Movies •Books •Music •Food •Tv Shows •Technology •Politics •Video Games •Parenting •Fashion •Green Living •more >

Lunch » Tags » Movies » Reviews » The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (The 7 Brothers Meet Dracula) » User review

The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (The 7 Brot...

The 1974 Hammer horror film and the final entry in their Dracula series.

Edit Topic

< read all 3 reviews

Hammer's last Dracula picture and first film with The Shaw Brothers Studios.

May 4, 2009

by Captain_Couth
posted in Welcome to the Grindhouse

Rating:

Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires is such an awesome film. How can you go wrong when you have Roy Ward Baker, Chang Cheh and the Liu brothers all working on a film together? This film has everything, the eeriness of a Hammer film with the red paint spraying, bone crunching action scenes of a Shaw Brother's flick! Peter Cushing reprises his role as Professor Van Helsing who's in China to prove the legend of the Seven Golden Vampires. After a lecture he finds someone who actually believes in the legend (David Chiang in a dual role). After local run in with some angry triads (thanks to Van Helsing's no good son who falls for a Scandinavian beauty. Will the good professor and friends find something that'll get them into a nasty situation that's way over their heads?

Hammer films at this time was pretty much on their last legs when they went on a joint venture with the Shaw Brothers. Run Run and Run Mei Shaw at this time were also trying to find a worldwide market for their two biggest stars David Chiang and Ti Lung. Ironically, Hammer and Shaw studios were just like each other in many ways (beautiful sets, a staff of great directors and actors. They also cranked out very diverse product and most of their films sadly were never given their proper due overseas, their films usually ended up being hacked to pieces and shown in grind houses or sliced and spliced for matinée showings). Sadly after a couple of collaborations the two companies never worked together again. Hammer Films would slowly fade away whilst Shaw Brothers Studios would last another ten years or so before concentrating on T.V. soap opera (a majority costume operas).

But for a brief time in history Shaw Brothers and Hammer (two of my favorite movie studios, especially when I was growing up) collaborated on a couple of films. Sadly they never worked with each other again. Legend of the Seven Golden Vampires was filmed in Shawscope (a.k.a. Panavision). Avoid Seven Brothers Meet Dracula, it's a horrible grind house re-edit of this grand production. Strongly recommended. David Chiang speaks English very well and his brother Paul Chiang (a.k.a. Paul Chu, a.k.a. Pei Chu) has a small part as the Triad boss' assistant.

What did you think of this review?

Helpful

Thought-Provoking

Fun to Read

Well-Organized

Post a Comment

More The Legend of the 7 Golden Vam... reviews

review by smurfwreck. September 24, 2010

posted in Welcome to the Grindhouse

Spoilers ahead...

I'd been meaning to see this flick for awhile (after hearing Ben and Dan talk about it on the Mondo Movie podcast), and today seemed like a great day to sit back and watch the very odd pairing of two cult movie studios, Hammer and the Shaw Brothers. Yeah, I know what you're thinking, how exactly do you mesh kung fu and horror? I was skeptical too, but after watching it I have to say that these two go together like chocolate and peanut butter. … more

Comments (2) Compliments (12)

review by smurfwreck. June 11, 2009

posted in Movie Hype

Shaw Brothers + Hammer Horror = Surprisingly Great!

I love the 1974 flick titled Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (or possibly the 7 Brothers Meet Dracula if you're more familiar with the shorter version with some alternate editing.) I'd been meaning to see this flick for awhile (after hearing Ben and Dan talk about it on the Mondo Movie podcast), and recently I got a chance to sit back and watch the very odd pairing of two cult movie studios, Hammer and the Shaw Brothers. Yeah, I know what you're thinking, how exactly do you mesh kung fu and horror? … more

Comment Compliment

see all The Legend of the 7 Golden Vam... reviews (3)

About the reviewer

Joseph Ulibas (Captain_Couth)
Ranked #37

I have been working on my web series Fine Feather Friends.

Consider the Source

Use Trust Points to see how much you can rely on this review.

Mr. Vampire

The Chinatown Kid

Boxer From Shantung

Blade II (New Line Platin …

rate more to improve this

Recent reviews by Captain_Couth

Our lips are sealed because we got the beat.
a review of Beauty and the Beat

The Beach Boys takes us back to the fun days of a …
a review of All Summer Long

Not qute Smile but close enough.
a review of Smiley Smile

see more reviews

About this movie

Wiki

One of the two collaborations between Hammer Films and The Shaw Brothers. This the last Dracula film from Hammer.

Was released in the US in a very truncated and edited form as The Seven Brothers Meet Dracula.

Hammer also released a spoken word album narrated by star Peter Cushing featuring music and soud effects from the movie called "The Legend of the Seven Vampires."

Chang Cheh was uncredited as the co-director.

Christopher Lee declined to play Count Dracula.

Action scenes were directed by Liu Chia-Liang and Tang Chia.

view wiki