Son of Dracula

????
Directed by Saleem Suma

Bollywood horror is filled with ups and downs. Mostly downs. Every once in a while, you run into something so ridiculously stupid, it is awesome. Unfortunately, that was Shaitani Dracula, and we are now watching Son of Dracula, which is absolutely terrible. All of the fun of random dudes strolling around in dime store costumes is gone, instead we have a disco guy seducing random women, one of which gives birth to Son of Dracula, a doll that is waved around like it is the spookiest thing ever, and a statue looking like bigfoot that spends the entire film yelling. The main crime is none of that is any fun. It should be fun. It sounds like fun. But, brother, it ain’t fun! I originally ordered this knowing nothing except what the vcd cover looked like, and it promised a vampire/Yoda thing. He is in here, but he isn’t as fun as he looks. The lesson for today is disappointment, a harsh lesson I am tired of learning over and over again with more and more films. Luckily, the good jewels make up for the duds.

I am guessing the film was edited by caffeinated squirrels with ADD, due to the hap-hazard cuts, random scenes, and nonsensical anything. Nothing in this film makes the slightest bit of sense. Even if there were subtitles, this thing would be a mess, and the subtitles would probably end up having been stolen from a Harry Potter film. Bollywood horror has a complicated history covered by multiple sources, and a quick summary here would not do it justice. So we will just skip it and dive right into the film, because it doesn’t take a detailed history of a country’s movie culture to recognize that this film sucks. And at TarsTarkas.NET, we don’t need no stinking subtitles, so we dive in unaided.

Thanks goodness!

What year this was made in is debatable, because it doesn’t seem to be listed anywhere. The other problem is the cast list, I cannot conclusively link most of the actors to parts, largely due to my lack of finding good pictures or even any information at all about most of the cast. The actors list is credited as follows: Joginder, Raza Murad, Alaudeen Ferozm, Poonm Das Gupta, Sapna, Arif, Mahendrea Tiwari. Joginder is probably Joginder Shelly, and he has been called “the Badshaah of 70s B-grade films” as he was a popular over-acting villain. I am sure you know what Badshaah means, so moving on. Raza Murad is another popular villain character actor. Poonm Das Gupta is Poonam Das Gupta, and is probably Mom of Son of Dracula. Imagine that, a misspelling in the name of an actor in a B-movie. Shocking. I got nothing on any of the others. So there. Drop us a line if you have a clue.

UPDATE: in the blog announcement Vinayak has disclosed that Takul is played by Joginder Shelly and the Inspector is played by Raza Murad: “he stated with “A grade movies” and slowly slipped to “C Grade”.” Thanks, Vinayak!

Takul (Joginder Shelly) – Disco Dracula, I guess. There is a constant cat yelping as he talks. He spends most of the film trying to seduce the random girls who sing songs while dancing in the rain or waterfalls that Bollywood films have taught me litter India like beer cans on the highway. He also seems to have a second good identity where he is a family man, I couldn’t tell if he was supposed to be twins (with one evil) or just a secret identity as the evil guy. Even worse, he lives at the end and seems to be accepted by the innocent family. So, yeah… Inspector (Raza Murad) – This police chief makes Chief Wiggum look like Sherlock Holmes. Many of his men get killed by a doll, and he is defeated by his clothes vanishing. Riggs and Murtaugh wouldn’t put up with that crap, and just shoot Son of Dracula in the head, revoking his Puppet Immunity. Witch Doctor Jesus (???) – Witch Doctor Jesus comes complete with trident, and fights the forces of Son of Dracula and Angry Bigfoot Statue. He uses retro effects, waving of hands, and being freaking weird as powers. He also has sit-down talks with bad guys, showing the forgiving spirit of Jesus. This is far more accurate of a portrayal of Our Lord than Passion of the Christ. Mom of Son of Dracula (Poonam Das Gupta) – As the name implies, she is the Mom of the Son of Dracula. She loves striped socks, odd clothes, writhing around, and giving birth to freaky puppet doll monsters by video toaster effects. Basically, your average girl next door! Son of Dracula (A doll) – A freaking doll with a rubber mask is waved around by an off-camera dude, and that is the Son of Dracula that terrorizes people in this film like crazy. Every once in a while, Son of Dracula is actually played by a real guy wearing the mask, probably a kid. These rare instances stand out like a hobo at a millionaire’s ball. Despite Son of Dracula’s immobile face and body, he is somehow able to kill around a dozen people thanks to his fangs and Son of Dracula magic. Angry Bigfoot Statue (A statue) – This statue never shuts up. All he does is yell and yell, and occasionally impregnate someone with the Son of Dracula. So I guess he is Dracula, except Dracula is not a statue, so he is more of a monster that the movie uses Dracula as the name for to get investors to pony up more dollars than Son of Angry Bigfoot Statue.

The description of the film is presented in its original Confuse-O-Vision format. Any attempts to understand the plot of Son of Dracula will be met with anger, confusion, frustration, desperation, despair, flailing of limbs, gnashing of teeth, tearing out of hair, itching of skin, rashes, mysterious smells, upset stomach, UTI, spontaneous combustion, spontaneous Robocop, and desire to quit Indian films all together and focus on wacky Pakistani films instead.

You know…Indian Spiderman would be a cool movie…

The film opens as Tekul is in a jeep, he shoots a guy and runs down a woman with his jeep. The problem is, we then jump into a temporal causality loop. History repeats and Tekul is running down the same woman with the jeep again! Each time she runs into a building, we get 1980’s vector graphics, a short scene to two random guys talking, then suddenly she is outside again running away from Takul in a jeep chasing her down, only for her to run into another building and the cycle to start anew. All that is missing is Data sending a message to himself and Kelsey Grammar showing up at the end. Finally, the loop breaks as some police guys use the phone, then Angry Bigfoot Statue gives orders to a bunch of women who seem to be worshiping it. This is followed by Takul now on a couch being called upon by an older lady who is angry. She is part of the Innocent Family, who will spend this film being menaced in piecemeal form, depending on which cast members bothered to show up for shooting that day.

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – a girl in a bikini dances and sings, under a makeshift waterfall. Just another boring day in India.

Takul goes to chat with her, lays on his PUA routine, drops some negs, and soon she is tied up and Angry Bigfoot Statue is yelling at her! After some boring talking parts…

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – a different girl in a bikini dances and sings, this time in the rain. Of course, she gets a visit from Takul as well. After all, she did AI and showed IOI; soon they have moved to kino. Be happy if you have no clue what I am talking about with these acronyms. She gets laid down for the sacrifice in front of Angry Bigfoot Statue. Heh heh heh, I said “she gets laid”!

I should also probably mention there is some old guy named Kula telling Takul about some of these dancing women. At Takul’s lair, one of the women worshipping the Angry Bigfoot Statue comes over, and soon…

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – she is bellydancing and singing. FOREVER! This song is the song that doesn’t end, it goes on and on, my friend…

Takul then speaks with Witch Docter Jesus, who casts a spell. Why is Witch Doctor Jesus speaking with Takul, who is evil? Then the Angry Bigfoot Statue monologues for a while, and Takul now has a new girl at his house. She has stripey long socks and other odd clothes, making her look like a tarted up version of Nanny from Muppet Babies. There is also a random guy with a shotgun in the room, but never mind him, he will barely be seen again. This tarted nanny is Mom of Son of Dracula, and she opens her mouth…

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – Mom of Son of Dracula sings, then sleeps. Afterwards, she gets laid out on the table, (heh heh heh!) Takul kisses her, and suddenly she is tripping balls and we get the first glimpse of the Son of Dracula creature promised on the VCD cover. Witch Doctor Jesus storms in with a trident, he is ticked off! Nothing happens, as Angry Bigfoot Statue yells a bit and we cut back to the Innocent Family.

A whole pack of retro-1970’s effects show us that Angry Bigfoot Statue has impregnated Mom of Son of Dracula with Son of Dracula. Son of Dracula pops out like a zit, and the first thing he does is eat some random dude in the woods, leaving nothing but a pile of bloody bones. Then he jumps on some woman, I don’t know if he eats her to bones, or just bones her, if you know what I mean.

