‘Billy the Kid Versus Dracula’ (B-Movie Review) — Part One
In a first for me, I had the dubious pleasure to see what has to be one of the most bizarre low-budget horror-western movies ever made.
The movie starts out with a small family — Ma, Pa, and Pretty Young Daughter — traveling across the frontier west. While sleeping under the stars, a bat appears from the sky (making weird clicking noises, which I assume are one of its echolocation techniques). The bat dives behind a chuck wagon and appears in the form of John Carradine. Who else?
So Carradine/Dracula leans over the daughter and nibbles delicately on her neck. And not much happens after that, except Ma (who, it turns out, is the Folger’s Coffee Lady, Mrs. Olson) notices the girl’s neck is freaking bleeding. And that is not good.
But then the story transforms briefly into the B-horror movie version of Stagecoach.
You see Carradine/Dracula ends up in a stagecoach bound for Lordsburg. Except they’re going to a different place. And there are only four passengers, including Carradine (who does not play a Southern gentleman here), a whiskey salesman (who may or may not be a doctor or a swindler, for that matter), and an elderly couple going to see their daughter or granddaughter or something like that.
But the woman is a freaking chatterbox. She keeps babbling on about a silver mine and how much dough that’s made for her family. Just the sort of thing you want to tell a complete stranger while traversing the middle of nowhere. You can probably guess ole Drac’s reaction to this bit of good news. Especially after he sees the girl’s photo and practically drools on it.
Cut to Betty (the daughter or niece-whatever) and Billy (the Kid-but reformed now) engaging in target practice together. A sure sign of everlasting love.
Here’s a trailer that will explain the setup. 🙂
*****
More of the review to come in the next part! 🙂
Originally published at http://debbimacktoo.wordpress.com on December 7, 2019.
