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A young man from Arkham Massachusetts with the Lovecraftian name Dexter Ward (Altman) is attending the funeral of his uncle Ephraim Ward (Robinson) at a crassly commercial mortuary called "Death City" (the blurb “Over 50,000 served” graces their sign, along with the logos for Visa and Master Card.) But Uncle Ephraim is so gauche as to awaken from his catatonic trance in the middle of the service, cussing out the hired mourners as he rises from his coffin to disrupt his own funeral. For forty years Uncle Ephraim has been head librarian at the Arkham Public Library, “the world’s largest collection of books on witchcraft and the black arts.” But this most recent brush with death has made him anxious to settle unfinished business. He asks Dexter - his favorite nephew and the only person he trusts - to help him find a lost book; a dangerous ancient grimoire called The Book of Ulthar. The book was checked out twenty years earlier by a man named Marinus Orlock and never returned. Uncle Ephraim explains that Ulthar, author of the book, was an ancient sorcerer from an age when Chaos ruled (“The Reagan administration?”- Dexter) and that his book can open a dimensional doorway to contact the Evil One.
Dexter’s search leads him to Marinus Orlock’s daughter Marissa (Copley), and they travel together to Transylvania, where Marinus Orlock was last seen according to a mysterious telegram. In Transylvania Dexter and Marissa meet professional vampire hunter Victor Van Helsing (Mask) who sent Marissa the telegram telling her of her father’s whereabouts. Van Helsing informs Marissa that her father is dead and that he, Van Helsing, has been made executor of her father’s will. The three then go to attend the funeral, which is to be held at the castle of Marissa’s uncle - Marinus’ brother - Lord Byron Orlock.
Dexter, Marissa and Van Helsing are admitted into the castle by Lord Byron’s servant Stephan (Scrimm doing a spoof of his role in Phantasm) and meet Byron Orlock (Vaughn) who dresses like Bela Lugosi in the 1931 Dracula. The vampiric Byron Orlock reveals that he and Marissa’s father were enemies - “he always objected to my torturing small animals.” Van Helsing also points out that Marinus and Byron squabbled over ownership of The Book of Ulthar, since Byron is not only a vampire but also an evil sorcerer. After the funeral, Marinus Orlock’s will is read - or rather watched, since it is recorded on videotape with old Marinus appearing as a game show host handing out prizes (inheritances) to the lucky winners (heirs). Marinus leaves everything to his daughter Marissa, including the castle which the resentful Byron will now have to leave. Everything that is, except The Book of Ulthar, which he bequeaths to whoever can find it with the clue “You can take it with you.”. Sure enough, Dexter and Marissa find The Book of Ulthar in Marinus’ coffin, but immediately lose it when Byron Orlock’s beautiful vampire bimbos knock Dexter unconscious and turn the book over to Byron. Van Helsing is no help because the vampire girls have already put the bite on him and turned him into one of the undead (“They’re not so bad, really.”).
In the next scene Dexter is decked out in bondage gear and chained between two pillars for sacrifice. Byron is using incantations from the book to summon the Evil One so that “once again the forces of darkness shall reign; complete and utter Chaos!” But the exact nature of the “incantations” are a little different from those used in most horror films:
But as soon as Byron utters these awe-inspiring words of power, Marissa appears - possessed by the spirit of her great-grandmother - and incinerates Byron Orlock with a magickal lightning bolt. With his dying breath Byron threatens to return in a sequel. And no sooner is Byron dispatched than the Evil One appears. (The Evil One, who looks like a giant cucumber with fangs and tentacles, is actually a monster from an early sci-fi quickie called It Conquered the World directed by Roger Corman in 1956.) Dexter tries to consult Van Helsing who confesses his ignorance, “Vampires I know, but this Lovecraft stuff is out of my league.” Dexter solves the problem by burning The Book of Ulthar. The Evil One then explodes and - like the rest of the movie - blows chunks.
Marissa’s dad, Marinus Orlock, turns out not to be dead after all. Van Helsing, who is enjoying his new life as an undead, forms a rock band as drummer with guitars played by the three vampire bimbos who formerly served as Byron’s harem. Marissa and Dexter turn the castle into a disco. And everyone lives - or remains undead - happily ever after.
This unbelievably heavy-handed farce was probably partly inspired (if that’s the right word) by Transylvania 6-5000 (1985), that sappy, neurodepressant but semipopular cheesefest of just four years earlier. Though Transylvania Twist tried bravely to satirize every horror film from Hellraiser to Nightmare on Elm Street, most of its gags somehow missed the mark, its vampire jokes had all been done before and better, and many of its puns were so bad that even I didn’t enjoy them. The most notable acting in this embarrassing turkey was a brief posthumous appearance by the great Boris Karloff taken from an old AIP film, followed by a welcome satire on movie icon Jack Nicholson and his beginnings as a bit player in 60's horror movies under Roger Corman.
There have only been two funny vampire comedies in movie history ; Roman Polanski’s The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967) and Stan Dragoti’s Love at First Bite (1979). But movie makers never learn from history, so they keep churning out unfunny vampire spoofs that nearly always end in box office disaster. The most recent fiasco was Mel Brooks’ Dracula: Dead and Loving It (1996) which was seen only by sleepy projectionists during its ignominious two week theatrical release, before being mercifully shunted off into video limbo. I don’t know why vampires don’t make good material for humor. One would think those pompous, melodramatic bloodsuckers would be overripe for satire, but somehow it almost never works.
The Book of Ulthar is one of the quaintest of the plethora of pseudo-Necronomicons to surface in recent movie history. The prop book is a gigantic folio-sized tome (approximately 3.5' X 2.5') with what appear to be leather covers. On the front cover is a round gold sigil standing out in bas relief below the title, which is written in black lettering on an H-shaped gold leaf background. HPL fans will know that Ulthar is a town in Lovecraft’s Dreamlands where cats are venerated and there is a hilltop temple to the Elder Ones where the high priest Atal dwells. Ulthar is associated with the Fourth Book of D’harsis, the Pnakotic Manuscripts, and the Seven Mystical Books of Hsan, but not specifically with the Necronomicon. Yet “Ulthar” is also the name of one of the Elder Gods mentioned in the Pelton version of The Sussex Manuscript, which is more properly known as Cultus Maleficarum, a poor English translation of the Latin Necronomicon supposedly done by the fictional Baron Frederic of Sussex and published by him in 1597 in an octavo edition. Is this “Book of Ulthar” just another name for Frederic’s English translation of the Latin Necronomicon? If so, then why in the name of Azathoth didn’t the screenwriter just go ahead and use “Necronomicon” as the name of his grimoire? In any case, screenwriter R. J. Robertson appears to actually know something about Lovecraftian Mythos fiction. Amazing!
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1998 © John Wisdom Gonce III. All rights reserved.