Mark of the Vampire

source: Mark of the Vampire

Count Mora has a scar on his temple. It's a gunshot wound acquired when after having incest with his daughter he committed suicide. That was meant to explain to the audiences how he and his daughter became vampires. But censors demanded the deletion of references to both the incest and the suicide.

Lionel Barrymore was probably drunk during most of the filming; he certainly seemed to be. His approach to delivering his lines consisted of suddenly finding meaning in the words he memorized as he delivered them -- my God, what horrible acting! His lousy work made it very difficult for everyone else on the set to get into their characters. You can see them waiting for Barrymore to pound out his lines unconvincingly, and then try to figure out how to make their own lines sound plausible. Bela Lugosi was on autopilot the whole time he was in vampire mode. The editing was execrable. You may say, "Hey, it wasn't Tod Browning's fault," but I say, "Hey, all we've got to go by is what wound up on the screen, and it's a mess!" The script, or what survived of it, is a steaming pile of clichés. Lordy, what a waste of an hour.

Mark of the Vampire is based upon London After Midnight and is an unusual vampire tale. There are genuinely creepy moments but the ending ruins the story. Lionel Barrymore and Bela Lugosi can't save this movie and we can only recommend this to dedicated movie buffs. The ending is disappointing and inexplicable.

Sometimes a genre overripens then gets reborn with a new fold. Such was the case with the recent "Shadow of the Vampire," which I thought was one of the most intelligent movies of 2000. It features two layers: the actual reality of the vampire and a "new" layer showing the overarching film reality. Naturally, one bleeds into and drives the other. That's not quite what have with this, 65 years earlier and surely embedded in the genesis of the genre. But this is close, so close. Tod Browning is surely one of the filmmakers worth watching. In this edition, he already stretches the bizarre world he lives in, one of freaks and madmen. This time, his mad scientist is a surrogate of himself, part obsessed and part creator of the world of obsession. Ted's Evaluation -- 3 of 3: Worth watching.

This starts out looking like a conventional horror film. Baron Otto (Jean Hersholt) comes downstairs to inform the servants that their beloved master, Sir Karell, has been murdered. Upstairs, in Sir Karell's office, the slumped body of the nobleman is examined. Dr. Doskil (Donald Meeks) is the superstitious and nervous one. He notes the two marks on Sir Karell's neck (not that big of a deal, maybe there before the murder), and that the body has been completely drained of blood (a very big deal, impossible to explain). His explanation - vampires. Inspector Neumann from Prague (Lionel Atwill) basically says poppycock, and goes around doing a methodical investigation, but comes up empty handed. Nearly a year later, shortly after the marriage of Sir Karell's daughter, Irena, to a young man with no real station in life or money of his own, odd things begin to happen. A local legendary vampire father/daughter team - Count Mora and daughter Luna - are spotted wandering near the old castle where the baron was murdered. Apparently the trauma of living in the same place where her father was killed was too much for Irena, so that castle was abandoned and now she is living in equally luxurious digs nearby. First Irena's husband is attacked near the old castle, but escapes with his life, then the vampires Luna and Mora start showing up and repeatedly attack Irena, and it is found that Sir Karell's grave is empty. Professor Zelin (Lionel Barrymore) - obviously a clone of Dracula's Van Helsing, shows up and assures everyone that this is the work of vampires, that Sir Karell is now one himself, and Sir Karell's daughter is next. Unlike Dracula, there turns out to be a logical explanation for everything. Or at least there is supposed to be - I'll let you watch and find out. Just suffice it to say that this evidence of vampirism is a huge ruse backed by the police that includes just about everybody being in on the plan EXCEPT the person that the police believe is guilty. If they are wrong, they have probably tipped off the actual murderer! Now let me go through the rest of the plot holes. Sir Karell's castle that the vampires haunt was a beautiful home just a year before at the time of the murder. In just one year's time the windows are broken, the masonry is crumbling, there are spider webs everywhere, and rats and huge spiders rummage through what one can only call ruins? The actual murderer gained nothing by committing the murder - the murderer never got what the murderer wanted, and apparently didn't even try to get it after Sir Karell died. So what was the point? Plus the film clearly shows one of the "vampires" turning into a bat - with no logical explanation. Finally, there is no satisfactory answer as to how the killer removed and disposed of all of Sir Karell's blood. Why do I like it? The performances and the pace mainly. Everybody is perfect at their roles. Atwill as the stiff police inspector, Elizabeth Allan as the distraught daughter, Donald Meeks as the nervous physician, but most of all Lionel Barrymore as the vampire hunter was a delight. He took what could have been a hammy role and made it work. He would have been a great Van Helsing in the original Dracula. There were tons of scenes deleted from this film that might have caused it to make more sense, including the description of an incestuous relationship that existed in life between legendary vampires Luna and Count Mora that explains the bullet wound clearly visible in Mora's forehead that left me scratching my head UNTIL I heard the commentary on the DVD. For MGM to mainly be a studio for churning out dramas not horror in the 1930's, I think they did a good job with this one considering the limitations the production code put on them at the time.

