Saturday, October 10, 1970: The Mummy's Tomb (1942) / Behind the Mask (1932)

Synopsis: Retired archeologist Steve Banning (Dick Foran) is regaling his son John (John Hubbard) and John’s fiancée Isobel Evans (Elyse Knox) with the story of his strange expedition to Egypt thirty years earlier: how he and the members of his expedition found the tomb of the mummy Kharis and, breaking the seal, unleashed a horrible curse that brought the mummy back to life. In a series of flashbacks, we are told how various members of the expedition were killed by Kharis, who was being controlled by the high priest Andoheb (George Zucco). In the end the mummy was destroyed and Steve and the surviving members of his party returned home.
John and Isobel find the story so fantastic that it isn’t clear if they completely believe it, but Banning claims every word of it is true.
Meanwhile, in Egypt, an elderly Andoheb is handing off his mummy-protecting duties to young Mehemet Bey (Turhan Bey). He tells the young man that the defilers of Kharis’ tomb still live; they must be tracked down and killed, and their line must be extinguished. Bey immediately makes plans to sail to Massachusetts, where the Banning family lives.
Once in America, Bey takes a job as caretaker in a cemetery, and from the caretaker’s cottage sets his plan in motion. Each night he gives the mummy the potion derived from nine tana leaves, which brings it to life. He orders the creature to kill Steve Banning. It shambles out to the Banning house and does so. The next night Bey orders it to dispense with Babe Hanson, another survivor of the expedition. This too the mummy accomplishes.


But a mummy's work is never done, and we learn that young John Banning is on the schedule for the next night. Surprisingly, the ultra-disciplined Bey hesitates. He finds himself captivated by the beautiful Isobel, and disobeys his orders from Andoheb by sending the mummy not to kill John but to capture Isobel, and bring her to him. What he does not know is that the townspeople are becoming suspicious of him, and that Kharis is close to rebelling against his sacrilege….


Comments: While watching The Mummy's Tomb, I found myself thinking back to the summer of 1999. In those days I lived in Saint Paul's Highland Park neighborhood, just a few blocks from the 2-screen Highland Theater. Walking along Cleveland Avenue one afternoon I saw two magic words spelled out on the theater marquee: THE MUMMY.
"Oh boy!" I blurted out. "The Mummy!"
A woman walking a few paces ahead of me slowed and threw a quizzical glance back in my direction: grown men are not supposed to say such things in public. I lowered my head guiltily, then jaywalked across to the theater and bought a ticket.
The movie I saw that day was, of course, Universal's "reboot" of the Mummy franchise, a "reimagining" that played more as an action-comedy than a horror film: louder, busier, more violent and more expensive than the originals -- not that there's anything wrong with that.
This millennial Mummy reboot was certainly entertaining, informed by the same bubblegum sensibility that made Raiders of the Lost Ark go.
Nevertheless, I prefer Universal's original take, as dull as its later entries sometimes were; as well as the Hammer mummy films that came along a couple of decades later.
Hammer films, it must be said, are an acquired taste. It's important to encounter them at the right time and under the right circumstances, lest the blood-and-boobs formula obscure their gothic underpinnings. I first saw Hammer's Curse of the Mummy's Tomb Blood From the Mummy's Tomb at age fifteen; and seeing it I sensed that a new world was opening up to me.



Not a world of mummies or the supernatural -- that was quite old hat for me. Nope, Valerie Leon had arrived in my life, and she was a different sort than the sugary girl-next-door types who had long inhabited American movies. Leon played a woman who, in spite of having an active sex life, nonetheless still smoldered with unfulfilled sexual longing. It just so happened that when I was fifteen, I was chosen to represent America in the global "unfulfilled sexual longing" competition, so I found her portrayal incredibly compelling; and at the same time I began to realize how prudish American movies were by comparison. We can see ample evidence of that prudishness in any Universal film of the era, but especially in tonight's movie.
After all, each of the Mummy sequels used sexual hunger as a plot device, but it was always expressed obliquely and never experienced by any of the women in the film. In fact the virginal female leads never display any interest in sex at all, beyond the occasional arch of the eyebrows designed to hurry her love interest along to the altar. The sexual longing in these films is entirely assumed by the hapless High Priests of Karnakh, a secret society so incompetent it can't even keep track of one fucking mummy, and staffed by members so repressed that the appearance of a single pretty woman sends the most devout of them straight over the edge.
George Zucco's Andoheb is the first to go bananas in The Mummy's Hand, as he decides to abandon his vows because he likes the cut of Peggy Moran's jib. Similarly, in The Mummy's Ghost, John Carradine's Yousef Bey decides that he'd prefer to wake up each morning next to Ramsey Ames, rather than a sarcophagus. In The Mummy's Curse, Peter Coe's Ilzor actually manages to keep his pants on, but assistant Martin Kosleck can't. In tonight's feature Turhan Bey is made the keeper of the tana leaf jar, but he fares no better: one look at John Banning's fiance Isobel and he becomes a sexually-obsessed wreck, turning Kharis against him when he opts to chuck his part in a 3,500 year-old mission in order to get laid.
This turn of events is foreshadowed early in the movie, when the newly-minted High Priest takes the job of a cemetery caretaker in Mapleton. The retiring caretaker is skeptical: why would a man want to waste his youth among the dead, when there is a whole world of living to be had? But the young man is adamant, insisting that he finds the cemetery peaceful. Like many religious fanatics, Mehemet Bey has drastically narrowed his life experience in order to avoid the temptations of the flesh. But he has outsmarted himself, because avoiding temptation has left him without the strength to resist it when it inevitably appears on his doorstep.
Which leads us to an almost archetypal scene in these movies: the High Priest of Karnakh has betrayed his vows in order to be with a woman, but he forgot to check in with the woman first. He has Kharis retrieve her the same way a black lab retrieves a downed mallard. Isobel wakes up, bound hand and foot, to see a stranger looming over her, delivering the Worst Pick-Up Line Ever*:

It is your destiny to achieve the greatest honor that can come to a woman. You will become the bride of a high priest of Karnakh....for you I am going to forsake the teachings that have been handed down to us for generations without end....the secret that has kept Kharis alive all these years can be ours as well....after I have given you the tana fluid you will be immortal, just as Kharis is immortal.

Aw, what a sweet-talker, this guy.
You'll note that the tana fluid device, which was never that convincing to begin with (exactly nine leaves to bring the mummy to life? What if the leaves are broken, or of different sizes?) is given a new angle: now if any human drinks the tana leaf fluid, they become immortal too. I can see the ad campaign now -- TANA LEAVES: THEY'RE NOT JUST FOR MUMMIES ANYMORE. No word from the High Priests of Karnakh as to how they came by this information, or how mummy-like a human imbibing tana leaf fluid becomes.
I'll let you know when I hear back from the High Priests of Karnakh's Chicago office. In the meantime, enjoy the Castle Films version of THE MUMMY'S TOMB.

