Review of Billy the Kid Versus Dracula

My parents showed their love for me by sending me away to summer camp. I would plead to my Dad " Please don't send me to sleep-away camp." He would smirk and say "It builds character, stop sniveling, toughen up!" When I arrived, reality set in when we had to make our own beds. The counselor demonstrated how to make a perfect bed. So perfect a quarter would bounce off the blanket. The counselor affirmed, "I'll be checking for hospital corners." Hospital corners? What the heck was that? Billy the Kidd Versus Dracula was, to say the least, a peculiar title. Scoundrel versus scoundrel? Cold-blooded gunslinger vs bloodsucking nocturnal victorian rogue? The story starts out with an aged wrinkly beady-eyed Dracula (John Carradine) taking passage on a stagecoach. During his passage, he is captivated by a photograph of a pretty girl. He is smitten with the image. Later in the evening Dracula randomly kills a young Native American girl who causes the tribe to attack the stagecoach and kill everyone except Dracula. Dracula takes the identity of Mr. Underhill. Dracula assumes the identity of the long-lost Uncle James Underhill. When he arrives, he meets the beautiful ranch owner, the young sweet Betty Bently (Melinda Casey). Betty presumes that it's her uncle. Dracula, I mean Uncle James, pushes his weight around, as his goal is to turn Betty into a vampire while her boyfriend, the newly reformed Billy The kid (Chuck Courtney) works on the ranch but has his doubts about this harassing, bossy stranger who claims to be her uncle. A familiar character actor, the housekeeper Virginia Christine and her husband Franz played by Walter Janovitz tend to the main house on the ranch. They are constantly threatened by the homely, lanky Vampire. One note, the daylight doesn't seem to bother Dracula/Uncle James. Special effects come into play here when Dracula has to travel by air. Just one of those awful films you have to watch with friends or adversaries to pass the time. Carradine does stay on point as a fraudster but there's a comical quality that seems to rise above all of this. Richard Reeves is also a period character actor as the saloonkeeper. Familiar faces, familiar dialogue, familiar ending except, Spoiler alert!!! When we see Dracula's cave and his beautifully made bed. The red bedspread is perfectly made. Boys and girls even the horrible Dracula makes his bed. That's right, Vampires have responsibilities. This movie was directed by William Beaudine who primarily worked on Walt Disney movies and shorts in his later years. Beaudine also directed a number of Bowery Boys movies. The Bowery Boys vs Dracula? Imagine?? I finally mastered the art of hospital corners in my camp bunk but it was all for nothing as the advent of the "Fitted Sheet" came into the mainstream of bed making.