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Originally announced under the title of The Vampires of Prague, Mark of the Vampire reunited Bela Lugosi with director Tod Browning, with whom he had made The 13th Chair (1929) and Dracula (1931).
The film is essentially a remake of Browning’s 1927 silent Lon Chaney vehicle London After Midnight, now presumed lost. Fourteen minutes of footage explaining Lugosi’s character’s suicide, he has a bullet wound on his head, after murdering his daughter, played by Lugosi protégé Carroll Borland, with whom he had an incestuous relationship were cut shortly before release. Universal Studios took legal action to block the release of the film, claiming it infringed on its Dracula copyright. MGM prevailed thanks to Mark of the Vampire’s ending which revealed that the vampires were actually actors involved in unmasking a murderer.
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Production Company: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Producer: Edward J. Mannix
Director: Tod Browning
Assistant Director: Harry Sharrock
Screenplay: Guy Endore and Bernard Schburt
Dialogue Contributors: H.S. Kraft, Samuel Omitz and John L. Balderston
Original Story: The Hypnotist by Tod Browning
Cinematography: James Wong Howe
Camera Operator: Charles Salerno, Jr.
Matte Painter: Warren Newcombe
Photographic Camera Effects: Thomas Tutwiler
Make-up: Jack Dawson
Make-up Assistant: William Tuttle
Recording Director: Douglas Shearer
Production Sound Mixer: G.A. Burns
Sound Effects Editors: James Graham, T.B. Hoffman and Michael Steinore
Art Director: Cedric Gibbons
Associate Art Direct0rs: Harry Oliver and Edwin B. Willis
Editor: Ben Lewis
Gowns: Adrian
Recording Engineer: Douglas Shearer
Sound Mixer: Gavin Burns
Musical Director: Edward Ward
Effects Mixers: T.B. Hoffman, James Graham and Mike Steinore
Still Photographers: Jimmy Rowe and Clarence Sinclair Bull
Stand-in for Carroll Borland: Harry Sharrock
Running Time: 59 minutes
Copyright Number: LP5490, April 15 1935
Cast:
Lionel Barrymore: Professor Zelen
Elizabeth Allan: Irena Borotyn
Bela Lugosi: Count Mora
Lionel Atwill: Inspector Neumann
Holmes Herbert: Sir Karell Bororyn
Jean Hersholt: Baron Otto von Zinden
Jesse Ralph: Midwife
Carroll Borland: Luna Mora
Donald Meek: Dr. Doskil
Ivan Simpson: Jan
Egon Brecher: Coroner
Henry Wadsworth: Count Fedor Vincenty
Lily Malyon: Sick Woman
Leila bennett: Maria
June Grittelson: Annie
Michael Visaroff: Innkeeper
Franklyn Ardell: Chauffer
Mrs. Lesovosky: Old Woman in inn
Rosemary Glosz: Innkeeper’s wife
Clare Vedara: English woman
Guy Bellis: Ronnie
Baron Hess: Bus driver
Zeffie Tilbury: Grandmother
Christian Rub: Deaf man
Torbin Meyer: Card player
Robert Greig: Fat man
James Bradbury, Jr.: Vampire
Louise Emmons: Gypsy hag
John George: Gypsy
Jane Mercer
Patricia Reel
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Unknown Newspaper
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The Film Daily, May 1935
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The undead, which is the professional name for the zombies of the piece, have chosen the tiny village of Visoka in Czechoslovakia for their depredations this time. There is a ruined castle whose sole tenants are believed to be the vampires, Count Mora (Bela Lugosi in private life) and his red-lipped daughter, Luna (Carol Borland). One night Sir Karell Borotyn is found dead, the telltale marks on his throat, his body drained of its blood.
“Vampires!” wail the villagers. “Murder!” insists Inspector Neumann. Lionel Barrymore drops in to become Professor Zelen, savant and delver into the occult. He scatters bat-thorn (also known as wolf’s claw) about the place to keep the vampires away, but soon it is apparent that Sir Karell’s daughter and her fiancé are being unwilling blood donors to the earth-bound spirits.
To go further into the story would be unfair to Tod Browning, director of the piece, and its authors, Guy Endore and Bernard Schubert. Let it be enough merely to add that, for all its inconsistencies, “Mark of the Vampire” should catch the beholder’s attention and hold it, through chills and thrills, right up to the moment when the mystery of the vampires of Visoka is solved. Like most good ghost stories, it’s a lot of fun, even though you don’t believe a word of it.
