A Study in Classic Horror- THE BLACK CAT (1934)

It’s amazing that a film can be so enjoyable, yet so incoherent. Plot-wise, it’s all over the place, but it’s saved by the sublime acting of Boris Karloff and the imposing presence of Bela Lugosi.

I’ll see if I can get it all straight. Lugosi is Dr. Vitus Werdegast, who has just been released from a World War I prison camp, and is on his way to the home of Hjalmar Poelzig (Karloff), whose actions during the war resulted in the deaths of many men as well as Werdegast’s imprisonment. The purpose of Werdegast’s visit is revenge, and to learn the fate of the wife and daughter he left behind. During his journey, Dr. Werdegast encounters a pair of honeymooning Americans played by David Manners and Jacqueline Wells. The three end up on an ill-fated bus trip that results in them all staying in Poelzig’s imposing mansion, so that the young bride can recover from injuries sustained when the bus crashed. Werdegast learns that his wife has died (possibly murdered by Poelzig) and that his daughter has subsequently become Poelzig’s bride. Oh, and apparently Poelzig is also the leader of a satanic cult, and Werdegast is afraid of cats.

Yes, it’s all a bit convoluted, but somehow none of that matters, because at the center of it all Karloff and Lugosi make wonderful adversaries. The way they toy with each other’s emotions and psyche becomes a waltz of intimidation. Manners and Wells seem to only be there to get into danger as the battle escalates. In fact Wells’ soul purpose is apparently to scream and be rescued. In another era this film could have been just the two men and a chessboard. The two leads are all it really needs.

Of course there are a few other elements that make The Black Cat stand out. There’s a gruesome, though mostly left to the imagination, torture scene at the end, and there’s Poelzig’s rather perverse inclination for collecting the corpses of beautiful women (including Werdegast’s wife) in glass cases. Nice components, but they’re hastily assembled. Like The Mummy, the movie’s greatest assets are its stars.

And if you’ve never read the Edgar Allan Poe story that lends its name to the film, don’t worry about spoilers. Of the three Poe adaptations I’ve viewed so far, this one bears the least resemblance to its source material. In fact, I think the only reason Lugosi’s character has a fear of cats is to justify the title.

This week’s supporting features:

Tom and Jerry in The Midnight Snack (1941)

The Our Gang short The Pooch (1932)

Next time:

She-Wolf of London (1946) starring June Lockhart, Don Porter, Sara Haden, and Jan Wiley

A Study in Classic Horror- MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE (1932)

As much fun as I’m having watch these old classics, I have to admit it’s a lot harder to be as frightened by them as I might have been when I was eight. I have been wishing for one of those moments when I am held completely in suspense as the actions on the screen unfold. I didn’t quite get there yet with Murders in the Rue Morgue, but it was the first time I found elements of the film truly disturbing.

This film may have more in common with its source material than the other recently-viewed Poe adaptation, (1935’s The Raven) but the resemblance is largely superficial. Unlike the short story, the film does away with the idea of building up to the revelation of the killer in favor of showing us the villainous machinations that lead up to the murders.

Bela Lugosi’s Dr. Mirakle is a madman who flaunts his pre-Darwin evolutionary theories while exhibiting his gorilla, Erik, in a travelling carnival. For reason known only to him, he dreams of creating a gorilla / human hybrid, and he attempts to reach his goal by kidnapping women and injecting them with Erik’s blood. In quite a brutal scene, a woman is strung up by her arms as Mirakle observes the effects of the gorilla blood on her system; he screams at her for disturbing his studies by moaning and pain, and when she dies he briefly shows something resembling remorse by making the sign of the cross before summoning his servant to “get rid of it” by dumping her into the river. Unsettling to watch, and according to the trivia page for the film's imdb entry, much of the original footage was censored. Later on, knowing what Mirakle is capable of makes his creepy stalking of the lovely Camille, the girl he believes will be the perfect match for Erik’s blood, all the more menacing.

