The Hammer horror classic Dracula aka Horror of Dracula starring Christopher Lee redefined the vampire for a whole new generation, and Lee’s Dracula is back this Halloween.
A brand new 4K restoration of Dracula starring Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing is on the way this October, and Hammer has released the official 4K restoration trailer this week.
But this isn’t just any ordinary 4K restoration. The upcoming restoration of Hammer’s Dracula will feature previously cut scenes and footage that has been unseen for 60 years!
Cut by censors and distributors at the time of the film’s original release, the lost footage was discovered in a Warner Bros. warehouse, and the unseen footage runs around three minutes long.
Hammer previews, “Painstakingly restored in 4K from the best original archival materials sourced from around the world, this definitive restoration includes footage believed missing for over six decades — deemed too shocking for UK and US audiences at the time, and previously seen only during the film’s original 1958 Japanese theatrical release. Restored by Hammer Films and Silver Salt Restoration in partnership with Warner Bros, this is the cut the censors tried to bury, finally uncensored.”
“Warner Brothers, they have this massive, massive storage near LAX where everything from the 1920s onwards is there,” new Hammer owner John Gore told Deadline. “And they found the director’s cut of the original 1958 Dracula. So we will be unlocking that and the world will get to see the bits they weren’t seeing, which is mostly to do with how Dracula dies at the end.”
Gore goes on to explain, “… they had to trim a bit of the sexual stuff and then how he’s destroyed at the end. They cut quite a lot out because they went, ‘It’s too gruesome.’ And now that’s back in. All the crucial points that were axed are now back in.”
You’ll be able to pre-order the limited collector’s edition beginning September 4, 2026.
Learn more over on Hammer’s official website.
