Count Dracula's Great Love (1973)

**_Spanish cabin-in-the-woods, except it’s castle-in-the-woods and the monster is Drac_** In the Tihuța Pass of the Carpathian Mountains north of Transylvania, a stagecoach consisting of five travelers, one male and four females, breaks down and they have no recourse but to seek sanctuary at a nearby sanitorium. They are welcomed by Doctor Marlowe (Paul Naschy), but could he really be... "Count Dracula’s Great Love" (1973), aka “Cemetery Girls,” is basically a Spanish sequel to Hammer’s Dracula flicks up to “Scars of Dracula.” It’s most reminiscent of “Dracula, Prince of Darkness,” but also contains bits that bring to mind “The Satanic Rites of Dracula,” which was released after this one. Naschy was of course the king of Spanish horror from the late 60s to the 2000s. This was his only stab at playing Dracula and the first cinematic depiction of the Count in a more romantic light, which would influence Frank Langella’s 1979 version and Coppola’s 1992 movie. Here, Paul sorta looks like Brando when he was younger. Haydée Politoff stands out on the female front with her glorious locks of auburn hair. She ends up being the main female character but, ironically, Naschy didn’t ‘click’ with her. Interestingly, this is essentially a cabin-in-the-woods flick, as pointed out in my title blurb. The ‘cabin’ just happens to be a castle or, more specifically, a sanitorium; and the era just happens to be the early 1900s. There’s even a skinny-dipping sequence. If you’re in the mood for a Hammer-esque Dracula flick with crumbling castles, eldritch woods, stagecoaches, spooky rumors spoken in hushed tones, women in Victorian apparel, bloodsucking vampires, Dracula’s ‘brides,’ diabolical rituals and female breasts, this fills the bill. The ending’s unique and I loved it, but there are some questionable things, like the corny booming voice that curiously comes out of nowhere and the overkill top nudity (which smacks of shallow exploitation). It runs 1 hour, 25 minutes, and was shot in Madrid. GRADE: B-