| The idea of a Hammer horror/Shaw Brothers kung fu fighting flick with a good dose of gothic vampirism sounds like a match made in heaven right? Think again.
Professor Van Helsing (Peter Cushing) gives a lecture in 1904 at a Chongqing (Chungking) university on Chinese vampire legend. He speaks of an unknown rural village that has been terrorized by vampires for many years. After the lecture, a student (David Chiang) informs him that the legend is true and that it is in fact his ancestral village. He then asks Professor Van Helsing if he would be willing to travel to the village and destroy the vampire menace.
Van Helsing agrees and embarks with his son, the student and his six kung-fu trained siblings on a dangerous journey funded by a wealthy widow (Julie Ege). The seven golden vampires, however, are acting under the guidance of Count Dracula himself, masquerading as a mad Taoist monk.
All the ingredients are there for a good mix between the two, but it misses. The fight scenes are hampered with poor camera angles that expose the fact that none of the blows are connecting, which is disappointing since Lau Kar-Leung handled the fight choreography.
The horror effects handled by Hammer Studios are mediocre even for the time. The bats flying around in Dracula’s tomb look like puppets on a string, something you’d expect from the 40’s, not the 70’s.
Peter Cushing works well with the simplistic story, as does David Chiang. Chiang and the rest of the Chinese actors aren’t dubbed, which is surprising for the time. The romantic subplots between David Chiang and Julie Ege, as well as Robin Stewart and Szu Shih, have an old fashioned charm about them that you don’t see often these days. | 
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