A Study in Classic Horror- THE INVISIBLE MAN RETURNS (1940)

As far as sequels go, The Invisible Man Returns is fairly satisfying. It may not be as a strong a film as Bride of Frankenstein, but it certainly has more going for it than Revenge of the Creature. It also does a nice job of revisiting the elements of its predecessor without being too repetitive.

This time around the invisible man in question is the victim rather than the aggressor.  Geoffrey Radcliffe (Vincent Price) has been wrongly imprisoned for the murder of his brother. His friend Frank Griffin (John Sutton) injects him with the invisibility serum invented by his brother Jack (the title character of the first movie) allowing him to escape, thus giving him the opportunity to track down the real murderer and clear his name. Things get complicated as the maddening side effects of the formula begin to manifest in Geoffrey.  The story becomes a race as Frank tries to discover a cure, while Geoffrey’s fiancée Helen (Nan Grey) tries to keep him from going over the edge as he attempts to confront the man he believes to be the real killer, Richard Cobb (Cedric Hardwicke). Hot on his heels is savvy Scotland Yard Inspector Sampson (Cecil Kellaway) who remembers the events of the original Griffin case all too well.

Though the storyline has some freshness, it still appears the filmmakers couldn’t resist bringing back some familiar plot elements of the original. Hardwicke and Grey’s characters seem like echoes of those played by William Harrigan and Gloria Stuart previously. But this is a minor quibble and easily overlooked in light of the new special effects tricks learned between movies.

I was a little curious about Vincent Price’s voice in this film. Price had one of the most recognizable voices in movie history, but here, in what is essentially a vocal performance, he doesn’t quite sound like himself. Granted this is one of his earlier performances, but he’s not that much younger than he was in some of his other notable roles. I suspect it was a conscious choice either on his part or the director’s; I just wonder what the motivation was. Only in a scene where Geoffrey seems to really be going off the deep in does Price’s familiar cackle sneak in.

Supporting features:

The Merrie Melodies cartoon Russian Rhapsody (1944)

The Our Gang short Fish Hooky (1933)

Next time:
The Man Who Laughs (1928) starring Conrad Veidt and Mary Philbin

We Are ALL Geeks!

For those of you who don't know I work in the exit shop of a theme park ride that sells those photos they take of you at key moments of the ride. A couple of weeks ago, I had a customer buying a photo who informed me that she was only buying it because of her shirt. I glanced down and saw that you could clearly see "Carolina" across the front of the shirt. My own thought was "you have the shirt, why especially do you need this picture of the shirt?, but hey, if you're happy..." We finished the transaction, I handed her her photo, and as she turned to leave she said "Go Gamecocks!" and departed. Now I'm not a sports fan in the slightest, but I do know that the Gamecocks are a collegiate football team in South Carolina, still I thought this was an odd way to end a brief conversation with someone you've never met before. Obviously this is a person who invests a great deal of her enthusiasm into her sports team, but I wondered what her reaction would be to a group of fans at a sci-fi convention dressed as Klingons or Imperial Stormtroopers. Would she stare in baffled amazement? Would she sneer with superiority and label them "geeks"? I wonder does, she realize that she is also, in fact, a geek? I'm sure she doesn't label herself as such, she's a "sports fan", but what is a sports fan, but someone who geeks on sports? I actually get a glimpse at what it looks like when these two aspects of fandom intermingle almost every year at Dragon Con in Atlanta, Georgia when the convention and a big bowl game both fall on Labor Day weekend. It's an odd sight, but somehow they co-exist in the same space for a few hours. There is even a little overlap. The truth is we all geek on something. I can't say I have ever witnessed a guy in a Jedi robe say "May the Force be with you" to a waitress who's just taken his order, but I have seen comic fans engage in behavior that is just as awkward to witness in public, as that of the Gamecocks lady.
I was in another position once where I volunteered to work a table at a convention for a pair of local museums who each had science-fiction themed exhibits. Some of the museum personnel were new to the con experience and were behaving as if they'd been deposited in the middle of a leper colony. I found myself in the position of having to defend fandom in general, which I'll admit was challenging at times, particularly with the guy in the poorly constructed costume who carried a picture of the character he dressed as to hand out so you could see what he was really going for. I tried to point out that they weren't just "being weird", they were exhibiting their individuality, their creativity and their skills. Yet for all my efforts these two girls still left that day still feeling they were somehow superior to all of the "geeks" they had witnessed, despite the fact that one of them became really excited when she got a picture of the back of Billy Dee Williams' head, or that another was at extreme sport competitions with boyfriend every other weekend. (Celebrity geek. Extreme sports geek.)
I'm not trying to claim that we pop-culture geeks are necessarily better than any other kind of geek, although I could do without those situations at parties where other guys think the only way to initiate a conversation with other males is to mention the latest athletic competition. It just amazes me that the different groups are unable to recognize their similarities. I mean which is geekier? The shirtless beer-gutted guy painted head-to-toe in his team colors, or the guy in the Superman costume with a decidedly un-Supermanish physique? Tough call; let's put them in a room and let them debate. I'm sure it would be more entertaining than any of the current Republican debates.

