Mama Dracula (1980)

Best movie of this year hands down!

From my favorite movies..

A lot of fun.

Blistering performances.

Obviously I had nothing to do with this production, and actually it was released before I was even born, but still I somewhat feel the necessity to apologize to all the poor people who – like myself – struggled their way through this film and literally hated every single minute of it. Why? Because I'm from Belgium and apparently so is this miserable excuse for a horror movie! There aren't too many horror films being made in Belgium, but judging by the quality of "Mama Dracula", that's maybe a good thing. This is supposed to be a horror comedy, but we all know what the main problem with these flicks is… They're not scary and they're definitely not funny! Some of the basic ideas in the script definitely show potential (like the spin on the Countess Bathory legend), but the film is unendurably tedious, imbecilic and embarrassing. It's a complete mystery how Louise Fletcher ended up in such an inferior Belgian film production, barely five years after winning an Oscar for one of the greatest motion pictures ever made, but luckily enough she stills keeps her dignity. Fletcher plays the title role, but perhaps they couldn't pay her enough, as her role definitely isn't the leading part. She's a posh vampire who requires bathing in the blood of young virgins in order to maintain her beauty. The problem nowadays, however, is that virgins are becoming quite rare in this indecent day and age. She therefore orders to kidnap the young scientist Dr. Van Bloed, as he's on the verge of achieving a breakthrough with his synthetic blood formula. The jokes – if you can even refer to them like that – solely revolve on a handful of totally insufferable characters. The horrible vampire twin brothers are the absolute worst, closely followed by a police inspector who yells out "sabotage" all the time, and the young dorky scientist. "Mama Dracula" is hectic and irritating, with a plot that continuously jumps back and forth between semi-processed plot ideas and lame gags. The twins own (or perhaps just work) in a fashion store where they kidnap young girls from the cubicles. These sequences aren't very important, but I want to mention them nevertheless because at least they featured some nudity. Horrible movie, avoid at all costs … and once more my most sincere apologies in case you already had the displeasure of seeing it.

What a bomb! Another example of how trying too hard to be camp just doesn't work. If you can imagine a bunch of stoners trying to make "The Three Stooges meet Countess Dracula" and loading it with bare-breasted women you may get an idea of what this is like. Unfortunately the many pairs of boobs make it unfit for 5-10 year old boys who would otherwise be the best audience for this. One pair of boobs just right for the little boys would be the idiot twin sons of the Countess who do a rather intriguing mirroring-each-other pantomime, getting out of bed and starting their morning ablutions. But mostly they're just two stooges in black capes and bad "Transylwanian" accents.Louise Fletcher manages to glide over this morass, ever elegant and charismatic. Watching her shine so magnificently over the ordure that is the rest of it is rather amazing to see, and the fashion show in the last 15 minutes has some fun costumes. Maria Schneider just looks like she's waiting to get paid. One hopes that she and Ms. Fletcher were getting plenty. Given the production values, either their pay ate up the entire budget, or they were blackmailed into this disaster.This may rival "Jesus Christ, Vampire Hunter" for worst vampflick ever, but at least "JC" was clearly an amateur production. There is no excuse for this abysmal waste of time.And no, it is not even Ed-Wood-so-bad-it's-good. Ed Wood, bless his soul, took his work seriously enough to give it a quirky charm. Even "Jesus Christ, Vampire Hunter" was compellingly weird in its gawd-awfulness. I like quirky bad movies, but this was just pointlessly vacuous.Poor, poor Louise... I'm sure she's done her best to forget this trainwreck, and so shall I!

I give this movie a ten, simply because I love discovering odd, interesting little films like this that I could have went my whole life without seeing, but luckily stumbled upon it.This movie is odd and campy. Don't view it if you're looking for a movie that will change your life. Because it won't. What a lot of reviewers have said is true. It is disjointed, and sometimes you can get lost because of the plot. However, the quirkiness kept me there until the end. A particular highlight is the performance of the Wajnberg brothers, Alexander and Marc-Henry, twins playing the vampire sons of "Countess Dracula". But despite it's problems, this movie does have a very strange charm to it. I don't recommend this movie for serious viewing, even as comedy (which is what it is). I recommend viewing this film with others that enjoy camp. The more people you watch the movie with, the better it becomes.

My sister found this for me at a local video store. After Iwatched it, I only had a vague idea of what was going on, but, the strange thing is, I didn't mind. The fact that this movie was so terribly incoherent, seemed to skip entire scenes, and had such awful humor made this a satisfying film to watch in the most bizarre way. It's amazing what people can think up.