Dance of the Vampires (1967) – 3/5

In the drink of an eye

This movie here really has so many different titles and I decided to give you a few of those. The most common one nowadays is probably „Dance of the Vampires“, but you can also find it as „The Vampire Killers“, „Your Teeth in My Neck“, „The Fearless Vampire Killers“ or the longest version, the one you also find on the poster would be „The Fearless Vampire Killers or: Pardon Me, But Your Teeth Are in My Neck“. All of these are about vampires, so you know what to expect. I must say that the one that is most known nowadays is maybe the one I like least from all of those. On the one hand it says nothing about the fact that this film is more on the comedic side than anything else and on the other hand I also did not feel like the dance was super memorable or a vital part of the film. All the other vampires present there are basically just that: Present. And they add nothing really to the story. In terms of memorable shots, I even preferred the recording from up above when we see them rise from their graves. This stayed more in the mind for me than the scenes inside the castle that followed. But let’s also take a look at the basics: The writer and director is Roman Polanski, Oscar-winning filmmaker now and he is almost 90 years old, which means he was in his early 30s when he made this movie, so not super young anymore. But he was relatively experienced then already, especially as an actor, but also with works that were not in front of the camera, so this is not a really early career effort from him, but you could say in terms of English-language movies it is a really early career effort for him. French Gérard Brach co-wrote for Polanski again and he is no longer with us, but managed to win a BAFTA during his career and also worked on a few films that are still remembered today. Not only this one here and unlike this one here, those are mostly in the French language.

As for the cast, first credit is Irish actor Jack MacGowran. He probably gave my favorite performance from the film and 50% of the comedy were him, if not more. He really succeeded there. He was also much younger than you would think. Aging makeup was a great deal with his Einstein-lookalike character. I will not go into detail about all the cast members now, but you can check out the list for yourself. Sadly, not too many are with us anymore in 2022, but given the film’s age it is no huge surprise. Except Polanski, you could mention Fiona Lewis, who was really, really young when she starred in here, so is also not super old now. She plays one of the not too many female characters in here. The biggest female character is of course played by Sharon Tate and this film was I think where she and Polanski met, so it was not just his character that had a crush on her, but also the filmmaker himself. Can’t really blame him with how stunning Tate is in here, even if there is not a lot to her character except how she always wants to take a bath andthe fateful moment at the very end. With Tate I do not need to talk about her fate in detail I guess, almost everybody knows what happened, but it can be said that she is perhaps the most tragic cast member here and we have a few who died at a too early age. One exception is Ferdy Mayne and I mention him specifically because he is from my country and he is the one who played the count in here. If we look at Polanski, you can say that it is maybe a bit surprising that this film is a comedy. I mean he made serious films about all kinds of other issues, so without knowing the contents here I would also have expected something darker along the lines of „Rosemary’s Baby“ perhaps, but the opposite is the case. This is all about the laughter and nothing else.

I will just mention a few of my most favorite scenes and moments now: One very brief moment that made me laugh more than I thought it would was when we hear Polanski’s character’s reaction to seeing the vampire boss abduct his love interest from the bathroom. So high-pitched. I am also mentioning this because, as I stated earlier, I think the greater comedy work from the two leads came from MacGowran and not Polanski, but admittedly the former also had the much better material. My favorite comedic sequence was maybe the one when Polanski’s character sits on the bed with the son of the vampire boss. That character was so bizarre as a whole anyway. You could surely say that how he behaved and also with what he said that there were some homosexual tendencies inside him. In that scene, Polanski did not even have to do much. Just sit there in shock and confusion and let the other man do all the work was funny enough already. Another brief moment I liked was when we see Polanski go for the girl and then he watches out of the window and realizes his boss is already stuck there in the window and we see his legs hanging out. There were many funny moments, but I also think that in terms of storytelling this film and script were a success. They of course brought in the usual aspects like the references about all the stuff that vampires cannot deal with like the cross, the garlic, the light and of course also the information that vampires have no reflection in mirrors. This maybe resulted in the smartest dramatic moment the film had to offer, namely when we see the two main characters at the dance and how they are trying to get out and then all of a sudden a mirror is in the way and reveals their true identity. Nicely done. Before that, the dance did not interest me too much, but it was still alright, also one funny moment when another vampire dancer there that looked pretty bizarre was close to Polanski’s character.

There was a great deal of situational comedy to this film. It felt like a very unique brand of comedy, definitely nothing that everybody will find funny, but I liked these inclusions like also when we see the former university professor frozen solid at the very start, but he is alright or also the voice-over telling us that his colleagues at the university saw him as some kind of nutjob. As a whole, the comedy reminded me a lot of the approach from the days of the silent films, the greats from that era like Chaplin, Keaton, Lloyd, Arbuckle and the rest and this included also scenes when for example people were simply struggling to stay on their feet, nothing too many will laugh about today anymore, but (over) a century ago it was a riot. I also had to think of this comparison when I read the closing credits and Tate’s character is described as „Sarah, his daughter“ or „Sarah, their daughter“ or something like that, but mentioning this family relation to other characters is something that was really typical back then during the silent film days, so I feel this movie is perhaps also a bit of a tribute from Polanski to the films and filmmakers from before he was born. Really strange to imagine that he was already 10 years old during the days of World War II. It lies so far back in the past. Anyway, Polanski is of course seen controversial for other reasons too, but I am glad that this did not keep too many apparently from coming to watch this film tonight. Really large audience in a big movie theater room and this is another statement I think that should encourage cinema owners to show these old films more often, if a film like this that is a little fun watch, but hardly a classic, can already get a triple-digit amount of people to buy tickets. Maybe we are on course there and showing old films can be more of a thing in the 2020s than it was five or ten years ago and if we are honest, nobody will really miss these many, many new films that are mediocre at best, even if of course this decade will also have its classics.

But now back to this movie: There is not too much more to say anyway I guess. The scenes inside were nice because of the art direction and some of the costumes and the scenes outside were mostly nice because of the winter landscapes and decent cinematography. It was also funny how the hunchback towards the end chases our heroes as if he was in some bobsleigh. In general, smart inclusion from the vampire boss (I somehow hesitate to call him Dracula) that he employed a human (or somebody somewhat human) to take care of his affairs during daytime too. The moment when we see Tate’s character’s father in the coffin next to the vampire boss‘ son was also funny, even if others in the room clearly loved it even more than I did. It can also be said that people who are really dedicated in terms of anti-sexism and gender equality will maybe struggle during a few occasions here, no matter if we are talking about what Polanski’s eyes focus on during an early occasion of the film, no matter if we are talking about a girl getting spanked from her dad or if we are again talking about what Polanski’s character has in mind with his hands when he is hiding under a table next to a female character. There are basically three females in here, two are for optical pleasure and the third, Tate’s character’s mother, is in it for some comedy moments. One that stayed in the mind there was what she does when she suspects her husband to be unfaithful. One character takes quite a blow to the head there and that moment was another very typical silent film scene. Also a bit strange how quickly the scene ended, namely three seconds after perhaps and they move on to the next morning. In general, there are also some funny inclusions in the dialogues, especially with MacGowran’s character, but the majority of comedy is linked to slapstick here. Oh yeah, another somewhat bizarre comedic inclusion was when Polanski’s character is about to save Tate’s during the dance and he says something like the future will be bright again (not the exact words), so clearly he is pretty full of himself and I am wondering if this was meant in a serious or in a comedic fashion. We will never know. What I am completely sure about, however, is that I give this film a thumbs-up. It is definitely worth watching.