Why was Dracula in Africa anwyay?

Scream, Blacula, Scream!
(1973)


Blaxploitation goes vamp!  Big Willis (who is like a buck fifty) is pissed that he's not named successor on the spot when his mother, a voodoo high priestess dies.  He makes some threats, gets shaken like a stepchild and departs. For revenge, he gets some nondescript bones from some vagrant-looking guy who tells hims not to worry where they came from.  Hobo-bone-giver also has a vendetta against the cult.  Willis is actually stupid enough to perform the voodoo blood ritual and, not to long after, guess who comes to dinner?  Dude had hair growing down from, like, his tear ducts...that's just wrong.

So now Willis is a vampire...and still not the top voodoo guru...but his first gripe is that he can't see himself.  Which is probably a good thing since he was wearing this:

I'm so glad the 70s are over, the menswear was atrocious.

Blacula, you jive bitch!

But I have to give it to dude: his perm was ON.

I wonder if he uses Lottabody.

Anywho, Blacula goes to Willis's friend's party where he gets all persnickety about some African art pieces and meets Lisa (Pam Grier), the nominee to be the new Mama Loa.  Apparently Blacs is really some ancient African prince named Mamuwalde and there's a flashback showing a women who looks like Lisa.  I guess they have some connection but the movie does absolutely nothing with that so it was a pointless scene.  Equally pointless was Mamuwalde preaching the gospel on some pimps that he then eats. 

After Mamu has a few snacks and turns into a bat a couple of times, Justin, Lisa's old man, gets suspicious.  Justin used to be a detective.  Apparently he's not very good at it.  I'm thinking if some one died in my home the same night that some weirdo in a red satin lined cape and tux - THAT I DON'T EVEN KNOW - drops by, I would've fingered him first.  Justin has to wait until someone mentions bat spore...and then what does he do? He goes to the book store.  You know what I love about these types of movies?  Whenever the eerie shit starts happening someone always has to go to the bookstore, or the library or (these days) the internet.  By the 1970s everybody should know what a fucking vampire is.  Seriously.  Victims are found drained of their blood with two strange puncture wounds on their necks and then at least one of them is witnessed rising from the dead...but he had to wait for the bat dander before he acted...and he did so by going to the motherfucking bookstore.  Dude...your girlfriend is the high priestess of a voodoo cult.  You honestly needed to go looking for occult books?

Whatever, a lot of blah, blah filler takes place and then Justin and a police squad storm Blacs swanky new digs (Willis's house).  Now this is where stuff gets just weird.  Where the fuck did the vamp-monks come from?  Not one time did I see Blacs put the munch on a monk and yet there were at least 3 or 4 of those suckers.  Where do fuck do you find monks in the city?  Well, while the monks are wreaking havoc, Mamuwalde has Lisa in some locked room trying to exercise the vamp-demon spirit.  He wants to die and return to his people.  They get interrupted and the movie ends with him screaming at the ceiling while some groovy 70s music starts cuing the credits.

Jive turkey!

The Library Is Closed

From A Whisper To A Scream
(1987)

On the eve of his niece's execution, a librarian (Vincent Price) tells a nosy reporter four grisly tales about the town they live in.  It's his belief that living in Oldfield, Tennessee is what drove his niece to kill.  I love Vincent Price but I've honestly forgotten most of what I just saw.  The first tale, about the consequences of obsession and necrophilia, kind of reminded me of a really gruesome interpretation of Ray Bradbury's "The Eyrie."  The second I think was one about a man who finds out greed and voodoo don't mix.  One was about carnies and I didn't feel sorry for anyone it in because you're an idiot for going to a show called "Lovecraft's Traveling Amusements."  The last one was about some war babies that would put the Children of the Corn to shame.

The opening scene was really the best because it set the tone of the movie as creepy and steeped in some kind of slow brewing mania.  Also, the wedding dress represents both the promise of a new life and innocence, and the eventual loss of innocence (because you know the gown is meant to come off).  After that it was mediocre - and doing two stories about voodoo was unnecessary and kind of unimaginative.

On to the nudity: Stanley (the guy in the first tale) has a crazy sister who's seriously trying to give him the box.  She's really the only full-on consistent nudity you get and I was surprised to see that she looked shaved.  I didn't think women were doing that back then.  Well, I guess it was the late 80s.  Shag carpeting went out in the 70s and by the 90s it was all about smooth flooring.  Funny, how those things relate.