A Study in Classic Horror- BLACK FRIDAY (1940)

Yes, I confess. I watched this on Black Friday. I couldn’t resist, but I think it’s a much better way to spend the day after Thanksgiving than braving the stores.

Yet again, this is a film that gets lumped in with the many horror films to star Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi, but in this case it’s more of a crime thriller with some Jekyll-and-Hyde-type science-fiction elements. In fact, even though those giants of the horror genre get top billing, the standout performance is really that of Stanley Ridges.

Karloff plays Dr. Ernest Sovac, who, when his friend Professor George Kingsley (Ridges), receives a deadly brain injury in an accident, saves his life by transplanting part of the brain of gangster Red Cannon, another victim in the accident, into Kingsley’s skull. Sovac’s intentions are good initially, but when he learns that Red had a hidden fortune, greed sets in, and he begins tampering with Kingsley’s mind to bring the Cannon personality to the forefront, hoping he can learn the whereabouts of the missing loot.

Karloff turns in another good performance, as a much more subdued and benign mad scientist than we’ve been seeing. Lugosi’s role, I’m afraid, is little more than a glorified cameo, and here’s where things get a little odd behind the scenes. Apparently, Karloff was originally tapped to play Kingsley and Cannon, while Lugosi would have played Dr. Sovac. Rumor has it that Karloff didn’t feel he was up to the duality of the role, so he took on Sovac and Lugosi ended up in the much smaller part of Eric Marnay, the second in command of Cannon’s gang. In comes Ridges who plays the duality so completely I admit it took some time for me to realize the two very different personalities were not played by separate actors. Costume and make-up helped accent the difference, but a lot of the credit goes to Ridges’ vocal work and the way he carried himself physically. This could have ended up a entirely different film had the original casting remained intact. I have to wonder about if the rumor is true about Karloff’s decision. I’ve seen him play quite a diverse range of characters, yet similarly in Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Karloff plays only Jekyll while another actor plays Hyde. Ridges holds his own with Karloff quite well. Perhaps if he’d lived longer he would have achieved notoriety on par with that of his costars.

One other interesting thing that went on behind the scenes: in what was probably a publicity stunt, Bela Lugosi supposedly underwent hypnosis for a scene in which he appears to suffocate. This may have been a ploy to make up for the fact that his role was so small despite his billing. You can see how it was used to promote the film in the trailer from my last entry.

Overall, I enjoyed it, though the brain transplant plot device did severely challenged my suspension of disbelief, but as such pseudo-science is common in these movies, it was easy to forgive.

This week’s supporting features:

Goofy in Tennis Racquet (1944)

The Our Gang short Readin’ and Writin’ (1932)

I’m taking a break for the holidays. I should be back on track by mid-January, returning with:

Revenge of the Creature (1955) starring John Agar, Lori Nelson, Ricou Browning, and Tom Hennesy

A Study in Classic Horror- THE INVISIBLE MAN (1933)

I never participated in that line at The Rocky Horror Picture Show when the lips would sing “Claude Rains was the Invisible Man” and the audience would shout, “Who’s Claude Rains?” Ignoring that the answer was right there in the song, of course I knew damn well who Claude Rains was. The Invisible Man was, of course, just the tip of the iceberg for Rains, who appeared in many classics over his career, but this was his first major role, and the one that made him famous, which is interesting considering his face is only seen for about twenty seconds.

