Thursday, November 25, 2021

'Zoltan – Hound of Dracula' (1977) – Albert Band.

In grubby, gob-garlended lahnden circa 1977 it was all anarchy in the UK, and designer safety pins on King's Road, but in dreamy delicious, sun-drenched California, Low-Budget impresario Albert Band was unleashing his barking-mad, kooky canine creep-show 'Zoltan – Hound of Dracula'. wherein the long-buried tomb of the demoniacal, perfidiously plasma purloining patriarch Dracula was crudely disturbed, fatefully releasing Drac's singularly demented dog's body, Viedt Schmidt (Reggie Nalder). This morbidly mute, silently savage servant of absolute evil is hell-bent on locating his new master, thereby leading the vainglorious Viedt to L.A. along with grisly-minded, grey-flanked, ferociously feral hound Zoltan!

Schmidt villainously vampirizes, Michael Drake (Michael Pataki) Dracula's sole living heir, and thereafter the blissfully boisterous horror film turns into a plasma packed, William Girdler-type of 'when-diabolically-dentured-dogs attack' B-Horror schlocker! There's an endearingly TV Movie-of-the-week aesthetic which permeates pleasantly throughout, and bravura character actor, Michael Pataki delivers a zesty, surprisingly committed performance in a dual role, with B-Cult icon, Reggie 'Albino' Nalder looming luridly, and grimly glowering with a ghoulish intensity! Albert Band's fur-flyingly fang-tastic fear-flick belongs entirely to Zoltan whose pristine canine acting pedigree cannot be denied, calamitously chewing up the scenery with a rabid intensity that would give Kinski an inferiority complex! 'Zoltan – Hound of Dracula' remains a terrifically toothsome terror-flick, unequivocally proving the old adage that every Devil Dog will have its day...or night!!! The lusciously lounge-tastic score by maestro, Andrew Belling is furry funky indeed, and sculpting genius Stan Winston's sanguineous prosthetics are a gruesome delight!

 









 

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