Review of The Return of the Vampire (1943) by John T — 20 Dec 2014

When a vampire's body is unearthed by a bombing raid on London during WWII, his stake is removed and he rises from the dead. With the help of his werewolf henchman, seeks revenge on the woman who staked him two decades earlier. Since Universal owned the rights to the Dracula franchise, Columbia had to make several changes to the story. The fact that the movie takes place in contemporary England, and that the vampire's assistant is a werewolf, are the only new twists in this movie, which in all other respects is a typical vampire movie from the golden age of monsters.

Bela Lugosi delivers his lines with his usual flair. Althought he only played a vampire two other times on film - in the original Dracula and in the Abbott and Costello movie - he slips smoothly into the role he made famous. Nina Foch, cast as the requisite damsel in distress, is the only other actor of note and she does a credible job. The rest of the cast was nondescript, at best.

Though I wouldn't call it a great movie it features a strong performance by Bela Lugosi and plenty of gothic atmosphere in the form of foggy graveyards and decaying crypts to make the film a more than passable example of the genre.