BEHIND THE MASK


Synopsis: A Sing Sing inmate named Quinn (Jack Holt) is plotting an escape. His cellmate Henderson (Boris Karloff) advises against it, claiming that powerful friends will spring both of them soon if they are patient. But seeing that Quinn will not be deterred, Henderson tells him how to get in touch with his associate on the outside, a man named Arnold (Claude King). Quinn’s escape is successful and he travels to Arnold’s mansion in the country. Arnold seems afraid to assist Quinn, but is too frightened of his employer, the mysterious drug kingpin Mr. X, to refuse. He employs Quinn as his chauffer, and Quinn becomes enamored of Arnold’s beautiful daughter Julie (Constance Cummings).
Soon enough Henderson is released and makes contact with Dr. August Steiner (Edward Van Sloan), who runs the Eastland Hospital. We learn that Steiner is also an agent of Mr. X , and he tells Henderson that Mr. X arranged for him to be incarcerated so long because he was displeased with him.
Henderson suggests Quinn as the perfect man to deliver the next drug shipment for the organization. But as soon as Steiner sees Quinn he knows the man is an undercover federal agent. Henderson is shocked and angered by this revelation.



But the plan to have Quinn to pick up the shipment via seaplane goes forward. After Quinn delivers the drugs to a ship at sea, Henderson instructs Quinn to take off and then bail out – the boat, he says, will come to his location and pick him up. Quinn, sensing that this is an attempt to dupe him, quickly “rigs a dummy”, attaches it to the parachute and tosses it overboard so that Henderson will think it’s him.
But before long Steiner captures Quinn himself. He plans on disposing of the federal agent in his usual manner – by getting him admitted to his hospital and subjecting him to an unnecessary – and fatal – operation…Comments: Behind the Mask is the sort of movie where crooks start off every speech with phrases like, "Now get this, you mug!" The warmed-over gangster patois doesn't wear particularly well because Behind the Mask doesn't take it seriously, or at least not seriously enough. Without any particular knowledge or interest in the lives of blue-collar criminals, the screenwriters focus on the brains heavy, whose white-collar sensibilities must have seemed more familiar. Thus we have Edward Van Sloan playing Dr. August Steiner, a bearded and bespectacled doctor whose sinister mien is shorthand for Jewishness in an era when such stereotypes were still considered acceptable. This Columbia offering differs from Warner's underworld pictures of the time because of the uncertainty of its approach as well as the zany hardware and tactics the mysterious Mr. X employs. This is a movie so melodramatic even Mr. X's taunting notes to the police come with their own dramatic pauses.


In fact so numerous are the high-tech gadgets (Cyclotrons! Telephones! Wire recorders!) that Behind the Mask might have worked better as a serial. Believe me, it could have used two fistfights and a cliffhanger every fifteen minutes.


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*Having tried this speech out a few times in my youth, I can personally attest that it is indeed the Worst Pick-Up Line Ever.

Saturday, October 3, 1970: Dracula (1931) / She Wolf of London (1946)

Dracula

Synopsis: Renfield (Dwight Frye), a young attorney from London, arrives at a small Carpathian village. His fellow travelers are staying in the village overnight but he insists on continuing on to the castle of a local nobleman, Count Dracula (Bela Lugosi).

The villagers turn pale at the very mention of the name, and beg him not to go. But Renfield is there on business, and insists on completing his journey.

After an unnerving trip to the castle, Renfield finally meets the count, who signs documents to complete his purchase of Carfax Abbey in England. It is to England, Dracula says, that he will go the very next morning.

Later, a ship drifts into an English harbor, all aboard her dead -- save for Renfield, who is now a stark, raving lunatic.

Several crates from the ship are delivered to Carfax Abbey. From one of them emerges Count Dracula, who soon insinuates himself into London society, befriending Dr. Seward, owner of the Seward Asylum where Renfield is confined. The asylum is, we learn, next door to Carfax Abbey. Dracula meets Dr. Seward's daughter, Mina (Helen Chandler); her fiancee Jonathan Harker (David Manners), and their friend Lucy (Frances Dade).

Meanwhile, a string of bizarre murders has caught the interest of Dr. Van Helsing (Edward Van Sloan), an unorthodox scientist and student of the occult. Two small puncture wounds, he finds, were on the necks of each victim, including young Lucy.

When Mina relates a dream of a man coming into her bedroom and biting her neck, Seward is surprised to see that Mina has been hiding two small puncture wounds herself. But Van Helsing is not surprised. He insists that a vampire is attempting to make Mina its slave by visiting her over a series of subsequent nights.

Mina can only be protected, he says, by locking her in her room, and sealing the windows with wolfbane and crucifixes, which vampires find repellent.

Meanwhile, Count Dracula pays a visit to the Seward home, and Van Helsing quickly realizes that Dracula himself is the vampire they seek. A battle of wits ensues, with Van Helsing battling Count Dracula for Mina's very soul....

Comments: Dracula was the first movie to be broadcast twice on Horror Incorporated, and tonight it becomes the first to be broadcast three times.

You may remember that Horror Incorporated first aired this movie the night of its premiere on November 8, 1969. We saw it again on August 22. Having it pop up again, for the third time in a single year, makes me wonder if we're getting too much of a good thing.

And it raises a question that I've been asked a few times since I started this project: how do we know for sure what was running on a particular date?

The short answer is: we can't be 100% certain. We're going by the broadcast schedules printed in the Minneapolis Tribune. And those of us who remember the olden days of newspaper TV schedules know that they were occasionally wrong.

But one advantage to having your show in the middle of the night was that it was harder to get pre-empted. Horror Incorporated wasn't about to get bumped by special programming -- for example, the American League playoffs, in which Minnesota was battling against the Baltimore Orioles for the pennant, interrupted a lot of programming on October 3, 1970.*

But Horror Incorporated was able to saunter on, oblivious to the mayhem farther up the program grid. So I'd say that if there was an error in the listing, it would be due to a mistake in the newspaper, not because the show was pre-empted due to an 11-inning ball game, or because the President suddenly got a yen to address the nation from the Oval Office.

Having said that, it's certainly not inconceivable that Dracula ran three times in one year.

Obviously, I'd prefer a back-up source of information -- videotape archives of the show, station memos or other documents referencing the movies on the schedule, etc.

I have been trying to obtain such documents, but let's face it: local, non-hosted late-night creature features were never seen as likely candidates for historic preservation. I'm sure much of what I am looking for was routinely tossed out by the station when it was no longer useful. But I will keep trying.

Anyway, I'm not complaining about seeing Dracula again. If you're going to see any movie three times in a year, it might as well be this one. It holds up surprisingly well on repeat viewing, though I would say that it is best in its first and final thirds, sagging somewhat in the talky second act.

Interestingly, Dr. Van Helsing stands as the perfect counterpoint to Bride of Frankenstein's Dr. Pretorious. Pretorious is an amoral scientist who turns to the occult in order to gain knowledge and abilities that science cannot offer; while Van Helsing is a deeply moral scientist who studies the occult in order to battle its evils. It's a pity the two characters didn't get a chance to face off in a movie of their own. It would have been interesting to see what each would have made of the other's curriculum vitae.

And just because you asked, here is the Castle Films version of Dracula -- pared down to within an inch of its unnatural life.

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* In case you're curious, the heavily-favored Orioles swept the Twins in the best-of-five series, then went on to defeat the Cincinnati Reds four games to one in the World Series. In 1970 there were two divisions per league, so division winners had only one best-of-five series between them and the pennant.

She-Wolf of London

Synopsis: Young Phyllis Allenby (June Lockhart) is preparing for her marriage to attorney Barry Lanfield (Don Porter). Barry is the perfect candidate for marriage: handsome, patient, understanding, and (last but not least) wealthy. But Phyllis is deeply troubled, because a bizarre series of murders has been taking place in the park near the Allenby estate. The method of the killings suggest an animal attack, and Phyllis mutters fearfully about a return of the "Allenby Curse".

