Format: Turner Classic Movies on big ol’ television.
Evidently, Christopher Lee played Dracula more than anyone else in film history. I think that makes sense. He also apparently ended each film by claiming that he’d not play the role again until Hammer Studios convinced him to take it up just one more time. Taste the Blood of Dracula is clearly a film in that vein, since Lee, the titular character, is barely in it and has only a couple of lines. There are times when this works—in Horror of Dracula, Lee is absent from much of the film, but he casts a huge shadow over everything that happens. Here, he simply doesn’t. He’s there, but in most cases, he’s almost a non-factor in everything that happens.
We start by watching Dracula (Lee) die. The witness to his demise is a merchant named Weller (Roy Kinnear), who goes to the remains of Count Dracula and takes his cape, ring, and brooch that has essentially powdered blood on it. This will all be important eventually, even though the scene is going to shift radically after this.
