Three respected philanthropists seek fulfillment via debauchery in their off-time, becoming quite jaded in the process.
Pussy or a deal with the Devil? You decide!
During one of their nights at a favorite brothel, they meet young Lord Courtley (Ralph Bates), who was disinherited by his family for dabbling in the black arts. Courtley offers the debauched trio unprecedented experiences if they purchase from him artifacts of Count Dracula, including the vampire lord's dried blood, which will be mixed with Courtley's own blood and consumed in a black ritual. The gentlemen attend the ritual in an abandoned church, but all refuse to drink. Courtley, however, does drink, screams, and falls to the floor, grasping at his guests for help. Instead they stomp him to death and head for their homes, shaken by the whole sordid affair. Courtley's body of course transforms into Count Dracula (Christopher Lee), who vows vengeance upon those who murdered his servant.
TASTE THE BLOOD OF DRACULA may have been the first Christopher Lee Dracula movie that I saw during childhood, during a late-night airing on NYC's Channel 5, and at the time I thought it was pretty good. Christopher Lee was an imposing figure as the Count, and the idea of a ritual involving imbibing what amounts to "Dracula Powdered Drink Mix" was intriguing, but pretty much everything else about this one is about as rote as it gets. It's a load of same old-same old with the expected murders and seductions and a pair of uninteresting lovers thrown into the mix, and while nowhere near as dire as what would come next in the cycle, this one's pretty skippable.
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