Meanwhile, Phyllis' cousin Carol Winthrop (Jan Wiley) is caught by her mother, Martha Winthrop (Sara Haden) trying to send a letter to a boyfriend across town. Martha warns Carol that she can never have anything to do with young Dwight Severn (Martin Kosleck), reminding her that Dwight is penniless. She reveals something that no one else seems to know -- that neither she nor Carol is related by blood to Phyllis Allenby. Martha has been the family housekeeper for decades and it is now taken on faith that she and Carol are members of the family.

Now that Phyllis is the sole remaining heir of the Allenby estate, Martha and Carol are in a precarious position, at risk of losing everything -- if Phyllis marries. But if Carol were to marry Lanfield instead, matters would improve considerably for both Carol and Martha.

Unorthodox Detective Latham of Scotland Yard is convinced that the park murders are the work of a werewolf, a theory rejected by hidebound Inspector Pierce (Dennis Hoey). In fact, the only person who seems to buy into the werewolf theory is Phyllis herself, who explains to Aunt Martha that the Allenby Curse dooms members of her family to turn into ravenous wolves, an affliction for which there is no cure.

Aunt Martha tries to convince Phyllis that it's all in her head, but Phyllis knows that each morning her slippers are caked with mud, her dress sodden and torn, and her hands covered with blood.

Fearful of the creature that she has become, she breaks off her engagement with Barry. But Barry refuses to believe in the curse, or in Phyllis' guilt, and he is determined to unmask the real she-wolf of London....

Comments: In my previous write-up of She-Wolf of London I noted that the film was an amalgamation of two popular suspense pictures of the early 1940s: Cat People and Gaslight. On a second viewing, She-Wolf of London might best be described as Cat People's premise melded with Gaslight's ending. As in Cat People, Phyllis is worried about her impending marriage to Barry because she is convinced she turns into a vicious animal, as predicted by her family's curse. But, like Gaslight, it turns out that this is all a set-up, perpetrated by her closest confidante.

This isn't a bad idea, actually, but She-Wolf of London falls apart on execution, for three critical reasons.

The first, and most egregious, is the that the screenplay cheats the audience. When you promise a she-wolf (in the title, no less) you'd damn well better come up with a she-wolf, either literally (woman turns into ravenous wolf) or figuratively (woman is predatory in her behavior, demeanor or appetites).

I asked my friend Shakira to throw a video together demonstrating this second definition of she-wolfery, and she kindly agreed:

Second, the Allenby curse is repeatedly invoked, and evidence is given for us to believe it (the crazed way dogs react to Phyllis, for example); but once Aunt Martha is identified as the killer, everyone agrees that the Allenby curse was just a lot of superstitious nonsense. Some of Phyllis' evidence for the curse is explained away by Martha's actions (the muddy boots and blood-stained hands), but everything else is conveniently forgotten.

The third problem that undercuts She-Wolf of London is its dreadful cheapness. The C-list cast is clearly racing through the shooting schedule, and there is no time to build atmosphere, suspense, or even convincing English accents. A very young June Lockhart has neither the screen presence nor the acting chops to carry the movie effectively, and she isn't aided by the colorless studio contract players surrounding her. Martin Kosleck, who is always interesting to watch, has little more than a cameo here.

Castle Films, it should be noted, apparently didn't think She-Wolf of London warranted an 8-minute version. I can't say I'm surprised.

Saturday, September 26, 1970: The Wolf Man (1941) / House of Dracula (1945)

The Wolf Man

Synopsis: Lawrence Talbot returns to the family estate after a self-imposed exile of nearly two decades. He is welcomed back by his father, Sir John Talbot (Claude Rains), and talk quickly turns to Larry's elder brother, who was recently killed in a hunting accident. Now that he is the eldest, Lawrence is heir to the estate, as well as heir to his father's limited capacity for affection.

Lawrence has spent a good deal of time in California, and it shows: by the standards of his home town he is distressingly informal and decidedly frivolous, taking more interest in local shopgirl Gwen Conliffe (Evelyn Ankers) than in the more serious matters surrounding the family estate. Nevertheless Sir John is happy about the prodigal son's return, believing that Lawrence (or "Larry", as he has taken to calling himself) has spent enough time in the New World to benefit the stodgy old ways of Talbot Castle. Larry is certainly good with tools and machines; it's when he is working with modern contrivances that he seems happiest and most self-assured.

In an attempt to get on Gwen's good side, Larry purchases an unusual item from her family's shop: an ornate cane with a silver wolf's head. The wolf, we learn, is a potent and fearful symbol of the supernatural in these parts, as is the pentacle, which is also etched on the handle of the cane.

It turns out that Gwen is engaged to Frank Andrews, a decent fellow; nevertheless, Gwen accompanies Larry to a Gypsy camp, where they hope to have their fortunes told. At the last minute, Gwen invites her friend Jenny (Fay Helm) to join them.

Alas, poor Jenny! She really ought to have known better. As Gwen and Lawrence walk together under the light of the full Moon, Jenny has her fortune read by Bela (Bela Lugosi). What the fortune-teller sees in Jenny's future alarms him, and he urges Jenny to go home -- immediately. Terrified, Jenny runs away into the woods.

Almost immediately, Jenny is set upon by some sort of animal. Larry, hearing her screams, rushes to her aid, and attacks the creature with his cane. He manages to kill it, but not before it mauls his chest. Larry staggers away, collapsing only a few yards from Jenny's body.

Larry is taken home. The next morning he learns several disturbing facts: Jenny is dead, her throat ripped out. While a wolf clearly attacked her, no wolf carcass was found in the area; instead, the body of Bela the fortune-teller was found nearby, his head smashed in, presumably by Larry's cane. Moreover, Larry's chest shows no animal bites whatsoever.

Larry is at a loss to understand what happened, but Sir John offers a rational explanation: Jenny was indeed attacked by a wolf. Larry and Bela ran to her aid at the same time, and in the confusion Larry killed Bela, thinking that he was attacking the wolf. But Larry is unconvinced: how could anyone mistake a man for a wolf, even in the dark? How could wounds on his chest be his imagination? And why wasn't Bela wearing his shoes?

That night, Larry Talbot undergoes a terrible transformation: he becomes a werewolf beneath the full Moon, and murders a gravedigger. The next morning, Larry confesses everything, but no one believes him.

No one, that is, except the Gypsy woman Maleva, whose own son suffered from the same curse....

Comments: Aside from introducing one of the great characters of the Universal horror pantheon, The Wolf Man offers something extra to devoted viewers of Horror Incorporated. The movie is simply loaded with actors we've seen again and again on the show. In addition to the ubiquitous Lon Chaney Jr, we also have Claude Rains (The Invisible Man), Evelyn Ankers (The Frozen Ghost), Ralph Bellamy (The Man Who Lived Twice), Bela Lugosi (Dracula) , Patric Knowles (The Strange Case of Dr. RX) and Fay Helm (Night Monster).

Sometimes movies that are lauded as classics prove disappointing to the modern viewer, but not The Wolf Man. It is, quite simply, a ripping good story. Much of its power comes from an insistence that modern logic offer no protection against ancient fears.

