FAQ

In the first scene with Holmwood and his wife, Van Helsing tells them they were colleagues. It is implied that they were partners in hunting vampires and Harker volunteered to go to castle Dracula to kill him.

The film was simply titled "Dracula" in Britain where it was made. In the US it was titled "The Horror of Dracula", to discern it from Universal Studio's various Dracula films of the 1930s and 40s. Additionally, an unrelated low-budget American film called "The Return of Dracula" was also released in 1958, though the title was changed to "The Fantastic Disappearing Man" in Britain.

Jonathan Harker (John Van Eyssen) takes employment with Count Dracula (Christopher Lee), ostensibly to catalog his vast library. In fact, he is on a mission to kill the Count, a vampire. Before he can do so, however, the Count gains the upper hand and Harker soon finds himself as one of the walking dead. Dracula has taken an interest in Harker's fiancée, Lucy Holmwood (Carol Marsh), and it is left to Harker's colleague, Dr. Van Helsing (Peter Cushing), to protect her. He has difficulty convincing Lucy's brother, Arthur (Michael Gough), of the dangers or even the existence of vampires. Soon, however, Arthur's wife Mina (Melissa Stribling) is targeted by Count Dracula, and he and Van Helsing must race to find Dracula's lair before Mina is lost to them forever.

Dracula is based on Bram Stoker's 1897 novel Dracula. The novel was adapted for this movie by Welsh screenwriter Jimmy Sangster. It was followed by The Brides of Dracula (1960), Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966), Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968), Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970), Scars of Dracula (1970), Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972), and The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973).

No. The exterior was built on the backlot at Bray Studios, with a design by Bernard Robinson. In the long shots, the turrets (and mountains) are actually part of a matte painting by Les Bowie. The interiors were also designed by Robinson and built at Bray.

Arthur and Dr Van Helsing stand outside watching the house all night, but the next morning Arthur finds Mina drained of blood. Van Helsing performs a transfusion using Arthur's blood, after which he suggests that Arthur have a glass of wine. However, Gerda (Olga Dickie) refuses to get a bottle from the wine cellar because Mina has forbidden her to go down there. They rush down to the cellar, where they find Dracula's coffin. Meanwhile, Dracula has abducted Mina and carried her off in a carriage to his castle. Van Helsing and Arthur follow, getting there just as Dracula is about to bury Mina. Dracula rushes into the castle, and Van Helsing follows. Dracula attempts to kill Van Helsing, but Van Helsing leaps onto some curtains, tearing them down and letting in sunlight. Dracula starts to deteriorate. Van Helsing grabs two candlesticks and makes a cross out of them. Dracula slowly turns to dust, and the cross burn on Mina's palm disappears. In the final scene, the wind blows away the dust that once was Dracula, leaving only his ring behind.

There are at least two scenes for which stills exist, but which did not make it to the final edit of the film. The first is the decayed corpse of Jonathan Harker. The second is Dracula's prolonged disintegration sequence at the end. For a long time the latter was rumoured to have been included in the Japanese release, and in 2012, it was confirmed. Several seconds of extra disintegration footage, including some of Dracula tearing his flesh from his face, were restored and integrated into the 2007 BFI restoration, then released in March 2013 on Region 2 Blu-ray and DVD. The recovered Japanese reels also included an alternate version of Dracula's seduction of Mina, with erotically charged shots of Mina from Dracula's point of view and more explicit shots of Dracula kissing Mina and her very clearly enjoying it. These, too, were restored and included in the 2013 Blu-ray/DVD release. The photograph of a decomposed Jonathan Harker is thought to be a test shot or studio still, and it's unlikely the full scene was ever filmed, not least because it wouldn't make sense for Harker, who is young, to age like the other vampires on being destroyed.

Although the colours are certainly beautifully and vibrantly restored in the new print, all the footage has been seen before--just never together in one version. The 2007 restoration includes the original British title card, which reads simply Dracula, in ornate, gothic script. A few seconds of extra blood are seen in Lucy's staking scene. These were in the original US release but not in the UK version. Contrary to rumour, this restored version does NOT contain any of the supposed Japanese footage of Dracula's disintegration or of Jonathan Harker's decayed corpse. Photographic stills exist of both, but until the 2011 discovery of a partial print in Japan, no actual film had been found.

The BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) demanded some cuts for the theatrical release of the movie in 1958. This version, known as Horror of Dracula in the USA, was for many years thought to be the longest version and was restored in 2007. So it was a real surprise when in September 2011, some old film reels containing previously unknown scenes were found in Tokyo. They didn't include the whole movie (just the last 36 minutes). Nevertheless, the buzz among the fans was huge and they naturally wanted to see these scenes. And the impossible happened at the beginning of 2013, when Lions Gate and the British Hammer Films announced the release of a new longer version of the movie on DVD and Blu-ray. Although the picture quality of the new scenes is a little bit worse than the rest and the movie's also only a few seconds longer, it is nevertheless the ultimate version for fans of this classic.