bought from Amazon.co.uk, (please note that it is the German version), by clicking the link below.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bram-Stokers-Count-Dracula-uncut/dp/B006RT5CWO/ref=sr_1_6?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1344463067&sr=1-6
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