From the very beginning Sir John Talbot is depicted as a progressive fellow, insisting that Lawrence's time in America can only benefit the locals. Throughout the movie, Sir John's confidence in modernity and rationality never wavers. Yet for all his soothing speeches, he is absolutely powerless to prevent the mayhem that is to come. In the end this rational man loses his own child to the same irrational force that took Maleva's. The only difference is that Maleva understands the ancient forces at work, and can at least make peace with them.

Curt Siodmak's brisk screenplay wisely makes Larry a proxy for the viewer: he has been away so long that he is essentially a stranger in his home town (though, if he grew up in the area, it's unlikely that he would be so ignorant of the werewolf lore everyone else seems to know by heart). Unlike the frosty Dr. Wilfred Glendon in Werewolf of London, Larry is depicted as a regular guy, someone who'd rather be buying a pretty girl a soda than peering through a microscope.

The screenplay rarely falters in making Larry a decent, likable fellow, but Siodmak arranges an unfortunate meet-cute between Larry and Gwen. Larry is setting up his father's telescope at Talbot Castle and, peering into the eyepiece, just happens (cough, cough) to see Gwen through her bedroom window; smitten, he goes to her shop and asks for the earrings he knows are on her nightstand. This was probably considered fun and light-hearted stuff in 1941 (hey, he wouldn't be spying on you with a telescope if he didn't like you), but today it makes Larry seem rather unsavory.

Of course, this might be a hint of what's to come, if you are willing to regard the werewolf as Larry's repressed id running amok; but the metaphor of hairy-wolfman-as-the-animal-we-carry-inside-us seems too shopworn and dreary to go into. So let's sidestep the issue and assume the telescope scene was meant to be innocent fun -- in an era when any women who said otherwise would be accused of being no fun at all.

This was probably Lon Chaney Jr's best performance, and the role seems to have been written with him in mind: Larry is good-natured, gentle in most circumstances, but capable of great anger when he feel he's been wronged. This plays greatly to Chaney's strengths as a soft-spoken but physically imposing actor. Similarly, Evelyn Ankers is not entirely forgettable here, as close to an acting triumph as she is likely to get.

Patric Knowles excelled at playing stuffed shirts named Frank, and he is perfectly serviceable here; but what Ralph Bellamy is doing as the local prosecutor, it isn't easy to say.

Maria Ouspenskaya is brilliant in her first film appearance as Maleva. She brings a somber dignity to her character, as she would later in the less-dignified Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man.

I've got a little treat for you -- the 8-minute Castle Films version of The Wolf Man. In the pre-home video days, Castle Films were the only way you could watch your favorite movies again, and they were cleverly boiled down to a single 8- or 16-mm reel. In many ways they were small masterpieces in their own right, cramming every plot point into an impossibly small container:

House of Dracula

Synopsis: Patients from all over the world seek out the brilliant Dr. Edelmann (Onslow Stevens), a physician with a keen mind and a big heart. He has a practice that he runs out of his castle in Vasaria, and those who have lost hope in conventional medicine can turn to him in their hour of need.
Late one night Edelmann is dozing in an easy chair when a man in top hat and tails shows up in his living room and wakes him. The stranger introduces himself as Baron Latos, but it's obvious right away that he's really Count Dracula (John Carradine). He wants Dr. Edelmann to help find a cure for his vampirism.

By cure, Dracula presumably isn't looking for the sunlight-and-wooden-stake cure. We're talking a medical cure, something that will make him mortal again.

Since Dracula's already dead, I would rate his chances for a full recovery as vanishingly slim, but Edelmann is made of sterner stuff and agrees to give it a try.

Meanwhile, an agitated man is trying to get in to see Dr. Edelmann. It's our old friend Lawrence Talbot (Lon Chaney, Jr). and after badgering the receptionist for a while, he rushes out of the clinic, jabbering about the full Moon that will soon rise.

In his laboratory, Edelmann is examining the Count's blood cells under a microscope, when he gets a phone call from Vasaria's chief of police (Lionel Atwill). A distraught man has demanded to be incarcerated. He's clearly a nutter, so would Edelmann come down and have a look at him?

Edelmann does so, and comes face to face with Lawrence Talbot, who claims he turns into a werewolf when the Moon is full.

At just about that moment, the full Moon comes into view and Talbot changes into a wolf man -- before his very eyes. He tells the Chief to keep the beast imprisoned until morning -- then he will examine Talbot.

When Dracula comes back Edelmann tells him that vampirism is caused by a blood parasite, and that a series of blood transfusions might do the trick. It turns out that Talbot's problem also has a scientific basis. Talbot turns into a werewolf, we are told, because he believes he will. This belief, combined with certain irregularities in Talbot's skull that put pressure on key points in the brain, trigger his lycanthropic proclivities.

The condition can be cured, Edelmann says, but it will take time. This is too much for the excitable Talbot, who races out of the castle and throws himself off a nearby cliff into the ocean.

Edelmann, believing Talbot may have been swept into a cave in the cliffside, lowers himself with a rope down the cliff face. He finds that Talbot -- now a wolf man -- has indeed found his way into a cave. Moreover, there's someone else there -- Frankenstein's monster, in suspended animation....

Comments: I talked about House of Dracula here, when it was first broadcast on Horror Incorporated; and in spite of my best efforts I couldn't muster a lot of enthusiasm while watching it again.

It's difficult today to imagine movies like House of Dracula being scary for audiences, even when they were running in theaters. Finding modern analogues for these movies isn't exact, but let's agree that Alien was creepy and quite scary, while Alien V. Predator was silly and derivative. Would it follow, then, that Alien is to Dracula as Alien Vs. Predator is to House of Dracula? It is tempting to think so. But to be sure I decided to go back and see what the self-appointed guardians of moral cleanliness thought about this movie. Take it away, Catholic Legion of Decency:

House of Dracula -- Murky monster tale of an idealistic doctor (Onslow Stevens) who cures the Wolfman (Lon Chaney, Jr.) after killing the prowling Dracula (John Carradine), then discovers he's been contaminated by the vampire's blood and becomes one himself until reviving the Frankenstein monster (Glenn Strange) for a fiery finale. Directed by Erle C. Kenton, the feverish plot is as unconvincing as the monsters, though the spooky visuals and eerie atmosphere offer some scary moments. Stylized violence, menacing situations and hokey moralizing. (A-II)

Now when the Legion of Decency accuses you of "hokey moralizing", you know you're in trouble.

The A-II rating, by the way, meant that it was only partially objectionable, and was acceptable fare for adults and adolescents. It was actually rare for the Legion to condemn a film outright; the studios were careful not to offend the Catholic lobby, and the Catholic censors was careful not to veer too far out from popular taste. The review suggests that the monster rallies of the mid-1940s were neither offensive nor particularly frightening.

And really, who is going to be scared of a horse-faced ham like John Carradine?

But the real question we should be asking is: Does House of Dracula entertain? Well, sure. It is a buck-toothed, lovable little movie. Perhaps I am less forgiving of it because its sudden lurch into pseudo-science was jarring (in the same way George Lucas' decision to come up with "mitochondria" as a scientific explanation for The Force was jarring). And after all, not counting a few Abbot and Costello appearances, this was the last roundup for the icons of Universal Horror. Too bad they couldn't go out with a bit more dignity.

