Product Description

In the privacy of a girls' school he sought his prey - turning innocent beauty into a thing of unspeakable horror!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9512 in DVD
• Released on: 2007-10-15
• Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
• Format: PAL
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 82 minutes

Synopsis
A beautiful young French girl unwittingly frees a man mysteriously chained to the wall of his room. Once unbound, the baron fiendishly recruits the undead for his evil purposes until captured by Dr. Helsing. A Hammer Films classic.

Review
Top class Hammer movie. Peter Cushing's second outing as Van Helsing and David Peel's only vampire role. One of the most beautifully photographed movies ever - Jack Asher at his best and director Terence Fisher in top form. If the bat is a little clunky by modern effects standards, no worry for there is plenty to enjoy here. Great performances from Cushing and Peel, as mentioned, but also watch out for the acting duel between vetrans Freda Jackson and Martita Hunt; each gives a ripe performance and both are highly memorable. Other performances to look out for are from scene- stealing Miles Malleson as the hypochondriac Dr Tobler and Andree Melly who gave one of the 60's classic vampire images to the screen. Michael Ripper is also there for fans, this time as the scared coach driver. Cushing's authoratative Van Helsing carries the movie and David Peel's Baron Meinster is an excellent vampire foe - clipped Oxford English, red eyes and hissing vampire attacks. The burning windmill finale was lifted to conclude Tim Burton's SLEEPY HOLLOW which was a tribute to Hammer Films. Pure escapism - enjoy! --maxgol

Customer Reviews

Excellent Sequel to Horror of Dracula !
I love how Van Helsing carried on from the original although it would have been nice to see Christopher Lee. This is my favorite Peter Cushing film. I live in America and originally I bought the R1 DVD included in "The Hammer Horror Series" boxset from universal but I had nasty results with the disks, Brides of Dracula being part of it so I bought a Multi Region DVD Player and bought this DVD and now am able to view one of my favorite Hammer/Peter Cushing films.

what a waste...
unbelievable at this point that a company would still butcher a film like this on dvd. the framing really ruins an impressively shot film.

One of Hammer's finest achievements - but not a great DVD
Brides of Dracula was the first of Hammer's many sequels to their breakthrough hit, and it's not just the best of the series but one of their very best pictures. There's no Christopher Lee this time round - in fact, there's no Dracula at all - but there's a lot of imagination at play here in a beautifully plotted story that sees Peter Cushing's Van Helsing coming up against David Peel's Baron Meinster, a follower of Dracula's vampire cult, after Yvonne Monlaur's schoolteacher ill-advisedly releases him from the shackles his not-as-mad-as-she-looks mother keeps him in.

There's a lot going on beneath the stylish surface here - a psychiatrist could probably have a field day with the curious relationship between Peel and Martita Hunt ("We pray for death, both of us. At least, I hope he prays"), not to mention Van Helsing's visible discomfort in the company of women - but it never overwhelms the plot, and there's no shortage of memorable scenes, from the professor treating a rather nasty bite he just got to the servant silently offering pointers to a newly created vampire on its first outing as one of the undead. Reuniting most of the behind-the-cameras talent from their first Dracula film and throwing in a rather splendid climax in a burning windmill, this is definitely one of Hammer's finest hours. Sadly, though one of their best looking pictures, like the overcopped first Hammer Dracula the UK DVD of Brides is also a bit of a disappointment - no extras and in the wrong ratio.