Vampire Batty

Seems there's someone behaving quite badly
Then this dummy starts raving, and madly
Does the guy like to bite?
He's Dwight Frye, so he might...
The poor bum in a cave will end sadly.



Dwight Frye plays the mentally challenged Herman Glieb in The Vampire Bat (Frank R. Strayer; 1933). Yes, it's another Dwight Frye-day.

Made to Odor

This doc, off-the-beam, lab well-stocked,
A toxic bat-cream will concoct
And its smell will incite
Flapping hell in the night
But his schlock movie scheme is half-cocked.

Surly Hack and David Cairns

Béla Lugosi plots low-budget retribution in The Devil Bat (Jean Yarbrough; 1940).

Scent to Kill

Try Lugosi's new aftershave lotion!
Tiny doses he'll craft with devotion
But the perfume's sillage
Leads to doom - quelle dommage!
Up bats' noses one draught spells commotion.

David Cairns

Béla Lugosi in The Devil Bat (Jean Yarbrough; 1940). Cosmetic company chemist Carruthers (Lugosi) is angry at his employers, feeling they have denied him his due share of company success. To get revenge, he breeds giant bats, conditioning them to kill those wearing a special after-shave lotion he has concocted, distributing samples to his enemies as a "test" product.

Yes Sir, Bat's My Baby

His sanity dimly receding,
This man on a whim has been breeding
Winged beasts, oversized
But, released, who's surprised
That, satanic, on him they start feeding.



Disgruntled chemist Dr. Paul Carruthers (Béla Lugosi) creates The Devil Bat (Jean Yarbrough; 1940).

Royal Flushed

Alive? This Count's sickly, undead
Surviving on victims he's bled
When absent fresh blood
He looks drab, feels like crud
But revived by one lick, he sees red.

Christopher Lee is in the pink in Dracula, Prince of Darkness (Terence Fisher; 1966).

A Biting Criticism

She said, "It was boring and flat,
And quite disappointing at that.
Because I'd been told
Though terribly old
The count was as big as a bat."

Donald B. Benson



Stephanie Beacham and Christopher Lee in Dracula A.D. 1972 (Alan Gibson; 1972).

The Bat and the Beautiful

Count Dracula's brides have a thirst
The pack of them must have been cursed
They lust for you, bud
But just for your blood
They'll snack on your neck like it's wurst.

Marie Devereux, Andree Melly, and Freda Jackson in The Brides of Dracula (Terence Fisher; 1960). Title by David Cairns, batting above average.

Bat to the Bone

Hammer's bats weren't ever convincing
Stiff and flat, through the air they'd come mincing
When a big scene transpires
Then the screen's thick with wires
Sham theatrics leave audience wincing.

David Cairns

 
Top: Peter Cushing fends off a not-so-special effect in the Hammer production Brides of Dracula (Terence Fisher; 1960) Above: The cast ducks under the wires in The Kiss of the Vampire (Don Sharp; 1963).

Goreplay

When they're bitten and given a squeeze,
All the prettys go weak in the knees
First they shudder, then swoon
And through blood, all too soon,
He's transmitted his icky disease.

Dracula (Christopher Lee) necks with Lucy Paxton (Isla Blair) in Taste the Blood of Dracula (Peter Sasdy; 1969).

Suckers for Suckers

Some other film genres are brainier
With angles more Citizen Kanier
But don't sell the tix
Like vampire pix
About that renowned Transylvanier.

Donald B. Benson

Like movie audiences, Maria finds Dracula irresistible: Veronica Carlson and Christopher Lee in Hammer Films' Dracula Has Risen From the Grave (Freddie Francis; 1968).

Der Fledermaus Pad

Count Vlad has a creaky mystique
And his pad's an antique-y boutique
If he makes you his guest
Stick a stake in his chest
'Cause the cad's an unspeakable freak.

Title by Der Fledermausketeer David Cairns. Image: Dracula (Bela Lugosi) welcomes Renfield (Dwight Frye) to his castle in Dracula (1931). Direction by Tod Browning; Cinematography by Karl Freund; Production Design by John Hoffman and Herman Rosse; Art Direction by Charles D. Hall; Set Decoration by Russell A Gausman.

The Pitt and the Pendulous

With a figure that's known to stop traffic
Miss Pitt jiggles and moans, acting Sapphic
When she rips off her bodice
Swings her hips, acts immodest
Ingrid signals her own demographic.

David Cairns



Bloodsucking Marcilla (Ingrid Pitt) exposes young Emma (Madeline Smith) to vampirism--or something like that: The Vampire Lovers (Roy Ward Baker; 1970).

The Stag at Bray

Count Dracula blushed as he stammered,
"My old brides were silver-screen glamoured.
Now colorful harlots
In literal scarlets ...
I must have gone out and got Hammered."

Donald B. Benson

Linda Hayden, Christopher Lee, and Isla Blair in Taste the Blood of Dracula (1969). Lee played the Count seven times for Hammer Films.

Drac the Knife

 

The shark has such teeth, pretty dear
In the dark they are sheathed, disappear
When he bares them, red billows
Flare out on your pillows
Leaving marks underneath on your bier.

David Cairns

Christopher Lee is the count with the canines in Dracula (Terence Fisher; 1958).

The Vlad and the Beautiful

He's a frightful old creep and no monk
Don't invite him to sleep in your bunk
Down he'll sink in a vein
Like he's drinking champagne
Just one bite, good and deep, and you're sunk.

Dracula (Christopher Lee), about to open a tap in Mina (Melissa Stribling) in Dracula aka Horror of Dracula (Terence Fisher; 1958).

Swallow Victory

He's a frightening, meddlesome fink
Late at night in your bedroom he'll slink
Your long, elegant neck
Called this fellow from heck
He will bite, but you led him to drink.



Dracula (Christopher Lee) puts the bite on Maria (Veronica Carlson) in Dracula Has Risen From the Grave (Freddie Francis; 1968).

Vile-entino

Dashing Drac, quite Ted Bundy-like, hovers
First attracting then plundering "lovers"
But his business with necks
Clearly isn't for sex
His bad acts aren't under the covers.


Frances Dade as juicy Lucy and Béla Lugosi as the no-account Count in Dracula (Tod Browning; 1931). Title by erst-vile David Cairns.

Auld Lang Lines

Obsolete, overthrown in a coup,
Wipe your feet on the old, bring the new!
Though the future looks scary,
Of reviewing be wary--
Stop beating that horse, time for glue!

Happy New Year from all of us at LimerWrecks!
Illustration © 2016 Pete Fitzgerald