The Dracula Business

1974, regia di ?

Scheda: Nazione: GB - Produzione: BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) - Distribuzione: BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) - Soggetto (dal Dracula di Bram Stoker): Daniel Farson - Sceneggiatura: Daniel Farson - Formato: Color, documentario, episodio della serie tv Tuesday Documentary - Durata: 50'.

Cast: Daniel Farson, Michael Carreras, Denholm Elliot, Bernard Davies, Bruce Wightman.

Plot Summary, Synopsis, Review: IMDb (sulla serie) - bbc.co.uk - bradmiddleton.ca - whatson.bfi.org.uk - goodreads.com: «First broadcast on August 6, 1974, The Dracula Business features writer and broadcaster Daniel Farson investigating the myths and locations from the novel Dracula, written by his great-uncle Bram Stoker. Now available to watch online via the BBC, this is a fascinating look back at a period of time when the Dracula, and modern vampire craze, was just beginning. Farson's investigation into "the weird obsession" of his great-uncle begins on the shores (and amongst the tomstones) of Whitby, England, where he notes that Stoker "is probably one of the least known authors of one of the best known books." Over the course of the 50-minute documentary, he travels to areas of London, as well as Romania, to explore the novel's global impact. Features interviews with Michael Carreras (Hammer Studios), Denholm Elliot (Mystery and Imagination: Dracula, 1968), and Bernard Davies & Bruce Wightman, who founded The Dracula Society in 1973».

taliesinttlg.blogspot.it: «This was a BBC documentary, which I came across as Anthony Hogg mentioned it to me. At the time of review available via BBC iPlayer the documentary was an archive piece and featured Daniel Farson investigating what made Dracula so enduringly popular. Farson was, apparently, qualified to ask such a question as Bram was his grand-uncle. Starting at Whitby, the documentary plotted an eclectic course through Transylvania, Highgate and Stoke-on-Trent. Obviously not all the locations mentioned are directly linked to Stoker's novel, but Farson's investigation included our obsession with vampires generally and touched on evil and the occult. It was also very British documentary of a certain age and that almost made the documentary as interesting as the subject matter did.

Interesting moments within the documentary included attending a Romanian peasant funeral, and meeting Tinka, one of the funeral singers. Via a translator she suggested that when her father died, his body did not display the expected rigor mortis. Because of this the corpse was staked before burial. Farson believed her father must still have been alive, which was a bit of a leap but tied the case into the idea of premature burial. Of course we don't know the circumstances of the gentleman's death, and Paul Barber does explain the bodies can lose rigor mortis depending on circumstances in his seminal book Vampires, Burial and Death. Whilst in Transylvania Farson touches on vampire tourism and Vlad Țepeș, and rightly points out that the historical Dracula had nothing to do with Bram's creation. The documentary, having passed through a London bookshop where a woman said that she was interested in the idea of vampires because her husband had left her and she fancied killing him rather nastily in her fantasies, looked at contemporary UK cases including the vampire of the Villas and the Highgate vampire. In an interview with a wonderfully down-to-earth Highgate groundskeeper, we hear about the hundreds of vampire hunters searching for something that the groundskeeper knows doesn't exist. He ties the event to David Farrant's original claims, mentioning none of the other participants by name, but suggests vandalism and desecration of corpses including staking of bodies took place. ...».

Episodio della serie Tuesday Documentary (1968-1983), andato in onda sul Canale One della BBC il 6 agosto 1974.

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