Nothing to see here. MGM hired Bela Lugosi and Tod Browning to reproduce their 1931 hit, Dracula, except they subtract a lot of Lugosi's role. We get a copy of the vampire's famous descent of the staircase, with the infamous armadillos replaced by a possum (although I kind of remember there being a possum in Dracula, too, but I could be wrong). The production, direction, and acting is all at least a step below Dracula (which I don't think is a film that holds up all that well anymore anyways; I gave it a 7/10). Lugosi, in the few scenes he's in, is on autopilot, as well as Tod Browning. The only thing of interest is the ending, which, well, isn't all that convincing anyway and feels like a cop-out. It's short, so if you are a classic horror fan, this might be worth seeing, at least as a curio. It's worth is still little. 5/10.

All of the essential ingredients for a good vampire film are here, but I guessed who the culprit was from the beginning (and even his motive), but I wasn't prepared for the nice twist in the surprise ending. The story about a vampire stalking people in a picturesque village is handsomely photographed by none other than James Wong Howe and the settings rival any of those used in the original "Dracula" film. This time ELIZABETH ALLAN is the frightened heroine while BELA LUGOSI and LIONEL ATWILL fill their standard horror film assignments in fine form. LIONEL BARRYMORE is Prof. Zelin and seems to have great difficulty in standing on two feet rather than being in a wheel-chair, so early was he inflicted with his rheumatism that forced him to be seated in most of his films by the end of the '30s, notably as Dr. Gillespie in those Dr. Kildare films. He's obviously a replacement for the usual Van Helsing character assigned to solve the vampire mysteries. With a running time of 1 hr. 1 min. there's no time to be bored. A neat little thriller with good supporting roles from character actors like Jessie Ralph and Donald Meek--with all of the histrionics strictly in broad '30s horror style. One of Tod Browning's better films. The atmospheric sets and shadowy but crisp B&W photography are beyond reproach.

This is a nice re-working of the lost classic "London After Midnight" which tragically perished in a fire, never to return. More a murder mystery than a horror story, "Mark of the Vampire" still has some very nice creepy moments and a fog-drenched atmosphere throughout that will make the twist ending forgivable. Irena Borotyn's father has been found dead, his body drained of blood through two small holes found upon his neck. Is it indeed the work of vampires, as the rumors through the isolated countryside insist? Or is it something else? A year after the murder, the dead man is seen wandering through the night in the company of two hideous ghouls. Strange things begin to happen and Irena seems to be the new target. Can Lionel Barrymore save her and solve the mystery once and for all? There are some absolutely gorgeous shots in this film featuring giant spider webs, furry arachnids skittering up walls, wolves howling mournfully in the distance and the silent presence of both Bela Lugosi and Carol Borland, walking in perfect sync together through the misty graveyards and the crumbling castle ruins, he in his cape and she in her burial shroud. There's also a GREAT scene where Miss Borland descends from above on giant bat wings! The plot doesn't always make a lot of sense, and at films end you discover you've been duped, but this is one of those films that should be watched for its atmosphere alone. It's so saturated with shadows and cobwebs and creepy Gothic splendor that it makes even the sunniest day feel like Halloween night. Highly recommended.

There are some excellent scenes in this film -- when the Prof peers in the window & sees Carole Borland "landing" -- very surrealistic! Also, when the father & Bela are in the cemetery, motionlessly watching the people looking into the crypt -- creepy sound effects! Also, Donald Meek is excellent as the superstitious doctor. What's wrong with it is that you hardly ever see Lugosi, and Lionell Barrymore REALLY hams it up in the "Van Helsing" role! He moves & speaks so slowly, so deliberately, that one would think that HE'S of the Undead, too! He tries for a dramatic effect, but fails miserably. You may notice the (bullet) wound in Bela's temple; the original storyline had him killed for having an incestuous relationship with his daughter (Borland). That whole scenerio was cut from the film. Even so, this a VERY "odd" & interesting "vampire" film; must see! Norm had Lug