The 1970s documentary IN SEARCH OF DRACULA promises the "blood-curdling truth behind the legendary vampire" on Blu-ray from Kino Lorber.

In 1972, Radu Florescu and Raymond T. McNally published the book "In Search of Dracula: The History of Dracula and Vampires," which suggested a link between Bram Stoker's creation and the historical figure of Vlad Tepes, also known as "Vlad the Impaler," an assertion that has subsequently been contested (although it was influential enough for Francis Ford Coppola to adapt it as the backstory for his 1992 blockbuster and the horrendous DRACULA UNTOLD). Long before that, Swedish filmmaker Calvin Floyd used the Florescu/McNally text as the springboard for this like-titled Swedish/West German/French curiosity that would seem to have been an unofficial forerunner to the Leonard Nimoy-hosted television series IN SEARCH OF… with the added novelty of Christopher Lee getting to play both Count Dracula and Vlad Tepes in interstitial scenes that require him to glower at the camera or walk around various atmospheric castle locations (along with some clips from SCARS OF DRACULA). The true meat of the documentary is looks at the spread of vampire lore to Eastern Europe from Asia Minor, being both vague about the cultural specifics while offering up intriguing bits of vampire myths that deviate from the popular image (including the obsessive-compulsive need of vampires to count spilled seeds as a distraction to prevent them from reaching the village before sunrise or the use of dogs with additional eyes painted on their heads left out at night to raise the alarm).

A discussion of eroticism in vampire myth leads to a discussion of the psychosexual with cases of true life mental cases and sexual sadists from Elizabeth Bathory to "The Vampire of Düsseldorf" Peter Kürten (subject of Fritz Lang's M.) or Fritz Haarmann (subject of Ulli Lommel's debut THE TENDERNESS OF THE WOLVES), as well as a discussion of psychological lycanthropy and the genetic condition that might have inspired legends of werewolves. The Villa Diodati portion of the documentary, ostensibly demonstrating the birth of English literary vampires earlier at the time as other monster legend Frankenstein focuses far more on the latter than the former and almost appear to be a teaser for what would have become "In Search of Frankenstein" after the Florescu text published the same year (Floyd's follow-up film ended up being a Swedish-produced, very low budget but more faithful adaptation of the Shelly novel titled VICTOR FRANKENSTEIN or THE TERROR OF FRANKENSTEIN stateside). His third work, the Irish/Swedish THE SLEEP OF DEATH, based on Sheridan Le Fanu's "The Room at the Dragon Volant", is a much more accomplished genre effort worthy of rediscovery. Floyd is credited with the music but it consists of library cues, including James Bernard Hammer cues and some of the same Phonorecord music used in the Spanish VAMPIRE'S NIGHT ORGY.

Unreleased on VHS in the United States, the film existed for the longest time as stills in various horror references books until Sam Sherman's Independent-International licensed it to Image Entertainment in 1999 as a barebones DVD. This was followed by a 2003 DVD from Wellspring that added the trailer, and then a 2012 DVD from Alpha Video – who licensed a number of Independent-International and Ted V. Mikels titles at the time – which was a direct port of the Image edition in the DVD-R format. Clearly in need of a new transfer, IN SEARCH OF DRACULA's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.37:1 pillarboxed fullscreen transfer immediately pops with the colorful Bob Le Barr animated title sequence. The film is made up of original footage shot abroad on location quick and dirty, Hammer clips in dark and muddy condition, and various bits of stock footage, but the overall presentation is a nice bump up from DVD. The DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 mono track is almost entirely clearly-recorded narration as well as music credited to director Floyd but consisting mainly of stock and library music including James Bernard Hammer cues and music that was already library music when it was used to underscore the Leon Kilmovsky Spanish vampire pic THE VAMPIRES NIGHT ORGY. Optional English SDH subtitles are also included.