Saturday, September 19, 1970: The Bride of Frankenstein (1935) / The Mummy's Curse (1944)

Synopsis: On a stormy night in the early 19th century, Mary Shelley (Elsa Lanchester), her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley and their friend Lord Byron are discussing Mary’s just-completed novel Frankenstein. Lord Byron marvels that the ladylike Mary could have penned such a ghoulish tale. He eagerly describes the plot of the story, and we see a recap of the original film. Lord Byron concludes by wondering what might have taken place after the monster was destroyed in the burning windmill.

Mary then tells the men that she has indeed devised a continuation of the story, and she begins to narrate a tale that begins where the 1931 movie ends.

As the flames of the windmill fire begin to die down, the pitchfork-bearing mob disperses. But the father of the young girl who drowned in the first film remains. He refuses to accept that the monster is dead until he sees its charred bones, and he begins to pick through the ruins to find them. The floor of the windmill gives out from under him and he falls into a flooded chamber below. The monster (Boris Karloff) appears nearby, evidently having been saved by the water in this subfloor, and the enraged creature drowns the man. The creature climbs up out of the ruins to find the man’s wife searching for her husband, and the monster kills her as well.

As the creature wanders the countryside, Henry (Colin Clive) recuperates at home. He is sorry for what he has done, but still gets that crazy gleam in his eye when he talks about the god-like power he had briefly harnessed. One night he is visited by Dr. Pretorious (Ernest Thesiger), a “professor of philosophy” who was fired from Henry’s university "for knowing too much”.
Pretorius wishes to form an alliance with Henry in order to create a new race of artificially-created humans. Henry has the power to restore dead tissue to life, but Pretorius claims to have mastered an entirely different trick – he can create new life out of inert material. To demonstrate this he takes Henry to his home, where – in a very odd scene – he unveils a series of tiny people he has grown in glass jars.

Meanwhile, the public learns that the monster still lives. It is captured and hauled into the village, but it soon escapes, leaving a trail of destruction behind it. Later it happens upon the cottage of a blind hermit, who befriends the creature, teaching it to speak a little, and to appreciate the finer things in life – namely, smoking and drinking. But a couple of townsfolk come looking for the monster, and in the course of the monster’s escape the cottage is burned down.

Pretorious wants Henry to use his knowledge of reanimating cadavers in tandem with his own knowledge of building new tissue. His plan is to procure the body of a young woman and create for it a blank brain that Pretorius has constructed. With a female, the monster will be able to reproduce and start a new race. Henry is tempted by the possibilities, but racked with guilt and uncertainty.

The monster stumbles into a vast crypt just as it is being raided by Dr. Pretorious and his assistants. Pretorious is not afraid of the monster in the slightest, and offers it a drink and a cigar, which the monster greatly enjoys. He brings it back to Henry’s estate, knowing that if Pretorious cannot force Henry to bring the new woman to life , the monster can….

Comments: This is Horror Incorporated's second broadcast of Bride of Frankenstein, and watching it again I am struck by how overtly it wears its religious symbols. Mary Shelley insists in the very first scene that her book will be published when it is understood that she is teaching a moral lesson, not just telling a spooky story.

From there the movie follows the monster emerging from the ruins of the windmill and wandering the countryside. As in the first film, its rage and frustration is mitigated by its childlike innocence, and when it is trussed up and then hoisted into the air by the angry mob, the Christ-like visual is only momentary, far too brief to become cloying.

Just as the monster died for Henry's sins in the first movie, now it is forced to suffer for his sins again -- in spite of his promises to be good, we know that Henry is going to go back to his old ways with the help of our cinematic snake in the garden, Dr. Pretorious.

Henry quickly identifies Dr. Pretorious' methods as black magic, and Pretorious does not deny this; and in speaking about the homunculi he has created, he says his favorite is the Devil, and notes that it bears a strong resemblance to himself. "Sometimes", he says, "I have wondered whether life wouldn't be much more amusing if we were all devils -- no nonsense about angels and being good."

Keeping himself amused is a job Pretorious takes very seriously. He laughs at the sight of another homonculus, this one dressed as a bishop, shaking its finger disapprovingly as the other little creatures have a good time. It is apparent that what got the professor kicked out of University is the same sort of worldly knowledge that got Adam and Eve kicked out of the Garden: the knowledge that God's meticulously ordered universe of arbitrary rules is, quite simply, a joke.

Horror films are by their nature conservative, even reactionary, and the chaotic Pretorious is held up as worse than Henry because Henry at least has the decency to agonize about his dark acts before he carries them out. For Pretorious, death and resurrection are, like life itself, the stuff of comedy. The man is so cheerfully amoral that we can't help but enjoy his company. Like Satan in Milton's Paradise Lost, he becomes the most interesting character by default -- everyone else is just so damned dull.

The impish Pretorius seems to embody Whale's sly sense of humor, which gets a bit more rope than it did in the first film. Pretorious' amusement at the sudden appearance of the monster in the crypt is perfectly done; and Dwight Frye's constant, nervous jabbering to himself is a brilliant touch. Una O'Conner offers the most blatantly slapstick bits in the movie, but they come at just the right moments, and never seem out of place.

Elsa Lanchester has got to enjoy the highest fame-to-screentime ratio in Hollywood history: she only played the Bride for a few moments, but they are unforgettable ones.

THE BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN can be found wherever fine monster movies are sold.

The Mummy's Curse

Synopsis: A construction crew is draining the swamps near a Louisiana village, and a number of men working on the project are nervous. There are tales of a mummy that roams the area at night, in the company of the Egyptian princess he carried into the swamp twenty-five years ago. Some of the locals dismiss it as the talk of superstitious yokels. Unfortunately, most of the guys working on the project are superstitious yokels.

Oh sure, the skeptics concede, we all know that a mummy did carry an Egyptian princess into the swamps, but that was a long time ago. You don't expect that sort of thing to get in the way of a federally-funded construction project.

An archeologist from the Scripps Museum named James Halsey (Dennis Moore) arrives on the site, bearing a letter that permits him to search the local swamps for traces of the mummy. Foreman Pat Walsh (Addison Richards) is annoyed by this sort of tomfoolery, but he must allow Halsey and his fez-wearing sidekick Ilzor (Peter Coe) to do as they please. The arrival of Halsey is not lost on Pat Walsh's beautiful daughter Betty (Kay Harding).

Almost immediately, mysterious mummy-related events begin to unfold. One of the workmen is found murdered, near an impression in the ground that is the same shape as a man -- as if a bulldozer had uncovered the body of a mummy.

Meanwhile, we learn that Ilzor is a member of the secret priesthood sworn to protect Princess Ananka*. He sets up shop in an abandoned monastery nearby, and aided by his henchman Ragheb (Martin Kosleck) revives the mummy Kharis.

Ilzor's plan is to use Kharis to track down Princess Ananka before Halsey does. But Ananka rises from the swamp and wanders into the village, suffering from amnesia. Her knowledge of ancient Egyptian artifacts impresses Halsey, who puts her to work on his archeological crew.

But the mysterious young woman is troubled by strange dreams, and a string of murders has been occurring, the victims found with ancient mold clinging to their broken necks....

Comments: The Mummy's Curse was the last -- as well as the shortest -- entry in Universal's original mummy franchise. It premiered in December 1944, just six months after the previous entry in the series, The Mummy's Ghost (which Horror Incorporated hasn't yet broadcast).

This final effort is entertaining enough, but the seams are clearly starting to show, as more and more plot contrivances are thrown in with a shrug of the shoulders . In one of the more remarkable continuity lapses between sequels, Kharis, who had descended into a New England swamp at the end of the last picture, emerges from a Louisiana swamp at the beginning of this one. Aw, what the hell! A swamp's a swamp, right?