Another riveting performance by Lugosi in downright demonic hair and make-up and some stunning art direction and camera work make it easy to overlook the film’s less impressive elements. Sidney Fox’s charming portrayal of Camille L'Espanaye is awkwardly offset by Leon Ames’ (billed as Leon Waycoff) dull take on Pierre Dupin. (Dupin, a man of Holmes-like reasoning in Poe’s story, is here a student with a knack for putting two and two together.) Erik, the gorilla, is clearly played by a costumed actor in the wideshots and by a chimpanzee in close-up. (In fact, the ape in the original story is an orangutan.) Yet the film is always visually impressive with expressionistic sets and frightening scenes played out in nightmarish shadow. However, there was one scene where the artful camera work left me feeling a bit queasy and it had nothing to do with mad scientists or killer apes. At a picnic where Pierre pushes Camille on a swing, the camera stays with her, so that the background swings in and out of frame while Camille stays in focus. (But my rum and Coke might be more to blame for the disorientation than the camera work.)

Lugosi makes a great madman, but I hope somewhere in my list of film he gets to play someone likable as Boris Karloff finally got to do in Night Key. He got to play sympathetic in his brief role in The Wolf Man, and I believe we’ll see him in more sympathetic roles in the later Frankenstein films, but just once, I’d like to see him do heroic.

This week’s supporting features:

Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam in Hare Trigger (1945)

The Our Gang short Shivering Shakespeare (1930)

I’m taking next week off for my wedding anniversary, the following week’s film will be:

The Phantom of the Opera (1925) starring Lon Chaney and Mary Philbin

A Study in Classic Horror - THE RAVEN (1935)

I enjoy seeing clichés before they became clichés. The Raven is a classic take on the Mad Doctor with a house full of secret rooms and elaborate torture devices, and to the modern viewer a lot of it may seem old hat, but personally I find it great fun to see early versions of what would go on to become classic motifs. We've got Edgar Allan Poe's swinging pendulum, a room where the walls close in and the actually rather unusual entire bedroom on an elevator platform. The film claims to be inspired by Poe's poem The Raven but the connection to that poem seems tenuous at best. The poem is quoted, (though I found it surprising that nary a "Nevermore" is heard) the sharpened descending pendulum is an obvious Poe reference and Bela Lugosi's Dr. Richard Vollin is a rather obsessed Poe aficionado, but truthfully the Poe references seem like an excuse to justify the film's title. I suppose there's a bit of Poe's characters in Dr. Vollin; it's easy to imagine him sealing an enemy behind a brick wall, but the film is far more a product of its own era than Poe's.

I've read that Lugosi was known for throwing himself wholeheartedly into his characters and Vollin is a prime example of that. Here's a man whose ego must be stroked before he saves a woman's life; he then develops an unhealthy obsession with her then attempts to destroy her and her loved ones when he can't have her. Though he may nibble at the scenery a bit, he's a delight to watch; Lugosi plays Vollin as charming one minute, maniacal the next and arrogant throughout. Boris Karloff may have received top billing, but Lugosi is clearly the star in this outing.

Which is not to take anything away from Karloff's performance. Karloff's Edmond Bateman is an understated counterpart to Lugosi's character. Almost a scaled down version of Frankenstein's monster, Bateman, despite his violent history is the character who evokes our sympathy providing the tragic element that is so often a part of the Universal canon. Even though he is made up to look as if half of his face is paralyzed for most of the film, this face, far less obscured that the Creature, gives us a more raw look at the emotions that made us feel for his brutal but sad character in the Frankenstein films.

A few words about the supporting cast: Jean and Jerry, the young lovers and Jean's father as played by Irene Ware, Lester Matthews and Samuel S. Hinds respectively are rather generic. But there's a third tier of characters played by Spencer Charters, Inez Courtney, Ian Wolfe and Maidel Turner who come in to provide some laughter to this black comedy as extra invitees to Dr. Vollin's party. (Presumably he wanted an audience for his grand guignol.) They provide a nice comedic touch and even one or two gags that might have worked just as easily in an Abbott and Costello film.

Rounding out this week's bill:

The Night Watchman, the 1938 Merrie Melodies cartoon and directorial debut of Chuck Jones

The Our Gang short Railroadin' (1929)

Next week's film:

Night Key starring Boris Karloff, Warren Hull, Jean Rogers and Alan Baxter