Marketic
It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.
Joanna Mccarty
Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.
Francene Odetta
It's simply great fun, a winsome film and an occasionally over-the-top luxury fantasy that never flags.
Spikeopath
Five years after Universal launched a Bela Lugosi inspired Dracula upon the film loving world, the sequel arrived - only not with Lugosi's Count Dracula in it. Pic picks up at the end of the 31 film and finds Von Helsing (yes Von, not Van) under arrest for the slaying of the toothy vampire. Enter Contessa Marya Zeleska, who sets in motion the wheels of vampiric legends and torrid passions about to be exposed.There's an ethereal low-key mood to Dracula's Daughter, exuding the sort of atmosphere that Val Lewton would hone and trademark within six years. It's a beautifully photographed movie (George Robinson), while there's some neat touches in the screenplay - such as lesbian overtones and the fact our vampire lady is very sympathetic due to her searching for a cure to her ills. However. The play is over talky and very bloodless, it's like the makers forgot to actually put some horror aspects into the piece. There's also an odd blend of humour and drama which never sits right, while the ending is abrupt and disappointing.It's a nice film, a nice production, but nice is a word that really shouldn't be on your lips given the history of the source materials. 6/10
jacobjohntaylor1
This a sequel to Dracula (1931) and it is great. It is very scary. It has a great story line. It also has great acting. It also has great special effects. If you like scary movies then you need to see this movie. Van H.e.s.l.i.n.g must now fight Dracula's Daughter. This movie is very intense and dark. I like it. If you like scary movies you will like it to. Dracula (1931) is a little bite better. But still this is a great movie. It is a must see. I need more lines and I am running out of things to say. Great movie great movie great movie great movie great movie. Very scary very scary. This movie is a must see. Very scary very scary very scary.
John T. Ryan
OUR STORY OPENS up at the death of Count Dracula at the hand of Van Helsing. The descent of the stake through the heart, followed by the obligatory super sigh, marked the passing on of the Dracula dynasty to yet another "generation".IN A HIGHLY SUBTLE manner, the eerie horror of "the Undead" is continued; quietly maintaining the dark and creepy ambiance; which was established by Director Todd Browning in Dracula (Universal, 1931). Hence, the howl of the wolf, the flapping batwings and mirrors' lacking reflections all became standard elements of Universal Pictures dark mythology.THE CHARACTERIZATION OF the female vampire heir to the Dracula estate is both multi-faceted and at the same time, fascinating. British born actress, Gloria Holden, projects a very feminine persona, a most unusual sort of beauty and a slow, deliberate speech pattern. All the while she is speaking, she seems to be crying underneath. Nearly expressionless and wooden, her countenance is as one truly dead.IN MORE RECENT times, with the wave of handsomer, sexier vampires, such as Frank Langella's portrayal in Dracula (Mirisch Company/Universal, 1979), the notion that the vampire used sex as a springboard to his sanguinary conquests came to the forefront. DRACULA'S DAUGHTER , is the prime example appears to be somewhat ahead of the curve; albeit in the form of lesbianism. The scene where Countess Zeleska (Dracula) auditions a poor girl from the street as a potential artists' model.THIS IS PROBABLY a major entry in the resume of director, Lambert Hillyer; whose output had a very unusual range. Starting in the days of the Silent Screen and William S. Hart westerns, to titles such as THE INVISIBLE RAY(Universal, 1936), BATMAN Serial (Columbia, 1943)and down to ZIV TV Productions' THE CISCO KID, HIGHWAY PATROL and I LED 3 LIVES. The durable and versatile Mr. Hillyer never lacked work during a 40+ year ride on the Hollywood Merry Go Round.THERE IS A LESSON here for our bright, young and well educated filmmakers of the 21st Century. In DRACULA'S DAUGHTER (as with so many of the other horror classics of the day). That is namely, subtle horror with hints of the frightening is much more effective and scary than all of that Technicolor blood & gore that we see all too often today.
Bonehead-XL
"Dracula's Daughter" is an endlessly intriguing film. It is, in many ways, very ahead of its time. The film gets a lot of notice for being the very first lesbian vampire on-screen. It also has got to be one of the earliest sympathetic vampires. Countess Zaleska is the main character of the film. She wants nothing to do with her father's legacy and instead longs to live a normal life. However, she is uncontrollably driven by her nature to feed on the blood of the living. The entire movie is driven by her struggling with two conflicting desires. The fate of the film lies on whether she chooses to be good or evil. This is thoroughly modern stuff, the kind of thing modern horror novels are built on.The extremely good cast helps. Gloria Holden has a captivating face, with wide expressive eyes. Her broad voice conveys the proper amount of aristocratic lineage. Her performance is surprisingly subtle. I suspect with an actress of her type, it would have been very easy to go over-the-top so she wisely plays it in the opposite direction. Her performance informs that entire film, which is generally a low-key, character-oriented affair.If Countess Zaleska is struggling with her nature, Irving Pichel's Sandor is strictly Mephistophelian figure. Perhaps conceived as a Renfield-like figure, Sandor instead constantly beckons Zaleska to the dark side. In the last reel, we discover this is strictly because he was promise the gift of eternal life in return for being the vampire's helper. When she goes back on the deal, he doesn't take it well.The movie is primarily a character study but, good as the film is, it still has to find time for the genre conventions of the era. Otto Kruger plays the movie's leading man, Jeffrey Garth, a psychologist who is positioned at the center of the Countess' moral battle. It's not a bad performance, Garth is actually fairly charming, but the love and obsession the vampire develops with him never really carries. The slap-slap-kiss-kiss back-and-forth Garth has with his secretary, played by Marguerite Churchill, occupies way too much of the film's time. The two sell the slap-slap part but not so much the kiss part. The two people seem to genuinely hate each other.The movie functions as a horror film too. The early scene of Holden cremating her father's corpse and exorcising the demons inside continues the first film's tradition of English fog and black-and-white atmosphere. The most famous moment in the movie, where a young woman is brought off of the streets to model for the bisexual vampire, slowly becoming aware of the danger she is in, draws tension out exceedingly well. When the vampire finally strikes, the camera cuts from a woman's screaming face to an African tribal mask hanging on the wall."Dracula's Daughter" would actually be a good candidate for a remake. A new version of the film could focus squarely on the Countess' struggle with her own nature, excising all the unnecessary comic relief and romantic subplots. The original is a surprisingly deep, underrated part of the Universal Monsters canon.