And what better way to start off a horror movie than with a cheerful little polka? Tinde Benthe, proprieter of the eponymous cafe, serenades the Louisiana day laborers with a ditty called "Hey You!". This is not, by the way, the morose Pink Floyd song of the same name.

As a public service, I have transcribed the lyrics in question:

Hey you, with the naughty eye

As you pass us by we just have to cry

Hey you -- yoo hoo!

When we see you smile in that sweet profile

We dream all the while of you

Hey you!

Did we meet again at the Place de la Madeleine in the rue Lorraine?

We two! And if you care for me

And be my sweet cherie

YOO HOO! I go for you!

The patrons don't all get up and walk out during this number, but let's admit it: entertainment options are presumably limited in the bayou.

Nevertheless, once things get rolling we have a pretty good time. Much of the action focuses on the travails of an amnesiac Princess Ananka, played here by Virginia Christine. You would have needed to see The Mummy's Ghost to know that she was in fact a woman named Amina Monsouri, an Egyptian college student imbued with the spirit of Princess Ananka. The role was originally played by Ramsey Ames, whom I wound up liking a good deal more than Christine. But then, you never get over your first Ananka, do you?

Martin Kosleck does a yeoman's job as Ragheb, the guardian of Ananka whose earthly desires proves to be his undoing (again -- the same fate befell previous Ananka guardians George Zucco in The Mummy's Hand, Turhan Bey in The Mummy's Tomb, and John Carradine in The Mummy's Ghost).

Interestingly, the song "Hey You!" was co-written by the movie's producer, a Hollywood jack-of-all-trades named Oliver Drake.

Drake started his career as an actor in silent westerns, eventually writing, producing and directing cheap oaters himself for the poverty row studios until TV pushed the genre out of the theaters. He wrote songs for his movies too, with titles like "On the Prairie", "Moonlight on the Painted Desert," and "Out On the Lone Star Trail."

Drake did a fair amount of TV late in his career. He directed his last film in 1974, an X-rated feature called Angelica: The Young Vixen. Presumably taking a lead from Son of Dracula, he was credited as Revilo Ekard.






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*They're doing a heck of a job, aren't they? Not only did they fail to protect the sanctity of the Princess' tomb, they are now mucking around in the Louisiana swamps after losing track of her for a quarter of a century.

Saturday, September 12, 1970: House of Frankenstein (1944) / The Frozen Ghost (1945)

Synopsis: In Neustadt prison, mad scientist Dr. Niemann (Boris Karloff) and his hunchbacked assistant Daniel (J. Carrol Naish) are unexpectedly freed when a wall of their cell collapses during a violent thunderstorm. The two happen upon Lampini's traveling horror show, which boasts as its main attraction the skeleton of Count Dracula. Neimann and Eric quickly murder Lampini and his driver and take their places. Niemann has been obsessed with proving the genius of Dr. Frankenstein and he sets out to the village where the Monster was created.

Niemann discovers that the skeleton of Dracula is authentic when he removes the stake that had been thrust through the vampire's heart. The skeleton promptly transforms into the Count (John Carradine).

Threatening to replace the stake if Dracula doesn't do his bidding, Niemann sends the vampire out to kill the three men who had him imprisoned: Strauss, Ullman and Hussman. Dracula kills Hussman but dies before he can dispense with the hated Strauss and Ullman.

Reaching the village of Vasaria, they encounter a band of gypsies. Seeing a gypsy woman Ilonka (Elena Verdugo) being abused, Daniel saves her and, smitten with her, asks her to join them.

Later, examining the ruins of Frankenstein Castle, Niemann and Daniel discover the frozen bodies of Frankenstein's Monster and the Wolf Man. Niemann realizes that the Monster can be revived, and he plans to place the Monster's brain in Lawrence Talbot's body; Talbot's brain in Strauss' body, and Ullman's brain in the Monster's body. But discovering that the Ilonka has fallen in love with Lawrence Talbot, Daniel wants his own brain placed into Talbot's body....

Comments: If this were Turner Classic Movies, and I were Robert Osborne, I would now be strolling toward you across a tastefully-appointed living room set, promising you a special evening of films starring Lon Chaney, Jr. and Elena Verdugo. Chaney and Verdugo appear in both of tonight's features, in analogous roles: Chaney as a guilt-ridden lone wolf, and Verdugo as a sweet, hapless young woman who vies unsuccessfully for his attention.

But TCM this isn't, and Robert Osborne I certainly am not. And if the person who programmed Horror Incorporated for the night of September 12, 1970 was even aware that two actors from House of Frankenstein would be seen later that night in The Frozen Ghost, we'll never know.

Perhaps it's unrealistic to ask for so much attention to detail. So let's chalk it up to coincidence, and give tonight's first movie a second look. I offered some notes on House of Frankenstein when it was first broadcast, and seeing it again hasn't improved my opinion of it.

I admire Boris Karloff's portrayal of Dr. Niemann, at least in the early going when he is a revenge-oriented fugitive scientist (which, of course, was exactly the character he played last week in The Invisible Ray). Later on, when he dons the white lab coat and decides to swap out brains like computer hard drives, his character becomes almost preternaturally boring. Meanwhile, Lon Chaney, Jr. seems unhappy with his billet and nearly gets lost in the jumble of this oddly-structured movie.

Actually, lots of things get lost; numerous characters enter and exit the film without their storylines ever intersecting, motivations shift around in order to conform to various plot demands, and in the end even the movie poster gives up and simply declares that House of Frankenstein is "History's Weirdest Household!".

No argument here. Imagine the fights over the bathroom each morning! Now that would have made an interesting movie.

I will give points to House of Frankenstein for its inventive finale, in which everyone manages to get killed in the last couple of minutes. You don't see efficiency like that from Hollywood anymore.

Elena Verdugo was a character actress whose dark complexion often landed her in "exotic" roles of various types. Like most of the roles afforded women in those days (well, in these days too) her character is essentially window dressing, but Verdugo projects an innocence that makes her a credible love interest for Daniel, and we feel sorry when she is killed off. Verdugo worked steadily through the 1940s and 50s, but found her greatest fame on television, where she played nurse Consuelo Lopez on the long-running series Marcus Welby, M.D.

Karloff and J. Carrol Naish play off each other pretty well, and once again I have to give Karloff credit for his consummate professionalism -- you never get the feeling that he's bored or uninvolved in the action, even when he's playing a character that he's essentially played many times before.

Of course, Universal's Frankenstein franchise was on its last legs by this time, and the Monster, which had been played with great sensitivity by Boris Karloff in the first three features, had been handed off to other horror-film stars in successive entries. So indifferent were their performances that for this go-round the producers decided not to cast an actor in the role at all, and stuntman Glenn Strange stumbled around under the makeup. He was actually better than Lugosi and Chaney in this role, but of course that isn't saying much.

The Frozen Ghost

Synopsis: Alex Gregor (Lon Chaney, Jr.) is a successful stage hypnotist who's got it all: sold-out live performances, a national radio show and a knockout assistant named Maura (Evelyn Ankers), to whom he is engaged. Performing as "The Great Gregor", his act is to first put Maura in a trance, then have her read the minds of astonished audience members.

