The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974)
Director: Roy Ward Baker
Starring: Peter Cushing, Julie Ege, David Chang
Synopsis:
A Chinese priest travels to Transylvania to seek Count Dracula's aid in reviving the Seven Golden Vampires.
Impressions:
The notion of a Hammer Productions-Shaw Brothers collabo was enough to get my attention and the fact that they had Peter Cushing making an appearance as Professor van Helsing pretty well sealed the deal. If only they had Christopher Lee as Dracula... (John Forbes-Robertson does okay, but Dracula doesn't have all that much to do and spends most of the movie taking the form of Kah.) Both the studios involved can make good movies, but there's a lot of crap they've put out as well and this film is inclined toward the latter. It's a very cheaply-made film with a threadbare plot and characterization. There's pretty much nothing to Hsi Ching's brothers beyond their weapon type and the eponymous Seven Golden Vampires are just glorified mooks with ugly makeup effects. Leyland and Vanessa aren't much better and mostly seem to be there so that Peter Cushing isn't the only white person around and to provide romantic subplots for Hsi Ching and Mai Kwei. You're probably at least holding out hope for some good kung fu fighting, but the fight choreography is nothing to write home about. Outside of being enjoyed as a peculiarity of this particular time in cinema history, there's not much reason to watch this. Take it or leave it is the best I can say for it.
50/50