Count Yorga, Vampire

A coffin is loaded to a truck at the Port of Los Angeles. The truck then climbs to a gated mansion in the Southern California hills.[2]

A woman named Donna hosts a séance in hopes of contacting her recently deceased mother. At the party are several of her friends, including Donna's boyfriend, Michael, Paul, Paul's girlfriend Erica, and doctor Jim Hayes. Overseeing the seance is Count Yorga, a Bulgarian mystic who has recently moved to the states from Europe. Donna becomes hysterical during the proceedings and Yorga uses hypnosis to calm her. Donna knows Yorga because he was her mother's boyfriend. They dated a few weeks shortly before her death. Yorga had insisted that she be buried rather than cremated per the deceased's wishes. Donna cannot recall seeing Yorga at her mother's funeral.

After the party is over, Erica and Paul drive the Count home. Their van gets stuck in the mud outside of his mansion, although Paul insists the road was dry a minute ago. They resign themselves to spending the night in their van. After sex, they settle in to sleep. Yorga attacks them, knocking out Paul and biting Erica. The following day, the couple returns to the city. Paul did not see their attacker, and Erica does not remember anything.

Erica visits Dr. Hayes to have the bite wounds on her neck inspected. In contrast to her usually lively personality, Erica now seems despondent and listless. Hayes notices she has lost a lot of blood but cannot determine the cause. He recommends rest and a high protein diet. Shortly after, Paul and Michael discuss the changes in Erica's behavior. They try to call her phone, which she drops to the floor without answering. The concerned men drive to her home and find the place in disarray, with a hysterical Erica eating her kitten. She reacts erratically to their presence, first threatening with violence and then attempting to seduce Paul before coming to her senses and breaking down.

They restrain her and call Hayes, who finds that Erica has suddenly lost a lot of blood and begins an emergency transfusion. Afraid, Erica babbles. She begs Paul to forgive her and to kill her.

Yorga awakens in his manor and heads to his basement which has been converted into a throne room. One of his two vampiric brides is Donna's mother, whom he made into an undead servant. He awakens them and commands them to have sex.

Although Michael is skeptical, the three men consider the possibility of vampirism as Erica's maladie and agree to look into it while she rests. That night, Yorga visits Erica. Promising her immortality, he seduces Erica, drains her of her remaining blood, and takes her body back to his manor. Upon finding Erica missing, Paul goes to Yorga's mansion to rescue her. Yorga chokes him to death and has his servant Brudah (who has seemingly supernatural strength himself) break his back.

Michael alerts Hayes that Paul has gone to the mansion. While mulling over his options, Hayes' girlfriend suggests involving the police, citing a similar case of a baby being found in the woods, drained of its blood with bite wounds on the neck. Hayes calls the police but is rejected as a deluded prankster following a recent rash of such calls. Hayes, Michael, and Donna go to the mansion themselves to inquire about Paul's whereabouts and keep Yorga active until sunrise. While Hayes distracts Yorga with questions about the latter's occult experiments, Brudah rebuffs Michael's attempts to explore the mansion. Michael and Hayes switch places to keep Yorga off his guard. However, Yorga becomes increasingly insistent that it is late and his guests must leave. He distracts Hayes and strengthens his hypnotic control over Donna.

After leaving the manor, Hayes convinces Michael that killing Yorga will not be easy: vampires have greater strength and the wisdom that comes from living much longer than a "mere mortal". He also adds they might have to kill Paul and Erica too if they have become vampires, since the vampire curse will make them evil and loyal to Yorga. They plan to attack that afternoon in the hopes of killing Yorga in the daytime. Michael and Donna rest while Hayes studies vampire lore until he, too, falls asleep.

