"Dracula's Daughter" is a disappointing sequel to both the 1931 film and to Bram Stoker's novel. Although it begins where the 1931 "Dracula" ended, at Carfax Abbey after the killing of Dracula, and it ends where that film began, at the Transylvanian Castle Dracula, most of what happens in between is antithetical to the spirit of either the "Dracula" film or novel. There's no Bela Lugosi. The only actor and character from the 1931 film has a minor role and is inexplicably renamed from "Van Helsing" to "Von Helsing." And Stoker's novel about faith and a female leader and surrogate storyteller (in the Mina character) is turned into one of pseudoscience and a female vampire largely reduced to a damsel-in- distress stereotype stuck between the wills of two men (the shrink and the dead Dracula, as aided by the living Sandor).This is essentially the same misogynist tripe, brought even more to the forefront, that the 1931 film did to the Mina character, where two men, Dracula and Van Helsing, had a contest of wills for her soul. At least, that film kept some of Stoker's religion. This time, the Countess tries to exorcise her father's body with a cross, but after that fails, and she continues to be haunted by him, she turns to psychiatry—specifically one male psychiatrist, who specializes, of course, in hypnosis. It's the Madonna and the Whore dichotomy once again, and when the Countess submits to being the "bad" one in the end, she's punished by the scorned man penetrating her with an arrow. (Interesting that they show this and didn't show a man staking another man in the first film.)Too bad, too, because this sequel has some things going in its favor. There's good atmosphere in parts, highlighted by the fog and musical score. Gloria Holden is a worthy successor to Bela Lugosi. She bares no physical resemblance to him, nor similar acting style, but she's convincing as Dracula's daughter because she shares an eerie aura about her. And she paints and plays piano. It doesn't suffer as much from the early-talkie staginess of its predecessor. And the homoeroticism when the Countess preys on a female victim is more explicit than Dracula's predation of Renfield in the first film. Otherwise, the psychiatrist is a jerk. He expresses his shock over a female not having the vanity of 20 mirrors in her flat. He demands that women fondle his tie and, then, demeans them when they don't do it correctly. Good thing he's not a Freudian.The vampire-meets-psychiatry premise is ripe for parody; unfortunately, however, this film plays it straight. Years later, the Dracula parody "Love at First Bite" (1979) realized that pseudoscientific shrinks (in that case, a Freudian) are the most gullible and so readily and enthusiastically believe in vampires. "Dracula's Daughter" is more pretentious, so we listen to characters rattle on with a straight face for a while regarding the "modern science" of the magic of hypnosis and some other misplaced notions that make about as much scientific sense as Stoker's blood transfusions performed without regard to blood types. After the bumbling bobbies, most of the comic relief here comes from the screwball-type banter between the shrink and his secretary, but even this comes off as mostly mean spirited. Meanwhile, cinema's first sympathetic vamp is little more than a misogynistic trope.(Mirror Note: Besides the hypnosis machine, the only mirror shots are of a man fiddling with his tie. Figures.)

Tod Browning's and Bela Lugosi's Dracula (1931) is my favourite of the Universal monster classics. this sequel, starring the beautiful Gloria Holden in her first leading role, doesn't quite measure up to the former but has its own charms it's likely to be the first lesbian or bisexual vampire film ever made; though censors from the Production Code Administration made certain that Countess Zaleska's sapphic inclinations are not overt, it's still fairly obvious whom she prefers. this is also the first film to my awareness to feature the reluctant vampire trope, à la Anne Rice's and Brad Pitt's Louis de Pointe du Lac, with Holden's performance seemingly made more poignant by her displeasure at being assigned the role — i guess auditioning worked differently in the 1930s the acting, setting designs and filming all have the look and feel of a stage play. the film's alluring string-heavy score is composed by Heinz Roemheld, music supervisor of Dracula and uncredited composer of the stock music used in Werewolf of London, Reefer Madness and about a hundred other films i'd love to see this movie remade with more emphasis on the titular character's sexuality — let her leave two puncture marks on the breasts of her victims rather than in the jugular — and the ending rewritten and brought up to date. i like the film as it is, though, and recommend it for fans of Dracula and other Universal Studios classics. be sure to bring the kiddies!

