THOSE FEARLESS VAMPIRE KILLERS
UK, 1966, 107 minutes, Colour.
Jack Mc Gowran, Roman Polanski. Alfie Bass, Sharon Tate, Ferdy Mayne, Iain Quarrier, Terry Downes.
Directed by Roman Polanski.
Those Fearless Vampire Killers is a very stylish comedy satirising the conventional vampire horror films. Acting and sets are much better than the usual horror films and, in fact, there is quite an atmosphere, part beauty, part horror about the whole film. It is witty and clever.
Polanski avows he is a fan of horror films and he is a master at creating atmospheres of horror and terror without resorting to blood and scream tactics. Knife in the Water, Repulsion, Cul-de- Sac, Rosemary's Baby, Macbeth, The Tenant, all rely on this creation of atmosphere.
Jack Mc Gowran, looking like an emaciated Einstein and Polanski himself, looking like Danny Kaye, seek out vampires in the name of science and, then, in the name of liberating the world. With the surprise ending, their mission is a failure. Vampires are laughed at - a Jewish vampire who is not repelled by a cross, a homosexual vampire and Richard III at the Vampire's ball. Peasants are laughed at. The fearless vampire killers are laughed at - and the audience is really laughed at but all in a light, good-humoured way. There is a certain curiosity about the film because in it Polanski directs and acts with his wife, the late Sharon Tate. The film is a better vampire film than the horror films it sets out to mock.
1. Did you think this was an effective satire? Why? Did it use cheap camera tricks and jokes to ridicule its subject or did it use better means? What were they?
2. What were the chief targets of satire here?
3. How did the M.G.M. Lion turning vampire and the continuous drop of blood (becoming a bat!) set the tone of the film?
4. Why was Professor Abronsius made up to look like an emaciated Einstein? Did the film poke fun at scientist theoreticians? (Dr. Abronsius seemed more interested in confirming his theories than the people involved in the vampire sucking. He almost stopped to study bats instead of making his escape.) Is Don Quixote and Sancho Panza a valid comparison for the two heroes?
5. What was Alfred's role in the film - master's apprentice? comic hero? An example of ordinary, fearful humanity - he could not put the stakes through the vampire's hearts.
6. Why did a Jewish vampire unafraid of the cross and the homosexual vampire, and the vampires at the ball poke fun at vampires? (And the lower class vampire put outside to rest!)
7. Why did vampire stories arise? Did people believe in them? Why were people so superstitious about them (with garlic)?
8. Writers say that vampire stories and superstitions express some of the darker side of our own personalities. How? Could this be true?
9. Is it true to say that evil always wins in this film?
10. What was the meaning of the ending? Did it poke fun at the whole film? How? "That night, fleeing from Transylvania, Professor Abronius never guessed he was carrying away with him the very evil he had wished destroyed. Thanks to him, this evil would at last be able to spread across the world."