One night a loud-mouthed drunk heckles Gregor, who gamely invites the man up to the stage. Gregor offers to hypnotize the guy and have him answer questions from the audience, just as Maura did. But the drunk is uncooperative and as Gregor stares into his eyes he angrily wishes the man were dead. Instantly the drunk keels over -- stone dead!

Gregor is mortified and turns himself over to the police. But the coroner states that the man was a heavy drinker with a heart condition, and the death is ruled the result of natural causes.

This does not satisfy the morose mentalist, who spends the night walking the streets, muttering "Death....death!" over and over.

So distraught is Gregor that he breaks off his engagement with Maura. His manager George Keene (Milburn Stone), sensing his meal ticket needs a little R&R, urges Gregor to stay at a relaxing place in a remote area for a while, and Gregor accepts.

Inexplicably, everyone agrees that there's no place in the world more relaxing than a wax museum, and Gregor moves into Madame Monet's, which is a sort of mansion with living quarters upstairs and wax sculptures on the main floor. He gets to know the people living there: owner Valerie Monet is assisted by brilliant wax sculptor and freelance kookenheimer Rudi (Martin Kosleck), and Valerie's general dogsbody Nina (Elena Verdugo).

As the weeks go by Gregor begins to feel more himself again, but seems only dimly aware that young Nina has developed a crush on him. Finding out about this, Valerie Monet, who had been nursing a crush of her own, is furious. She and Gregor argue, and Monet suddenly collapses to the floor. Hours later, Gregor finds himself standing down by the waterfront, with no idea of how he got there. He learns that Monet has vanished, and that her scarf is in his coat pocket....

Comments: Let Carrie Fisher complain about being overshadowed by her famous parents. I suspect that Lon Chaney, Jr. had a worse time of it.

The legendary silent film star Lon Chaney had often told his son Creighton that the young man wasn't cut out for a career in film. After Chaney pere's death, Creighton began pursuing film roles in defiance of his father's wishes, but success eluded him. It wasn't until he reluctantly adopted the stage name of Lon Chaney, Jr. that he began to get noticed.

One can only imagine how that felt, to want to prove his father wrong, to prove that he could make it on his own merits, and yet need his father to get a leg up in the business. I suspect that all the success Lon Chaney, Jr. enjoyed never quite took the sting out of having to trade on his father's name in order to make that success possible.

And maybe it's my imagination, but I feel I can see that frustration in the man's performances -- and a good example is tonight's second feature, The Frozen Ghost. So far, we've seen four of the six Inner Sanctum mysteries. Our second feature tonight is a repeat of The Frozen Ghost which, like all the entries in this film series, stars Lon Chaney, Jr.

Inner Sanctum Mysteries run along a fairly predictable groove. Chaney portrays a decent, put-upon fellow, who at some point is accused of murder. The central mystery is whether or not Chaney's character is guilty.

There are other common elements to the Inner Sanctum films*. The protagonist is always successful, and young women always find him attractive, though he seems rather oblivious to it. In two of the films he breaks off his engagement with his fiancee because he assumes she is only going forward with it reluctantly; in two others, he has blackouts during which the victim is murdered -- blackouts that occur without benefit of alcohol, a blow to the head, or a history of such episodes.

Such a convenient blackout features prominently in The Frozen Ghost.

The movie begins with Alex Gregor's mentalist act. Well, it isn't his mentalist act. Gregor is a hypnotist, not a mentalist. See, what he does is hypnotize Maura, then she does the mentalist act. But it turns out that he can hypnotize anyone, and have them read minds.

At one point Gregor says that he's had his mental powers all his life. But how would he know, if he had to hypnotize someone to find out?

Well, it's kind of complicated. This is too bad, because his stage show is broadcast to a national radio audience. The announcer stands at stage left, murmuring a lugubrious play-by-play into the microphone:

ANNOUNCER

Now Gregor the Great is leading a member up to the audience up to the stage....he's going to place the man into a hypnotic trance....

GREGOR

Sir, please sit down and try to relax.

DRUNK CONTESTANT

You ain't gonna hypnotize me, ya two-bit Houdini!

GREGOR

Hold still, please! The process can't work if you're agitated!

ANNOUNCER

Remember, folks, Gregor the Great can't read minds, he hypnotizes people so that they can read minds....

DRUNK CONTESTANT

This is all a bunch of hokum, if you ask me!

GREGOR

Nobody asked you!

ANNOUNCER

This member of the audience appears to be inebriated and uncooperative....

If I were sitting at home listening to this, I'd probably be yelling, "Martha, for gosh sakes, what is this junk you're listening to? Ain't Duffy's Tavern on yet?".**

After the obnoxious drunk dies, Gregor is certain that he's responsible -- so certain that even after the coroner rules that the death was due to natural causes, he wanders the streets all night, muttering to himself that he's a murderer.

This seems a bit much, even for someone in show business, and when he breaks off his engagement with Maura (he doesn't want her to marry a murderer out of a misplaced sense of obligation) there's no escaping it: the guy is a serious drama queen.

This is supposed to set us up for a big payoff later. Gregor is unsure if he is really a murderer, and then he has a blackout and Valerie Monet disappears. We're supposed to wonder if Gregor really did it.

But it doesn't make any sense to wonder this, because Gregor's m.o. has already been established: he kills with his mind and then turns himself in to the police, whether they believe him or not. If he killed Valerie Monet with his mind, why would he then drag her body down to the waterfront and dispose of it, then blot out the memory? Wouldn't his overweening sense of responsibility prevent him from doing such a thing?

Oh well, Gregor is really just doing double duty here. He's both the protagonist and the red herring. It had to be that way: the Inner Sanctum Mysteries were pretty low-budget affairs.

Neverthless, the much-maligned Lon Chaney, Jr. does a good job leading the cast, and Martin Kosleck steals every scene he's in as nutty wax sculptor Rudi. And as for Elena Verdugo -- well, this is her night, isn't it?

THE FROZEN GHOST hasn't been released on DVD, but VHS copies are available through Alibris

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*With the exception of Strange Confession, which was structured somewhat differently than the others.

**Implausible dialogue is simulated. You can hear Duffy's Tavern Thursday nights on this NBC Blue station. Consult your local listings for times and frequencies.

Interlude: Chiller

A fan of WPIX's creature feature Chiller created this -- it's a clever reconstruction of a mid-70's broadcast of the show, featuring The Crawling Eye (1958), a movie starring the supernaturally beautiful Janet Munro (oh, and Forrest Tucker was in it too).

The reconstruction comes complete with bumpers and commercials from the era.

Clever idea, eh? It's nicely done, too, but (if I may be a bit obsessive here) the commercials are from national ad campaigns which were unlikely to air late at night (at least here in the Twin Cities; perhaps in New York it was different). Horror Incorporated fans may recall spots for local advertisers -- TV dealers and waterbed retailers and heating & air conditioning installers.

If you remember any of them, let me know. For right now, I'll stick with the movies.

Saturday, September 6, 1970: The Great Impersonation (1935) / The Invisible Ray (1935)

The Great Impersonation

Synopsis: Austrian nobleman Baron Von Ragenstein (Edmund Lowe) has been banished to the wilds of Africa after killing a romantic rival in a duel . He is surprised to come upon his exact look-alike, Sir Edward Dominey, half-dead in the jungle.