Yorga awakens Donna telepathically and has her sabotage Michael's alarm clock before having her come to the mansion. On her arrival, Brudah rapes her. When Michael awakens, he finds Donna gone. It is nearly evening when he calls to awaken Hayes. Despite knowing how dangerous their chances are, they stock up on stakes and makeshift crosses before heading to the mansion as night falls. The two split up, and Yorga confronts Hayes. Yorga leads Hayes into his basement where his vampire brides lie dormant. Hayes finds Erica's body among them, finding no heartbeat or pulse when he examines her. He then attacks Yorga with a cross and stake, while yelling out for Michael. Despite being held back by the cross, Yorga taunts Hayes while positioning him in front of his brides, then silently commanding them to awake and attack. Hayes is forced to the floor and fed on by the vampire women.

As Yorga reunites Donna with her mother, Michael finds Paul's mutilated body. Brudah attacks him, but Michael mortally stabs him and manages to reach the throne room. He finds Hayes as he lays dying from blood loss. With his last breath, Hayes reveals where Donna is. Erica, now a vampire and completely under Yorga's control, and a fellow bride charge into the room to kill him. In the ensuing fight, Erica pauses, giving Michael a chance to stake her. However, despite seeing she is no longer the Erica he knows, he cannot bring himself to do kill her.

On the way to the staircase, Michael encounters Brudah, who eventually dies of his wounds. Michael reaches upstairs and confronts Yorga and Donna's mother. Yorga pushes Donna's mother into Michael's stake and flees. When Michael tries to give chase, Yorga ambushes him outside the room intending to choke him. Michael rams Yorga with his stake, killing him. Donna mourns her mother a second time before Michael collects her. He and Donna watch Yorga turn to dust.

As they start to leave, they are confronted by Erica and the other bride. They chase Michael and Donna downstairs until repelled by Michael's cross. As the vampire women are forced back toward a cellar, Erica glances at Donna. Michael locks them in and drops his cross, believing the danger is over. However, as he turns to leave, Donna hisses and lunges at him, fangs bared, fully transformed into a vampire. Having been too late to prevent Yorga from turning her, Michael dies.

The film opens with a narration by character actor George Macready, whose son, Michael Macready, produced the film and also played "Michael".

Variety wrote that Robert Quarry had an "aristocratically handsome look and plays the part with a certain sinister intelligence (and) even a sly humor that befits a guy who has been around for several hundred years," adding that "The dialogue has a believable sound to it, and the playing of the principals is low-key and convincingly realistic."[4] Roger Greenspun of The New York Times called Robert Quarry "the best chief vampire I have seen in years."[5] Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune declared it "the best horror film of the year."[6] Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times wrote that "writer-director Bob Kelljan has freshened up the formula pretty well ... he and his attractive cast of unknowns do succeed in persuading us to go along with the hokum for the duration of the film's fast-moving 90 minutes."[7] Kenneth Turan of The Washington Post called it "as good a horror film as we have had for some time" and "90 minutes of supremely diverting entertainment."[8] Kenneth Thompson of The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote that "the understated acting and the tightly controlled, increasingly staccato tempo make this the most distinctive essay in the macabre since Night of the Living Dead."[9]

After the sequel The Return of Count Yorga, a third Yorga film was planned, which would have featured a broken Count living in Los Angeles's sewers and creating an army of undead street people, but it never materialised.

American International Pictures had planned at one stage to revive Count Yorga as an adversary for Dr. Anton Phibes in Dr. Phibes Rises Again.[10] This plan was dropped, however, and Quarry appeared as the artificially young Dr. Biederbeck.

Count Yorga, Vampire has been the subject of several home video releases in nearly all formats since the 1980s. In April 1991, the film was packaged as a Laserdisc double feature (Catalog Number ID7661HB), paired with the Vincent Price horror film, Cry of the Banshee; both films were not letterboxed, but employed a full screen, pan-and-scan process.

In 2004, MGM's Midnite Movies DVD line (which redistributed much of the American International Pictures horror catalog previously owned by Orion Pictures Home Video) released Count Yorga, Vampire and its sequel, The Return of Count Yorga as a DVD double feature. Both films were presented in the widescreen format, and included original theatrical trailers.

• Vampire film
• Dracula

• Count Yorga, Vampire at IMDb
• Count Yorga, Vampire at AllMovie
• Robert Quarry on playing Count Yorga