Billy the Kid Verses Dracula (1966) (Blu-ray Review)
DIRECTED BY: William Beaudine
STARRING: John Carradine, Chuck Courtney, Melinda Casey
RATED: UR/Region: O/1:85/1080P/NUMBER OF DISCS 1 (BD-r)
AVAILABLE FROM Leomark Studios
If you’ve ever wondered what happens when someone throws two completely unrelated names into a hat and says, “Yep… that’s a movie,” then welcome to Billy the Kid vs. Dracula.
On paper, this sounds like the greatest idea ever conceived at three in the morning. Billy the Kid. Dracula. Old West. Surely this is going to be an epic showdown for the ages, right?
Well…
Not exactly.
The biggest surprise is that Billy and Dracula don’t spend nearly as much time actually versus-ing each other as the title would have you believe. It’s like advertising Godzilla vs. King Kong and then having them spend most of the movie doing paperwork. The title promises the horror equivalent of the fight of the century, while the movie mostly delivers people standing around talking until Dracula decides it’s finally time to clock in.
And poor John Carradine. The legendary horror icon gives the role everything he can, but even he looks like he’s wondering how he ended up playing Dracula in a movie where his greatest enemy isn’t Billy the Kid—it’s the budget. His performance is the classiest thing in the entire production, which is a bit like bringing fine china to a backyard barbecue.
The sets look like they were assembled during someone’s lunch break, the action is surprisingly sparse for a movie with “vs.” in the title, and the pacing occasionally wanders off into the desert without leaving a forwarding address. You keep waiting for the movie to fully embrace its wonderfully ridiculous premise… and it never quite gets there.
The crazy part is that the concept itself is genuinely fantastic. A supernatural western pitting an infamous outlaw against history’s most famous vampire? Sign me up! Instead, the film mostly settles for being an average western that periodically remembers, “Oh yeah… Dracula’s in this.”
Still, there’s an undeniable charm to the whole thing. This is pure ’60s drive-in cinema, where a killer title and a wild premise were sometimes all you needed to sell tickets. You can’t help but admire the sheer confidence of calling your movie Billy the Kid vs. Dracula and assuming nobody would ask too many questions.
Is it good? Not really.
Is it disappointing that it doesn’t live up to its incredible title? Absolutely.
Would I still recommend it to fans of bizarre cult cinema? Without hesitation.
Because movies like this simply don’t get made anymore. It’s weird, it’s cheap, it’s unintentionally funny, and it’s endlessly entertaining in that special way only vintage B-movies can be. Just don’t expect the epic supernatural showdown the poster practically screams at you. The biggest battle here is between your expectations and reality… and reality wins by a landslide.
