‘Hell Yeah!’ is an ongoing series in which horror filmmakers, critics and fans share their take on movies they love. This month: vampires!

No matter the amount of screen time they give their vampires, what sticks in the memory about most vampire films are their toothsome bloodsuckers. Schreck's misshapen creature, Lugosi's debonair count, Oldman's tragic lover – each of them overwhelm the other characters in their narratives. The bold exception to this rule is the output of England's Hammer Studios. Starting with the breakthrough hit The Curse of Frankenstein, it was clear the studio valued their human protagonists (here the antihero Victor Frankenstein, played by Peter Cushing), as much as their supernatural menaces. Curse's follow-up, Horror of Dracula, cemented this, again starring Cushing, this time as Bram Stoker's iconic vampire hunter Doctor Abraham Van Helsing. Christopher Lee is magnetically feral in the title role, but the charisma, the ingenuity and, most importantly, the vitality of Cushing's character must have come as a bit of a shock to audiences in 1958, so used to the grandfatherly Edward Van Sloan playing Van Helsing in Universal's 1930s Dracula films.

An unqualified success in the role, Cushing would return to it several times throughout the next decade (most notably in the superior sequel The Brides of Dracula), until succumbing to the inevitability of age, upon which he too was forced to play the vampire hunter as wise old man, in Hammer's Dracula A.D. 1972. But a fresh blast of youth, infused with Cushing's resourcefulness, soon followed, in the studio's 1974 effort Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter.

Captain Kronos followed Horror's template of the vampire hunter as young, charismatic hero, but its titular hero was unlike any film audiences had encountered before. A veteran of some unnamed 18th century war, the good captain (played with subtle humor by German actor Horst Janson) found his calling when he returned home from battle to find his family destroyed by vampirism. He then decided to take a hunchback sidekick, vampire expert Professor Grost (The Abominable Dr. Phibes' John Cater), and roam Europe, in a crusade to rid it of the undead plague. At least that's what one can assume from the little exposition given – unlike too many films today, Kronos isn't obsessed with back-story (we're spared even a single flashback). Which makes the little we learn about its hero all the more enticing. We can assume, for example, that Kronos has studied in the Far East: to relax, he smokes a Chinese herb, and practices what appears to be an Asian meditation technique. There's also a samurai-like flair to his sword-fighting. Yet his cigars and strong, silent demeanor recall Eastwood's Man with No Name.

At the start of the film, our hero acquires a new companion, in the shapely form of ‘70s genre queen Caroline Munro. As most good fanboys know, Munro made a splash in such films as The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, The Spy Who Loved Me, Starcrash and Maniac. But her roles were largely designed to showcase her looks. In Kronos, though she's given little dialogue, she shines as a scrappy gypsy heroine who devotes herself to the captain after he frees her from the stocks ("I danced on a Sunday," she explains simply). There's a nice understated chemistry between Munro and Janson; and, it's worth noting, the film was shot at the zenith of her legendary beauty.

The film's vampires, on the other hand, are not fully revealed until its climactic fight scene. Most of the running time is focused on a series of attacks on young peasant girls, in which each is found drained not of blood, but youth – resulting in a withered, old corpse. Kronos and his companions investigate these murders with methods made even more charmingly eccentric in the light of decades of film and TV police procedurals. One such method involves identifying a vampire by planting a dead toad in its path. If life returns to the toad, the vamp is outed. ("It's an old wives tale," says Kronos, "but like most such tales there's some truth to it.")

The chief suspects in these murders are a pair of aristocrats, Paul Durward and his sister Sara (played by Shane Briant and Lois Dane). The undercurrent of their relationship holds a discomforting hint of incest; made all the more uneasy by his preoccupation with witchcraft, and her cold obsession with retaining her youth. And neither of the Durwards cares very much for Kronos' local friend and confidante, Dr. Marcus (John Carson), who once failed to save the life of their father, and whose failure they blame for their mother's haggard appearance.

Thanks to some clever plotting and misdirection, even on a third viewing, the full plan and identity of Kronos' vampires remained a surprise to this writer. Credit writer-director Brian Clemens, responsible for many of the best episodes of The Avengers. Clemens (who also wrote Hammer's Dr. Jekyll & Sister Hyde) brings much of the smart, economical storytelling that made that show such a beloved fan favorite; coupled with a wonderfully stark autumn atmosphere. Unfortunately, his work here was released in America with little fanfare by its distributor, Paramount, and, like so many B-movie classics, disappeared before it could make much of an impact. A sequel was considered, but plans were abandoned. And though Clemens continued his successful TV writing career, he's never directed another feature film. Fortunately, however, as is also often the case with worthwhile genre films, a cult developed, and a DVD was released in the States a few years ago, with a thoughtful audio commentary provided by Clemens and Munro.

When I interviewed Munro after the DVD's release, she told me no less a director than Quentin Tarantino had acknowledged Kronos' influence, on the Kill Bill saga (most evident in the first half, with its emphasis on quick jugular kills and samurai swordplay). But its legacy – that of a sexy vampire hunter who doesn't take himself too seriously – can also be seen in contemporary vampire film and TV like Blade, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Van Helsing (the latter – though a wretched film – even features similar sidekicks: a gorgeous gypsy and a comical hunchback). But there's a purity to Kronos that remains unsullied after thirty-five years. Clemens and his colleagues were smart enough not to copy their predecessors, and sophisticated enough to take a fresh look at the genre, one brimming with wit and swashbuckling bravado. It still shines – as bright as a drop of blood on newly forged steel.