The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires

By 1973 the writing was on the wall for the Hammer gothic. Trying to stay relevant, the studio produced a number of hybrid forms including The Satanic Rites of Dracula and Captain Kronos Vampire Hunter. None, however, perhaps showcases the studio's desperation quite so clearly as this co-production with Hong Kong's Shaw Brothers.

A long pre-credits sequence sets the scene: A remote Chinese province is plagued by the Seven Golden vampires and their legions of hopping corpses. One man, Hsui Sung, managed to destroy one of their number, but the others remain. This caused their human priest/servant Kha to travel to Transylvania to seek the help of Dracula (John Forbes-Robertson – Christopher Lee declined to play the part again unless he could do it faithfully). He refused, but did take advantage of the opportunity to possess Kha and, in some form at least, venture east.

Now, 100 years later, Professor Van Helsing (Peter Cushing – an impeccable performance as always) – who disposed of Dracula's European incarnation some ten years ago – is teaching anthropology at Chungking University. While most of his students are dismissive of his tales of vampires as backwards superstition, Hsi Ching (David Chiang – one of the many possible successors to Bruce Lee around at the time) – a descendant of Hsui Sung – seeks help in fighting the vampires who plague his home province.

While Van Helsing and Ching debate the subject, his son Leyland and the wealthy Scandinavian Countess Vanessa Buren (Julie Ege – looks good, couldn't act to save herself) run into a spot of bother with the local Triad boss. Fortunately they are saved by Ching's brothers, giving them an opportunity to demonstrate their skills and Professor Van Helsing a debt of gratitude to repay…

With backing from the adventurous Countess, the Van Helsings and the Hsi family – seven brothers and their one sister Mai Kwei – embark upon their expedition to the interior. After an initial skirmish with the Triad's men, a series of battles with the Golden Vampires ensue, with losses on both sides, until finally Van Helsing faces off against Kah, now transformed into Dracula himself…

There's nothing massively wrong with The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires as far as entertaining B-movies go. It's more that fans of both its parent cinemas are likely to recognise the film to be an awkward hybrid which fails to showcase the strengths of either form.

With Hammer director Roy Ward Baker handing over the reins to Shaw Brothers' Chang Che whenever it's time to punctuate the dramatic development with action, the stitching together of the film, Frankenstein monster style, is all too apparent at times.

The plethora of characters and incidents give the film a more polyphonic, ensemble based Hong Kong approach compared to the typical Hammer horror with its monster/savant format. Hammer fans, then, may find Van Helsing reduced to a support figure on the sidelines too often, while martial arts fans may be disappointed by the final Hammer-style showdown: Though Peter Cushing may have been a surprisingly physical actor for a cadaverous-looking, chain-smoking 60-year-old he was never about to take out Dracula with some nunchuks…

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the film, then, are its subtexts.

Although Dracula has sometimes been regarded, in the context of late C.19th fears of Slavic hordes, as a symbol of an alien threat to western European civilisation, here he could be interpreted as an European interloper threatening China, a colonial presence not too far removed from those in, to pick a few titles at random, Fist of Fury and Once Upon a Time in China, with which the film shares its turn of the 20th century setting.

In turn, Van Helsing, as a European intellectual whose ideas provide the basis of defeating the colonial presence, might be read as standing for Marx.

Schematic and reductive, to be sure, but a perspective to validing the film's interest for the double-domed practitioners of detournement…

Less progressive, however, is the way in which the film treats the relationships that develop between Hsi Ching and the Countessa and Leyland Van Helsing and Mai Kwei: The Countessa and Ching are killed for their transgression – the latter heroically dragging them both onto the stake after she has been vampirised – while Leyland and Mai make it to the end credits. The European guy can have the Chinese girl, but the Chinese guy can't have the European girl seems to be the message here…

Whatever the case, The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires is one of those films that can be designated historically significant, even if only in that generic niche context and as a precursor to the likes of Mr Vampire.

This early Region 1 DVD from Anchor Bay is not up to the standards of contemporary product as far as visuals go. While presented in the original 2.35:1 aspect ratio – a fact that is crucial to a better appreciation of the martial arts sequences, even if their choreography and performance in no way matches the best the genre had to offer at the time – there is considerable compression artefacting visible in most every frame.

Extras wise it's a good show thanks to the inclusion of a complete alternate cut of the film in the form of The Seven Brother Meet Dracula. Released a number of years after the original and with a hilariously bad trailer – "The Seven Brothers… and their one sister" – it shows you how much worse things could have been.

There is also an audio excerpt with Peter Cushing reading The Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires, sourced from a (now-collectable) record that came out at the time of the film's original.