THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES (1974)

February 09, 2024

THE LEGEND OF THE 7 GOLDEN VAMPIRES (1974)

DIRECTED by Roy Ward Baker & Chang Cheh

SCREENPLAY by Don Houghton

STARRING - Peter Cushing as Professor Van Helsing, John Forbes-Robertson as Count Dracula, David De Keyser as Voice of Dracula, Robin Stewart as Leyland Van Helsing, Julie Ege as Vanessa Buren, David Chiang as Hsi Ching/Hsi Tien-en, Shih Szu as Mai Kwei, Chan Shen as High Preist Kah/Dracula's host, Lau Kar-Wing as Hsi Kwei (the archer), Huang Pei Chih as Hsi Po-Kwei (the Spearman), Wang Chiang as Hsi San (Twin Swordsman)

PLOT - A lone Taoist Monk - Kah, High Preist of the seven golden vampires makes a pilgrimage to Castle Dracula in order to forge an alliance with Count Dracula. Once there he meets with the undead Count, however Dracula betrays him and takes over his body, using Kah as a host so that he can escape from the confines of his castle in which he has been mystically imprisoned.

Many years later - Professor Van Helsing is travelling through China with his son Leland on a lecturing tour detailing the rules of vampirism. At one lecture he meets Hsi Ching who tells Van Helsing that his village is being terrorised by the legendary seven Golden Vampires and thier leader Kah (in reality Dracula). Hsi Ching begs Van Helsing for help in destroying the vampires and Van Helsing agrees.

Joined by Leland, Hsi Ching and his seven Kung-fu trained siblings and a wealthy baroness - Vanessa - who is funding the expedition, Van Helsing must journey to the lair of the seven Golden vampires and destroy them and Count Dracula once and for all...

PERFORMANCES - This is Peter Cushing's final performance in a Hammer Dracula film as Professor Van Helsing. As this film is once again set in Victorian times (unlike the previous two entries in the series which where both set in the 1970's) we can safely assume that Cushing is back to playing the original Van Helsing once more instead of his lookalike grandson. As ever Cushing is great. He plays the vampire hunting Professor with his usual style and dignity. He sometimes seems a little bewildered by all the Kung-fu action going on around him and looks a little lost in some of the fight scenes but to be fair this type of genre mash-up was probably completely new to him and may well have been out of his comfort zone. However he soon rises to the occasion (Van Helsing even gets a few kicks and punches in himself during the final battle) and once more carries the film with style. Plus, Cushing looks really cool in a pith helmet.

Less successful is Van Helsing's son Leland played by Robin Stewart. He's not a bad actor and it's a perfectly decent performance but Hammer never got thier more youthful heroes quite right in the way that they absolutely nailed thier more mature counterparts. Leland manages to annoy and offend a local crime lord in the early part of this film, mainly through showing off to the glamorous Vanessa (Julie Ege) who the gangster had set his sights upon. This offence causes Leland and Vanessa to be attacked by the gang boss's men leading to the deaths of several people. Leland is never taken to task over this, Van Helsing just seems to let it slide as youthful high spirits. To make matters worse Leland soon totally forgets about Vanessa and starts making a play for Hsi Ching's sister Mai Kwei (Shih Szu). Vanessa doesn't seem too bothered though as she ends up getting together with Hsi Ching (David Chiang) anyway.

A quick word about the supporting characters. Julie Ege as Vanessa is a cut above the usual Hammer heroine. Unlike most of the female characters in these films she's actually required to do a bit more than just look pretty and be a victim.

Vanessa is a wealthy and independent woman, she's also something of an adventurer herself and seems to be an open minded and seasoned traveller who is more than capable of looking after herself. A refreshing change.

David Chiang is good too as Hsi Ching, he has a good rapport with Cushing and the two characters seem to build up a strong and respectful friendship with each other over the course of the story. The romance subplot with Vanessa is also well done and the two characters have a natural chemistry with each other that transcends thier cultural differences. Ultimately the two are doomed - Vanessa gets bitten and turns into a vampire biting Hsi Ching in the process, as a result of this Hsi Ching impales both himself and Vanessa on a giant wooden stake and the two die in each other's arms.

By this point in the series Christopher Lee had grown tired of playing Dracula. So how do you replace someone as iconic as Lee ? The answer is...you don't. Here Dracula is played by John Forbes-Robertson who is only onscreen for the opening and closing scenes so doesn't really get a chance to prove himself. He's certainly got the right physical presence. He's tall and imposing as Dracula should be (and in long shots doesn't look unlike Lee). The problem lies with the unfathomable decision of covering Forbes-Robertson's face in heavily (and badly) applied make-up. Dracula's wearing LIPSTICK !!!! WHY ???? It completely robs him of any menace he may have had and makes him look like an ageing drag queen. Plus they've dubbed him with a different actor's voice which leaves Forbes-Robertson with even less of a chance to make his own mark on the character. Its all a bit of a mess sadly.

Dracula then posseses the body of Kah (Chan Shen) who at least isn't saddled with rubbish makeup and makes quite a cool looking vampire in his own right but Christopher Lee's absence hangs over this movie like a cloud. Maybe they should have forgotten about Dracula if they couldn't get Lee and made the head vampire into a new different character perhaps.

SFX - While we may be poorly served for Dracula himself in this film the creature designs go some way towards making up for it. The legendary 7 Golden Vampires themselves are pretty good - they're much more monsterous and semi-decomposed looking than we usually get in a Hammer vampire film...

... All in all they work quite well I think.

We also get the Revenants who are the Golden Vampires' undead servants. These appear to be skeletal zombies who hop instead of walk (Its a common thing for undead creatures to hop in Chinese legends for some reason). Once again they work pretty well and generally act as foot soldiers/general cannon fodder in the large scale fight scenes in the latter part of the movie.

There are also some excellent scenes of the various vampires decomposing when they're dispatched. The Golden Vampires themselves emit smoke and melt into slime when they're killed...

Dracula himself gets the best death and decomposition scene that he's had since the original Horror of Dracula back in 1958...

At least they got that bit right.

SEX & VIOLENCE - Lashings of both. For some reason the virgin daughters of the village are stripped topless and tied to some sort of bondage dungeon table by the Golden Vampires before having thier blood drank. Yeah...the vampires are perverts as well as being undead.

In terms of violence...in the words of the famous song - everybody was Kung-fu fighting. We get lots (and I mean LOTS) of brilliantly choreographed high kicking Kung-fu action (no surprise seeing as this film was co-produced by the Shaw Brothers). We get hand to hand combat, sword combat, pole combat...pretty much anything you can think of happening in a kung-fu movie happens in these epic battle scenes.

Of course in situations like these not everyone's going to come out unscathed. Several of Hsi Ching's brothers die before Hsi Ching himself performs his heroic vampire killing murder/suicide.

The vampires all get staked in the end (one way or another) so ultimately the good guys win.

RATING - This film is a lot of fun and is certainly a departure from what we'd come to expect from Hammer. It's very fast paced and quite epic in scope and it's runtime simply flys by. You'll never be bored watching this film.

It's a shame Christopher Lee didn't want to join in the fun but the great fight scenes, fun monsters and beautifully shot scenery do compensate for this.

Its by no means perfect but Legend Of The 7 Golden Vampires is by and large a successful experiment which manages to capture most of the best elements of Hammer horror and Chinese action cinema. 4 and a half flying death kicks out of 5.

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