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On their search for Count Dracula (Thomas Desfossé), the professor (Jacques
Régis) and his assistant Eric (Denis Tallaron) one night stumble over the
dwarfish clown Triboulet (Thomas Smith) at a graveyard, who has come there to
feed his girlfriend, the Vampire Girl (Sandrine Thoquet). Figureing he, as a
parallel being (whatever that is), must know the way to Dracula, the professor
and Eric threaten
his girlfriend until he tells them about the mad girl of the tower (Magalie
Aguado), who knows the vampire's wherabouts.
The Mad girl in turn tells them about the chamber of clocks, an otherworldly
place, where Dracula resides, but only his fiancée Isabelle (Cyrille Iste) has
the ability to go there. Problem is, she is presumed mad and is kept at a
sanatorium run by the nuns of the White Virgin, who are quite off the hook
themselves - allegedly because Isabelle's insanity is infectuous.
The professor however manages to hypnotize Isabelle to come to him at
midnight and lead him to Dracula, but unfortunately a couple of aged
sorcerers (Nathalie Perrey, Bernard Musson) had the same idea, and with the
help of clown Triboulet they steal Isabelle from under the professor's nose.
The professor and Eric follow them however, and through a labyrinth of
caves that is guarded by the children-eating Ogress (Magalie Aguado again) they
do reach castle Dracula, where, from a hiding place, they can watch Dracula's
servants, led by the strict and ever watchful Louve (Brigitte Lahaie), make
preparations for their master's wedding. It is not until Louve leaves the
castle that the professor and Eric go into action and abduct - or as they
see it, free - Isabelle, but she is soon recaptured by Dracula's servants, and, for her wedding to the vampire king, tied to a post on the beach, where
she is to be devoured by the tide - for this is the way to get to Dracula's
chamber of clocks.
And while Eric is searching for a secret passageway to the chamber of clocks to free Isabelle, whom he has since fallen in love with,
the professor attempts to kill Dracula's servants - most of them crazy vampire nuns - but pays
with his own life instead, while Isabelle is finally devoured by the sea and transferred to Dracula's chamber of
clocks. Eric has found the secret
entrance as well, but Isabelle seems to not be impressed by his bravery, since
she has really fallen in love with Dracula, and, while some of the vampire nuns
have decided to seal Dracula's chamber shut, she leaves with the vampire king
through another passageway hidden inside a clock, while Eric remains prisoner
of the chamer of clocks ...
As usual with director Jean Rollin's more personal films, this one has little
to offer in terms of coherent storytelling or narrative logic, but impresses with a
weird, surreal imagery consisting of both genre-elements as well as the
director's very personal views of women, eroticism, vampirism and the like,
topics that have been present in all of Rollin's better films since La Viol
de Vampire (1968), and many images from Rollin's earlier films show up
again here, like the woman being tied to a post on the beach or people popping
in and out of clocks, giving this film the feeling of a timewarp. Not a film to
easily understand, but Jean Rollin-fans will love it ...
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