Jack Griffin is quite a contrast from Rains’ other roles too. There’s usually a level of charm in a Claude Rains character, just look at the often unscrupulous yet always likable Captain Renault in Casablanca, arguably his other most famous role, but there’s little to like about this self-serving invisible man with an inflated sense of importance. But it’s a memorable performance for such an unlikable character. He lashes out at people with little provocation and embarks on a reign of terror with an air of pure glee.

At least in the film, his madness can be blamed on the ingredient monocane in his invisibility formula; in the novel, his egotism is a constant that the formula merely intensifies. Yet, The Invisible Man is a far more accurate reflection of its literary source than Frankenstein or Dracula. Yes, it has a romantic subplot injected into it, some of the novel’s characters are absent, and it has a very different climax, but a lot of the elements of the book are still there.

In the end however, I’d say this film is more Whale than Wells. One of director James Whale’s trademarks was his dark sense of humor. There’s plenty of humor simply in the casting of the wonderful Una O’Connor who plays the landlady at the inn where Griffin takes up residence, (and who gets an even bigger and funnier role later on in Bride of Frankenstein), and more humor can be found as Griffin dispatches one-liners when he victimizes innocent villagers, but it’s Whale’s juxtaposition of slapstick and horror that really struck a chord with me. Take for example Griffin’s murder of a policeman that is preceded by his throwing ink in the man’s face resulting in an Oliver Hardy-esque take to the camera.

There are many great performances by character actors in small roles too numerous to mention, though I must give props to E. E. Clive as Constable Jaffers. Henry Travers, who is probably best known as the angel Clarence in It’s a Wonderful Life is enjoyable as Dr. Cranley, but William Harrigan is rather dull as Dr. Kemp. And I’m afraid even Gloria Stuart’s role as Griffin’s love interest, Flora, leaves something to be desired. It may not be her fault, as I said, the romantic subplot seems like it’s only there to fill an obligatory niche, and I feel the need to go easy on Miss Stuart, as I was somewhat irritated last year when she passed away and headlines could only refer to her as the “Titanic actress” as if the rest of her 72 year career was non-existent.

Rounding out the things that make this movie special are John P. Fulton’s special effects. Even today those scenes where Griffin removes his bandages to reveal nothing underneath are pretty startling. I’m sure they incited many gasps in the 1930s.

Something else that sets the Invisible Man series apart from the Frankenstein and Dracula films is that the author of the source material was around to see it. I’m not sure if H. G. Wells’ reaction to the movies is documented, but I’d be very interested in what he thought of seeing his late 19th Century story, brought into the age of automobiles and radios.

This week’s supporting features:

Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck in Ali Baba Bunny (1957)

The Our Gang short Bargain Day (1931) featuring the final appearance of Jackie Cooper in the series.

Next week I go to a theatrical screening of Dracula (1931), I’ll post my entry on that sometime the following weekend. If you’re going to be in Central Florida on October 8, stop by the Enzian in Maitland and join me.

A Study in Classic Horror- THE INVISIBLE RAY (1936)

I’m sure if you come into this movie knowing as little about it as I did, you won’t get anything close to the plot you imagined from the title. I pictured a ray that rendered people or objects invisible. I’m still not entirely sure what the ray is that the title refers to. The posters seem to suggest it has something to do with the powers Boris Karloff’s character acquires, but posters have been misleading before. (See my entry on Night Key.)

What we actually have here is a rather sad melodrama entangled with science-fiction. Boris Karloff is Dr. Janos Rukh, a brilliant scientist who (with the help of some 1930s movie pseudo-science) proves that a meteor struck Africa millions of years ago leaving a deposit of an unknown element that will revolutionize both physical and medical science. Unfortunately, his initial exposure to it not only causes him to glow in the dark, but also makes his skin deadly to whoever else touches him. Thanks to renowned physician Felix Benet (played by Bela Lugosi) the physical attributes of his condition can be held back, but Benet can do nothing to prevent the effects on Rukh’s mind.