MARK OF THE VAMPIRE, from a story by Guy Endore and Bernard Schubert; screen play by the Messrs, Endore and Schubert; directed by Tod Browning; produced by E. J. Mannix for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Professor Zelen . . . . . Lionel Barrymore Irene Borotyn . . . . . Elizabeth Allan Count Mora . . . . . Bela Lugosi Inspector Neumann . . . . . Lionel Atwill Baron Otto . . . . . Jean Hersholt Fedor . . . . . Henry Wadsworth Dr. Doskill . . . . . Donald Meek Midwife . . . . . Jessie Ralph Jan . . . . . Ivan Simpson Chauffeur . . . . . Franklyn Ardell Maria . . . . . Leila Bennett Annie . . . . . June Gittelson Luna Mora . . . . . Carol Borland Sir Karell Borotyn . . . . . Holmes Herbert Innkeeper . . . . . Michael Visaroff
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The Nevada Daily Mail, May 8, 1935
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The Telegraph, May 9, 1935
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The Telegraph, May 10, 1935
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The Toledo News-Bee, May 11, 1935
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The Miami News, May 14, 1935
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The Film Daily, May 15, 1935
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The Film Daily, May 20, 1935
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Lawrence Journal-World, May 25, 1935
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Picture Play Magazine June 1935
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Modern Screen, June, 1935
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Sarasota Herald-Tribune, June 5, 1935
The Daily Times, June 6, 1935
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The Daily Times, June 7, 1935
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The Film Daily, June 10, 1935
Timely Topics
Weird Camera Effects Due To Absence of Tricks
Filming weird, startling effects in a sinister drama does not depend on “camera tricks.” In fact, it depends on the absence of any trick whatever, or any attempt to make the lens of the camera deceive the audience or distort what is placed before it. It is done by the creation of illusions such as human forms in mist, bu the placing of lights to get hard mysterious shadows – and then letting the camera “play straight” – in other words, photograph exactly what is on the stage as the eye sees it. If you were photographing a stage magician performing one of his illusions, you would do it exactly this way – photograph exactly what the eye sees. When odd lights and effects are staged for a picture the same thing is true. To attempt to diffuse or do other lens tricks would blue or distort the effect, hence we use the camera simply as a scrutinizing eye, and let it see everything done in the effect. In one scene of “The Vampires of Prague” we had the camera low to the floor, so that when Bela Lugosi approaches there is the effect of towering height of a great shadow. That was not a camera trick. The camera simply looked from where the person lying on the floor before Lugosi would have looked – hence the camera saw just what the person saw. Most believe these weird effects are camera trick, but they aren’t. The camera is never tricked.
James Wong Howe.
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The Spokesman-Review, July 3, 1935
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The Sunday Spartanburg Herald-Journal. July 14, 1935
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Kentucky New Era, June 17, 1935
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The Desert News, July 23, 1935
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Lodi News-Sentinel, July 25, 1935
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Lodi News-Sentinel, July 26, 1935
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The Desert News, July 26, 1935
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The Desert News, July 27, 1935
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Spokane Daily Chronicle, December 10, 1935
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Spokane Daily Chronicle, December 11, 1935
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The Spokesman Review, December 12, 1935
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Unknown newspaper
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The Sydney Morning Herald, January 13, 1936
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Unknown Newspaper
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Unknown Newspaper
Courtesy of http://astasdoghouse.blogspot.jp/
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Spanish Newspaper Ad
Courtesy of http://www.facebookhorrorpixfrance
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Spanish Advertisements
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French Advertisement
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Posters
Six Sheet
Three Sheet A
Three Sheet B
Window Card
Australian Daybill
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Lobby Cards
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Pressbook
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Heralds
Spanish Heralds
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Austrian Cinema Programme
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Cigarette Card
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Stills
Bela Lugosi photographed by Clarence Sinclair Bull
Bela Lugosi photographed by Clarence Sinclair Bull
Caroll Borland photographed by Clarence Sinclair Bull
Bela Lugosi
Caroll Borland and Bela Lugosi photographed by Clarence Sinclair Bull
Bela Lugosi and Caroll Borland
Caroll Borland, Bela Lugosi and Holmes Herbert
Bela Lugosi, Caroll Borland, Elizabeth Allan and Henry Wadsworth
Bela Lugosi, Caroll Borland, Elizabeth Allan and Henry Wadsworth
Caroll Borland, Holmes Herbert, James Bradbury, Jr. and Bela Lugosi
James Bradbury, Jr., Bela Lugosi and Caroll Borland in a scene cut from the final print
Tod Browning (centre front of camera), James Wong Howe (right of Browning), Caroll Borland and Bela Lugosi
Elizabeth Allan and Bela Lugosi with the Bela Lugosi Trophy for the Junior Los Angeles Soccer League