Beginning just after the events of "Dracula" (1931), "Dracula's Daughter" has Countess Zaleska, Dracula's daughter, stealing her father's corpse from the Scotland Yard to burn it in hopes of destroying a familial curse. However, events do not go as planned, and Countess Zaleska finds herself succumbing to the thirst only quenched by the vein.This dreary and downbeat sequel to the gargantuan Universal monster classic is one of the studio's unsung pictures, little-seen but loved by those who have. It's a slow-paced and relatively uneventful film, but is a masterful work of suggestion. I'll leave film theory and psychoanalysis out of the review, as it's so often the context under which this film is discussed—but I will say that the film, while in direct conversation with the Stoker narrative, seems to be reaping the feminine horrors of Sheridan Le Fanu's preeminent vampire novel "Carmilla" to a greater extent.The tone of the film is also unusual in that the narrative approach is sympathetic to the monster— something of a first. Anne Rice has mentioned seeing the film as a child and referenced it as an influence on her writing, and it's very evident. In spite of the film's low budget, the cinematography is dazzling, and there are some phenomenal outdoor sequences bathed in fog. Gloria Holden's performance as the distant Countess is fantastic, with a fine performance from Otto Kruger as a therapist who plays a key role. Nan Grey also has a memorable part as a diffident art model for the Countess.Overall, "Dracula's Daughter" is a fantastic film for a variety of reasons, but the most compelling thing about it is that it seems to wallow in its own atmosphere to an extent that is rather rare. It's a somber and unassuming offering that is as thematically rich as its predecessor, and in some ways visually exceeds it. 9/10.

A year after Carroll Boland introduced us to a Vampira/Elvira predecessor in "Mark of the Vampire" as Bela Lugosi's vampiress daughter, stage actress Gloria Holden took the spotlight as the unseen Lugosi's daughter in a sequel which gave her one shot at horror film fame. Borland's unspeaking spook looked like a hippie thirty years before her time, but Holden here looks as if she could have been sired by the count and "She who must be obeyed". In fact, a year after Helen Gahagan played the ageless underground queen in "She", Holden played "She who must drink blood to live". Holden's Marya is a Hungarian countess who shows up to destroy her father's body (don't worry, he'd be back....) so she can hopefully escape his curse of an eternal death. So for much of the film, she's a neck biter with a conscience, but when one requires a certain substance to live, one is going to steal or kill to get it, no matter how hard they are trying to get off the stuff....One thing is certain in this film, and that is the fact that Marya wanted no part of her father's curse. It seems like there was no love lost between them, and it is a shame that the proposed flashback featuring Lugosi in his pre-vampire days ended up being scraped. What remains, however, is a thrilling Gothic melodrama where the often partially hidden Holden makes for certain that if she can't be cured of her vampirism, she's at least going to have love through the presence of doctor Otto Kruger who is in love with somebody else. Of course, a woman scorned (especially one with fangs) is going to use the other woman to get what she wants, even if it means leading Kruger back to Dracula's castle in order to make the decision: His life or his lady love's. Von Helsing (Edward Van Sloan) is back too even if he's more there to explain the background rather than move the plot forward. While it appears that dummies representing Lugosi and Dwight Frye's mad Renfield are the actors themselves, studio documents have shown otherwise. Replacing Frye is Irving Pichel as Sandor, an equally creepy character who follows Holden around like a lost mouse.The film has a genuine creepy atmosphere, although it seems to be set in more modern times than its predecessor, even though it takes place right afterwords. There's enough fog and slow moving photography to make for a really chilling atmosphere, and the insinuations of Holden's lesbian provocations in one scene are obvious even though it is clear that she wants to make Kruger her love slave. It would take another decade for Lugosi to return to his Count Dracula role on film, but playing cape clad characters in the classic horror films reminded the many fans of what he would ultimately be remembered for. It's just a shame that he didn't end up here and that more family exposition was made, a factor which greatly damaged the next "Dracula" film where his supposed "son" turned the family name around to disguise who he was.