What follows is a tragic descent into madness. The element, Radium X, is refined and through the work of Rukh, Benet and their colleagues becomes everything they’d hoped it would be. However, the expedition to Africa has caused Rukh’s marriage to crumble, and he feels that he is not receiving his due from the other scientists for his discovery despite being awarded the Nobel Prize. His madness leads him to blame all of his misfortunes, both real and imagined, on the rest of the expedition and he decides to use his deadly powers to enact his revenge.

As is often the case, there is a romantic subplot, but this time it’s at the cost of Rukh’s marriage. Frances Drake, as Diane Rukh, really appears devoted to her husband, but events in Africa lead her to believe he no longer cares for her, and she runs to the arms of Frank Lawton as Ronald Drake. All just part of the spiral that Dr. Rukh’s life goes into. At the beginning he seems to have a lot going for him, and slowly he begins to lose it all, and more to due to happenstance than to his own faults. Very sad.

While essentially enjoyable, The Invisible Ray is also a mixed bag. It opens in a classic stylized Universal mansion complete with a laboratory and an observatory; the middle section, set in Africa, is filled with politically incorrect natives and wealthy Brits who whine about the weather and fancy themselves great white hunters, and the final act is the exploits of a serial killer in the streets of Paris. It could have been a mess, but once again the lead performances of Karloff and Lugosi manage to tie it together. Despite his eventual villainy, Karloff is easy to sympathize with, and Lugosi is a welcome surprise in a more heroic role for a change. The two have a wonderful chemistry that manages to keep the film’s lesser performances from dragging it down.

Now I find myself wondering, and I think I already know the answer, as they so often seem romantically motivated, will Boris or Bela ever get the girl?

This week’s supporting features:

Goofy in Goofy and Wilbur (1939)

The Our Gang short Helping Grandma (1931)

I’ll be taking a break for a bit now as I prepare for our big vacation, which includes my annual trip to Dragon*Con in Atlanta, Georgia (See you there!). I’ll be back the weekend of September 16 with:

Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer, Boris Karloff (1949) starring Bud Abbott, Lou Costello and Boris Karloff

A Study in Classic Horror- CAPTIVE WILD WOMAN (1943)

Captive Wild Woman is the first of three films featuring Paula Dupree, the Ape Woman, and mainly because of availability, the only one I’ll be viewing in my project. A scientist played by John Carradine grafts some glands and a cerebrum from unwilling human donors into the body of a stolen female circus gorilla. The operation transforms her into a beautiful woman played by Acquanetta. He then reintroduces her as his patient at the circus where she demonstrates a strange influence over other animals, which makes her a natural assistant for their big cat act. This results in a romantic trial between her, the cats’ tamer and his fiancée (Milburn Stone and Evelyn Ankers), and Paula’s fury not only makes her homicidal, but also causes her to revert back to ape form.

I don’t have much to say other than this brief synopsis, because I had a hard time enjoying this one. As far as story goes, a sort of female Wolf Man in reverse, it’s not bad, although it ends abruptly and leaves some things unresolved. The cast does a fine job, with, perhaps, the exception of Milburn Stone, who I had a hard time buying as a rugged animal trainer. It’s just that I found it difficult to watch what was deemed acceptable animal treatment in the 1930s and 40s. There’s a lot of stock footage of lions and tigers being kept in small cages, and also being whipped for the purpose of entertainment. I may have gone to the circus a lot when I was a child, but I’m just not interested in seeing that sort of thing any more. I’d rather see wild animals simply be wild, rather than watch someone flaunting his bravado by making them do tricks. Normally, I can separate my feelings and opinions and watch something for what it is, but in this case my enjoyment was marred by my sympathy for the animals.

I often forgive older works of art for not being in sync with today’s mindset, and I forgive this one as well, but in this case, it doesn’t make it any easier for me to look at.

This week’s supporting features:

Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam in Mutiny on the Bunny (1950)

The Our Gang short A Tough Winter (1930) which, speaking of older sensibilities, featured the now-often discussed African-American performer Stepin Fetchit.