Not only are the two identical in appearance, but their lives have gone on parallel trajectories: they had attended Oxford together, and Dominey has recently banished himself to Africa, after he too had been accused to killing a romantic rival. Now Dominey is a dissolute fellow, busily drinking himself to death. But a plan is already germinating in the Baron's mind.

It seems that since his exile, Von Ragenstein has been working for an international munitions manufacturer, one that wants to push the nations of Europe toward war. They have agents throughout mainland Europe and now need an agent in England, someone influential who can help ensure that the peace-loving Brits join the fray. Knowing that Sir Edward had once run for Parliament, Von Ragenstein decides to have Dominey killed and take his place in England.

Before long he shows up at Dominey Hall and easily passes himself off as Sir Edward. But his reception is a frosty one. Housekeeper Mrs. Unthank (Esther Dale) believes he killed her son Roger (Dwight Frye), though the body was never found. His wife Eleanor (Valerie Hobson) was traumatized by the alleged murder, which took place on their wedding day; moreover, she can still hear the ghost of Roger crying piteously in the night. Dominey Hall itself is in a state of decline and discord.

Everyone in the household is soon astonished by the "new man" that Sir Edward has become. He is no longer a drunken, boorish cad; he is courteous and attentive. He takes charge of the estate, engaging workmen to effect repairs on the dilapidated buildings and walls. He treats the servants with a decency they have not seen before. He even treats Eleanor well, showing her the affection that had always been denied her. Soon morale at Dominey Hall is high, and Eleanor is well on the road to recovery.

But the strange sobbing from Roger's ghost are still being heard in the house, and the Baron's lover Princess Stephanie (Wera Engels) visits Dominey Hall, and begins to suspect that he has fallen in love with Eleanor.

But then she learns that Edward Dominey wasn't killed in Africa, but escaped and might have made his way to England. So the question becomes: is this Von Ragenstein pretending to be Dominey, or Dominey pretending to be Von Ragenstein pretending to be Dominey?

Comments: I'm not entirely sure that The Great Impersonation can rightly be called a horror movie. Just what kind of movie we're dealing with is hard to pin down. Perhaps it's more easily defined by what kind of movie it isn't: it isn't a political thriller, isn't a Victorian melodrama, isn't a haunted-house film, isn't a propaganda film, and isn't a romance.

But like two earlier Horror Incorporated entries, The Black Room and The Man Who Lived Twice, The Great Impersonation cleverly plays with the idea of identity. By the end of the picture we find that we didn't know who Edward Dominey was any more than we knew who Von Ragenstein was. And unusually for a movie of this era, the answer is less pat than it first appeared.

After all, the man who ends up living in Dominey Hall couldn't really be Edward Dominey, the blue-blood drunk that everyone back home had learned to despise. Even if he had somehow managed to escape his captors and return to England, he would still be the same man he was -- the same moral coward who tormented his wife into the madhouse, who lied and cheated his way into exile, the same heel who decided once in Africa that the highball glass was the only thing worth living for.

Nor could he really be Baron Von Ragenstein, the cold-blooded and morally bankrupt shill for a crooked arms dealer, the man who would -- literally -- kill for the chance to get sent back to Europe.

Somehow, we have wound up with an amalgamation of the two; the doppelgangers have fused into one man, more than the sum of their parts. This is never explicitly stated; rather, the conclusion offers a daffy switcheroo that can't be taken seriously. It's only on reflection -- walking home from the theater, let's say -- that the real significance of The Great Impersonation sinks in.

Edmund Lowe is probably best known for playing the title role in Chandu the Magician (1932) and he specialized in playing smug, upper-crust types. I've written admiringly about Valerie Hobson's performances in two other movies released the same year as The Great Impersonation: Bride of Frankenstein (1935) and Werewolf of London (1935); she is much more naturalistic than her contemporaries and she is a joy to watch here.

THE GREAT IMPERSONATION is available through Satellite Media Productions.

The Invisible Ray Synopsis: Renowned scientist Janos Rukh (Boris Karloff) demonstrates his newest discovery to a disbelieving group of savants, including Dr. Felix Benet (Bela Lugosi). In a somewhat surreal and complicated sequence, he reveals that all light and sound waves are preserved in space and time, and that looking back far enough he can see the moment millions of years ago in which a meteor containing an ultra-rare element called Radium X fell in southwestern Africa.

Radium X, as the name implies, is a souped-up form of radioactive material, possessing great potential for both healing and destruction. Somewhat baffled but convinced by his demonstration, the scientists join Rukh on an expedition to recover the meteorite. In Africa, Rukh works obsessively to unlock the secrets of Radium X.

Meanwhile, Rukh's beautiful young wife Diana (Frances Drake) begins to fall in love with another man on the expedition (Frank Lawton). Most of the party returns to Europe. Dr. Benet quickly discovers that Radium X, applied properly, can cure any physical ailment, and he uses it to heal the sick, though he assiduously credits Dr. Rukh with the element's discovery.

When Rukh returns home he learns of his wife's infidelity and of his rivals building new careers on his work. After receiving an accidental overdose of Radium X, Rukh discovers that his skin glows in the dark and that his touch can kill.

The overdose also seems to have left him deranged, and he decides to murder all those whom he believes have betrayed him, starting with the scientists who accompanied him on the expedition....

Comments: When I first embarked on the Horror Incorporated Project, I knew there would be days like this. I knew there would be repeat broadcasts of movies, and I knew that some of the movies would be clunkers. And I spent some time thinking about how to handle that.

My pledge to you (well, you weren't there, but it was to you) was to watch every movie on the schedule, in order, just as if I was watching Horror Incorporated each week. Didn't matter if I'd seen the movie before. I wouldn't cheat and throw a note up saying, yep, saw this on December 20 -- though of course I did, and you can read the review here.

I decided I'd try to have something new to say about repeated films, try to find some angle I hadn't examined before. And so far, I've been able to keep that up. But I am sorry to say that The Invisible Ray didn't wear very well on a second viewing, and I found it difficult to say anything new. So instead, I decided to build a drinking game around the alleged romance between Frances Drake and Frank Lawton, two of the most unconvincing screen lovers you are likely to come across.

But even in this modest goal I was frustrated. There wasn't a catchphrase repeated often enough to warrant a drinking game, but I did find myself seeing everything Diana said as a double entendre. This might be due to the faintly suggestive tone she used to deliver every line, or it might be that I just have a dirty mind.

Well, why not both? Here's Diana and Ronald, witnessing the great scientists preparing to unlock the mysteries of the universe:

Ronald

All this makes a man like me feel quite small and useless.

Diana

Oh, but you've entered uncharted places too!

[That's what she said!]

And here's Diana returning to her tent in the jungle:

Diana

Bring me three boys for a safari!

[That's what she said!]

This dreary romantic subplot mostly takes place during the movie's Africa-based second act. But on this viewing I must admit that Diana and Ronald do step aside in the lively third act, which takes place in Paris and involves a glow-in-the-dark Boris Karloff taking loony revenge on everyone whom he thinks has betrayed him -- which is, of course, just about everyone. Karloff certainly isn't afraid to go over the top in this effort, and his death scene -- where he literally disintegrates in midair -- is quite spectacular.

If I ever receive a lethal dose of radium X and find that I can both glow in the dark and kill with a touch of my hand, I'll keep asking myself, What would Boris Karloff do? And then I'll do that. Just letting you know in advance.

THE INVISIBLE RAY can be found on the Universal DVD set The Bela Lugosi Collection. It's available on Amazon.