Dracula's Daughter (1936)

     Turns out that Dracula had a daughter.  Who knew, right?  I consider this movie to be underrated by most.  It just seems to me that Dracula's Daughter never quite gets the credit it deserves.  Maybe it's because it's without the great Bela Lugosi.  People often speak of how Universal Studios should have done more Dracula movies with Lugosi and the fact that they didn't is just a lost opportunity, and that may be so.  BUT..... Dracula's Daughter can hold it's own against any of the other Universal Monster sequels.  In fact, Son Of Frankenstein is the only sequel I can think of that I like more than this movie.

     Gloria Holden plays Countess Marya Zaleska.  Like her father, she too is a vampire stalking the streets of London.  Apparently she followed Dracula there,  hoping to burn his body while performing a sacred rite that would lift the curse of vampirism from her and allow her to lead a normal life.  She has her familiar, Sandor, in tow as well.  Sandor doesn't seem too sure that Zaleska will be able to reverse her condition.  If he truly felt that she could give up her undead night life, I'm sure he'd do what he could to put an end to it.  At some point, the Countess promised to turn Sandor into a vampire as well and he's starting to get a bit impatient, though it doesn't show early on.  The two of them make a formidable pair.

     Now, the continuity does seem to break a bit at the beginning of this movie.  We supposedly pick up right where Dracula (1931) ended, but there is no Johnathan Harker or Mina in sight.  Renfield's body is in a different place than we remember and Professor Van Helsing seems to have found a nice hat he likes.  It might sound like I'm just nit-picking but seriously, this doesn't even remotely look like the same castle ruins that we left off with in the first movie.  Oh and the police, who couldn't be bothered to help previously, have shown up just in time to question Van Helsing as to why there is a corpse with a stake driven though it.  Van Helsing is arrested and spends most of the movie in police custody.

     From here the movie pretty much follows the first in that our heroes (Who in this case are therapist and his secretary aided some by the police chief and Van Helsing), attempt to discover the identity of this vampire that is loose in London at night, and put an end to it.  All while the Countess is hiding in plain sight, much like Dracula did in the first movie.  Zaleska does manage to escape back to Transylvania though and it's a delight that she did because it gives the viewer an excuse to gaze upon that great castle set from the first movie and even explore part of the caste that we didn't see the first time around.

     Don't let the fact that Countess Zaleska wants cured fool you.  She has her cold hearted, blood thirsty moments.   As far as I'm concerned, Zaleska is a vampire worthy of being mentioned along side all the greats.  She might not have seen eye to eye with her father but they both knew how to terrorize a city.  I highly recommend this movie.
                                                       GRADE: A