| A teacher, Akiko (Midori Fujita), paints the golden-eyed figure of her childhood nightmares, which her boyfriend, Dr Saeki (Osahide Takahashi), dismisses as an "obsession of threat." However, Akiko's lingering fears prove well founded when a coffin is delivered to the boathouse keeper at Lake Fujimi, and a female patient arrives at Saeki's hospital drained of blood. Akiko's younger sister, flirty Natsuko (Sanae Emi) is easy prey for the vampire (Mori Kishida), and the future starts to look a bit grim for all concerned.
"The truth is out there." As with much modern horror, only a return to the past - which, here, means that a visit to the place in the heroine's recurring dream (the shadowy house of Dracula) - is necessary to confront and solve the dark mystery. This Toho production makes excellent use of its scope aspect and has first class corpse effects. In particular, the way that director Yamamoto shoots the vampires standing quietly, with an unnatural stillness, is deliciously creepy. This appealing Japanese chiller was successful enough to warrant a sequel, and Evil Of Dracula appeared in 1974, again starring Kishida as the vampire... |
Reviews:
