There is an abundance of movies that deal with a male Dracula or one of his descendants. It could be interesting to watch a film with a different perspective, in which a female is the fiend. In Les Lèvres Rouge from 1971, also known as Daughters of Darkness this is the case.

Belgian director Harry Kümel presents in this film a couple that is just married as a chase for countess Elisabeth Bathory. Countess Bathory is well known as the woman that slaughtered numerous virgins (20 to 2,000, it depends on the source) in the sixteenth century to bathe in their blood. She believed this would grant her perpetuating beauty. In this film it worked. The film is about the cat and mouse game that unfolds between the newlyweds and the countess.

The film reminded me of The Hunger from 1983 with David Bowie in a leading role and among others, Bauhaus and Iggy Pop on its soundtrack. In that film there is also a dominant woman that gets her beauty from drinking blood. Just like The Hunger, Daughters of Darkness can’t be taken too serious. They evolve around violence and erotic visuals and the thin, somewhat boring story’s only job is to legitimate and connect these scenes. This is more true for Daughters of Darkness than for The Hunger.

At the end of both films the absurdity has risen to such a level that it was impossible for me to not start laughing. This ensured that watching these bloody, campy horroflicks gave me a light-hearted, happy feeling and still dared to go to the toilet at night.