Next week’s film:

Werewolf of London (1935) starring Henry Hull, Warner Oland and Valerie Hobson

A Study in Classic Horror - NIGHT KEY (1937)

What I create, I can destroy.

It sounds a bit ominous, doesn't it? As if poor David Mallory has finally been pushed over the edge, but Boris Karloff is actually playing the hero for a change.

Night Key is the first film I'm likely to be called out on in my study. No, it's definitely not a horror film and it just barely qualifies as science fiction. When I scanned the index of Michael Mallory's book on Universal horror I found that it's not even mentioned. In fact I guess it only made my list because of its inclusion in the Boris Karloff Collection DVD set, the cover of which promises "The Master of Horror in His Most Frightening Roles!" Still I'm glad it made the list because it's a film that any fan of Karloff and classic horror should take a look at if they'd like to see the range that Boris Karloff had.

An early take on the Little Man vs. Big Business motif, Night Key is the story of inventor David Mallory, who created a near flawless security system only to have the patent stolen from him by Steven Ranger, his former rival for his late wife. Twenty years later, Mallory invents a new system that will render the previous one obsolete, but Ranger connives with a crooked lawyer to lure Mallory into signing over the rights to the new system with no intention of actually implementing it. But Mallory has also invented a device that can disrupt the old system, and with the aid of a smalltime hood named Petty Louie, sets off on a gleeful spree of breaking and entering to demonstrate to Ranger just how valuable his ingenuity is to this business equation, always leaving his calling card: "What I create, I can destroy -Night Key".

I warmed to Karloff's Mallory the second I saw him. His first moment of screen time features him tinkering with his new invention with a look of pure joy on his face, as if he creates and perfects for the pleasure in it rather than out of greed. Yes, he'd like to make money off of his invention, after all he's slowly going blind and shares a tiny apartment with a daughter who's stuck in a dead-end job, but the good his invention will do is just as important to him. His moral lapse into breaking and entering is strictly to teach the greedy a lesson. He never steals from the burgled businesses. And when a local crime syndicate takes notice of his escapades and begins to use him for more nefarious purposes, he does his best to sound the alarm, even when that bring him and his daughter under threat.

Karloff is charming as Mallory. It really is refreshing to see him free of heavy prosthetics playing an outright likable, good humored yet still sympathetic character; a scientist, but not a mad one. At the time this was made, Universal was considering phasing out horror, Karloff was probably cast mainly out of contractual obligations, and despite my affection for the old fright flicks, I wonder what else we might have seen from Karloff had the genre not seen a resurgence at the studio. It's a pity we can never revisit Karloff's stage roles.

A rather good supporting cast: again the compulsory young lovers don't offer a lot to the story, but Jean Arthur as Mallory's daughter Joan and Warren Hull as a hotshot security employee do well with the material at hand. Samuel S. Hinds as Steven Ranger has a bit more dimension than he did in last week's outing The Raven. The group of thugs led by Alan Baxter as "The Kid", while well played, are a prime example of how screen criminals have changed over the years, it's hard to watch them and not think of Rocky and Mugsy of Looney Tunes fame. Last but not least, we have Hobart Cavanaugh as Petty Louie, the small time hood with the heart of gold, who delivers the second-most memorable performance in the film as its comic relief.

In defense of its inclusion here, you can certainly see attempts have been made to sell it as a horror film, and I guess those attempts resonate to this day, if the aforementioned box set can be used as an example. Take a look at these other promotional posters, both using pictures of Karloff from other films. The second one makes a blatantly erroneous promise of "Murder in a Wax Museum". Yet I'm grateful, for without those misleadings I might never have seen it; it may not be a horror film, but I highly recommend it to the classic horror aficionado.

Rounding out this week's bill:

Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam in 14 Carrot Rabbit (1952)

The Our Gang short Lazy Days (1929)

I'll be taking a break next week. Got a wedding to go to. Then it's a Friday the 13th weekend with:

Paul Leni's The Cat and the Canary (1927) starring Laura LaPlante, Creighton Hale and Forrest Stanley