Review of Dracula's Daughter (1936) by Ryan V — 03 Nov 2016

Professor Abraham Von Helsing (Edward Van Sloan) is being prosecuted for driving a stake through the heart of a man whom Von Helsing insists was an insidious vampire lord. His psychiatrist friend (Otto Kruger) is the only man who can clear his name, but this shrink is distracted by the charms of a brooding aristocrat (Gloria Holden) who believes that therapy and hypnosis can cure her insatiable bloodlust.

Dracula's Daughter is more technically accomplished than its famous predecessor, but polished cinematography and an actual score are packaged with stock characters, a boilerplate story, and a script that sometimes feels like it's checking plot points off a list rather than telling a story.

On the other hand, Gloria Holden is captivating in the title role, the concept of a reluctant vampire seeking a cure for their condition was still a somewhat novel story approach in 1936, and the movie does have enough courage to borrow a few of the sapphic undercurrents found in Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's 1872 Gothic novella Carmilla.