Dracula - 4K Restoration + Dracula Has Risen from the Grave + intro

HOME is putting on a Hammer horror double bill on Thursday 29 October, with the 1958 original Dracula as the main feature. It's a 4K restoration of the film that made Hammer the big name in horror, and it's being shown uncut, with an introduction by director Terence Fisher.

That 4K restoration is the real draw here. It was put together from original film elements and brings back footage that's been missing for more than six decades — scenes that only audiences at the original 1958 Japanese theatrical release ever saw, and that have never been released in the UK or the US. It's the version of the film that actually made the studio's reputation, and seeing it restored and uncut on the big screen is a proper way to watch it.

Dracula is the one that defined the whole series, with Christopher Lee as the Count and Peter Cushing as Van Helsing. The double bill is rounded out by Dracula Has Risen from the Grave, the first of the Hammer Dracula films not directed by Fisher. It was a stylistic update and gave Lee one of his most memorable turns under the cape, and together they cover two different eras of the studio's run with the character. The Hammer Dracula series remains one of the studio's great classics, and this pairs the original with one of its later entries.

The whole thing runs for 197 minutes including an intermission, so it's a long evening. It starts at 19:00 at HOME, Tony Wilson Place, Manchester M15 4FN.