In 1980, Edmonton police seized Dracula Sucks (1978), a pornographic vampire film, from the bygone Jasper Cinema. What began as a regional censorship dispute became Towne Cinema Theatres, Ltd. v. The Queen, a 1985 Supreme Court of Canada decision that transformed Canadian obscenity law. This lecture follows the strange legal afterlife of Dracula Sucks, showing how debates over sexual morality were recast as questions of degradation, dehumanization, harm, and equality. How did this unruly film help shape the legal logic later consolidated in R. v. Butler (1992)? How did a feminist “harms test” come to reinforce conservative sexual morality? And what does this history reveal about obscenity law’s anti-queer effects? Come find out more about vampire pornography, censorship, and the making of modern Canadian obscenity doctrine, and discover why Dracula Sucks still matters.

Kyler Chittick is an instructor in the Department of Women’s & Gender Studies at the University of Alberta, where he recently completed his Ph.D. in political science. He is also co-director of the Rainbow Story Hub Foundation, a local non-profit that uplifts Edmonton’s queer history through digital storytelling and public programming. Kyler’s research intersects queer theory, critical sexuality studies, law, film, and contemporary political theory. His academic work appears in a range of journals, including Alberta Law Review, Porn Studies, Rhizomes, Senses of Cinema, and Synoptiqueg.

Frank’s Lecture on Tap