Let’s pause here and explain more about Son of Dracula. It is obvious that most of his appearances he is nothing but a mask on top of some sort of doll, usually moved by an off-camera stagehand and waved around threateningly. Just imagine the horror of that. Or the hilariousness.

Now Witch Doctor Jesus is helping the family instead of having dinner with agents of the Devil, except he is a failure and Son of Dracula bites and kills the family member Witch Doctor Jesus is walking along with. Witch Doctor Jesus’s magic effect of having a red disc slowly move to the right failed to stop Son of Dracula. Witch Doctor Jesus then goes to talk to the Inspector about defeating the evil dudes. Now some annoying guy is in the forest with his girl. I don’t understand a word he is saying, but I can tell he is one of the most annoying people in the universe. Shut up! Seriously! It has been five minutes and nothing has happened because he is talking. I hate this guy. I hope he dies. I hope Son of Dracula eats him to bones. Then eats the bones. Then pukes up the bones, and eats them again. I really, really hate this guy, and I would only hate him more if I understood a word he was saying. Son of Dracula warps in, and at one point punches the Annoying Guy, who continues to talk and talk. Annoying Guy is punched several times (I like Son of Dracula now) but then Son of Dracula warps out of the area. (I don’t like Son of Dracula anymore.) Annoying Guy talks to the camera and mugs like he is Robin Williams. I hate him because he didn’t die.

Son of Dracula attacks the police station where the Inspector is, but not in a cool way like in Terminator. The Inspector’s gun is ineffective and he looks doomed, but Witch Doctor Jesus makes Son of Dracula go away. Witch Doctor Jesus then talks to Takul, who didn’t seem to know Son of Dracula is running around. More randomness as Son of Dracula kills some dude from the innocent family, and three random cops, which ticks off Inspector. Inspector talks to the old guy Kula who helps Takul, but one of the other cops is Son of Dracula in disguise, who continues to scare Kula when he tries to rat out his boss. The feed up cops go to arrest Son of Dracula, but he just removes their clothes. Bollywood comic relief. Blech.

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – another girl, another song, another fast-forward on my DVD player.

Afterwards, Inspector gets a freakout involving Son of Dracula that then becomes too confusing to describe. Yes, too confusing for us. I think he dies.

MUSICAL INTERLUDE – Lots of girls prance around, all the brides of Angry Bigfoot Statue.

Takul then swordfights all these chicks with a space background as Angry Bigfoot Statue screams, fake lighting is clashed, and things are confusing still. Why is Takul suddenly a good guy? He beats up Mom of Son of Dracula and says some things, and Witch Doctor Jesus helps him by scaring off the girls. Son of Dracula kills some more random people, because, he’s Son of Dracula and that’s what he does. Don’t question the Son of Dracula, or you’ll get dolls waved in your face until you are dead!

Murder!
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Witch Doctor Jesus gets ready to fight! His trident is cocked, locked, and loaded. Witch Doctor Jesus fires eye beams, trident beams, and even beams coming out of the lines in his forehead; blasting everything in sight. He blasts the brides of Angry Bigfoot Statue. He blasts Angry Bigfoot Statue, and blasts Mom of Son of Dracula. Next, someone rented a flamethrower or something, as now everything and everyone in the movie is breathing fire. Witch Doctor Jesus is breathing fire. Son of Dracula is breathing fire. Even the freaking trident is breathing fire! Son of Dracula and the women are killed, I guess Angry Bigfoot Statue is destroyed but it is not clear, and everything is now fine. Some of the people Son of Dracula killed earlier are now alive again and pray their thanks. Wait a minute, what the frak?

The end. The end? That doesn’t make any sense! What happened?? Gah! Son of Dracula, you jerk! How come your movie is confusing and stupid? Obviously, this is an attack on me personally. I’ll get you for this, Bollywood! I’ll get you good!

I will remember, “Sony Mony”! From Hell’s heart, I stab at thee! With my last breath, I curse thee!

Rated 4/10 (Blue Skeleton, Red Skeleton, Is this the Indian Manos painting?, Soldier statue with more screen time than half the cast)

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