... aka: Nude in Dracula's Castle
Directed by:
Harrison Marks (uncredited)
After a failed career as part of a music hall comedy duo, director Marks started work as a photographer. In the early 50s he was supplying photographs to publishers on a freelance basis but eventually opened his own studio in Soho. It was there that he formed his company Kamera and became one of the UK's top glamour photographers. And by “glamour,” I mean nude. His company produced their own magazines (the primary one was called Kamera but there were off-shoots like Solo), calendars, cards, photography books and more. In 1960, he branched out further and started making “nudie-cutie” shorts that were distributed on 8mm by the company's new label, Kamera Cine Films. Most of theses were simple little shorts with a little harmless T&A but later on became a bit more explicit to cater to the times. This is one of the earliest of these, runs just 5 minutes and is a showcase for model and former topless dancer June Palmer, who was very popular in England at the time.
Some of the models who started out in Marks' shorts even showed up in legitimate films. Palmer, for instance, had an uncredited bit in Hammer's TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA (1970) while fellow nude model Pamela Green, who dated Marks at the time, was prominently featured in Michael Powell's classic Peeping Tom (1960), on which Marks served as an uncredited "photographic consultant." Years later, she also made an appearance in the Peter Cushing film Legend of the Werewolf (1975). Perhaps most notable was Sue Bond, who started out in softcore shorts for Marks like Hot Teddy and then tried to deny ever working for him after she got a semi-recurring role on The Benny Hill Show and some mainstream TV guest spots.
With suitcase in hand, a young woman (Palmer) makes her way through the woods and then to the Elm Manor Hotel. She's greeted at the door by a creepy man (played by Marks' former comedy duo partner Stuart Samuels) and then goes to her room. From here on out she's faced with one terror after another; losing both her composure and her wardrobe. While putting on lipstick in front of a mirror, a caped vampire appears behind her. When she turns around he's gone. She then goes downstairs for some water, where the vampire-butler chases her around for a few minutes until she collapses in bed. The next morning she awakens unharmed. Believing her visions from the previous night were merely a nightmare, she goes downstairs where a surprise awaits her.
There's really not much to go into here. This runs about 5 minutes and is a semi-interesting curio. While there's no dialogue, some added spooky music helps. Aesthetically, it looks more like something made in the 1920s than the 60s and the grainy photography and harsh lighting actually do give it a creepy feel. It also succeeds in giving us a nice look at Palmer, who shows plenty of T and a little A, though keeps the P covered with her nightgown. It's easy to see why she was so popular back then with her beautiful face and voluptuous physique.
A number of Marks' other shorts are also horror in nature. There was Witches Brew (1960) starring Green as a witch and Marks as a hunchback, Vampire (1963) starring Wendy Luton and the director as Dracula, Perchance to Scream (1967) starring Jane Paul and involving women being terrorized in a torture chamber and the mad scientist tale Dolly Mixture (1973) starring Clyda Rosen, which was released in both hard and softcore versions. The former runs 19 minutes and was released in Germany as Vor Geilheit kochen ("Boiling with Lust").
The Alternative Cinema print is called Nude in Dracula's Castle. Many of these are available to view on the BFI website, although you have to be British to be able to see them. Others (including this one) have leaked onto both archive.org and Youtube.
★★1/2
