Fri 20 Nov 2009
Dan Stumpf Reviews Three More Pre-Halloween Movies.
Posted by Steve under Horror movies , Reviews[4] Comments
● House of Frankenstein. Universal Pictures, 1944. Boris Karloff, Lon Chaney, John Carradine, Anne Gwynne, Peter Coe, Lionel Atwill, George Zucco, Elena Verdugo. Story by Curt Siodmak. Director: Erle C. Kenton.
● House of Dracula. Universal Pictures, 1945. Lon Chaney, John Carradine, Martha O’Driscoll, Lionel Atwill, Onslow Stevens. Director: Erle C. Kenton.
● Bride of the Gorilla. Realart Pictures, 1951. Barbara Payton, Lon Chaney, Raymond Burr, Tom Conway, Paul Cavanagh, Gisela Werbisek. Screenwriter and director: Curt Siodmak.
Following The Body Snatcher (reviewed here ) came House of Frankenstein / Dracula, the sad swan songs of the Monster Movie heyday, offering the Frankenstein monster, Dracula and the Wolfman, with Mad Scientists and Hunchbacks tossed in for good measure.
These movies are two of my guilty pleasures; I know in my head they’re ridiculous, but it thrills my heart to see all the old cliches — and I mean all of them — treated respectfully one last time.
As for Bride of the Gorilla, it shows more intelligence than you’d expect to find in a movie called Bride of the Gorilla.
Written and directed by Curt Siodmak, it offers Raymond Burr as a virile man-about-jungle who kills his mistress’s husband and finds himself the subject of a jungle-movie curse with predictable echoes of The Wolf Man (also written by Siodmak).
One interesting twist is that Burr gets cursed not because he killed a man, but because he toyed with the affections of a local girl. The other twist is … well, I won’t reveal it except to say that this tatty little quickie repays careful viewing.
November 20th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
I agree about these three ‘guilty pleasures.’ The two House films are fun, Frankenstein just a group of vignettes, but Dracula at least a full blown story, and some nice touches. A shame Carradine didn’t get to do Drac in a better film. The hunchbacked nurse is a character that could have come from one of the classic early Universal horror films.
Bride is, as you say, an odd little film, almost Woolrichian. The narration by Chaney is poetic at times, and though there is a certain cheesy cheap feel to it at the same time there is an undercurrent of something different. Something better. It’s odd, with strangely compelling performances, and a curious feeling that there is more to it than you can put your finger on. Burr is actually quite good in a role that calls for a little more than the usual villainy.
November 21st, 2009 at 5:13 am
I loved those House films when I was a kid in the 1970s. Agree about Carradine. Also the Abbot and Costello one.
Bride of the Gorilla I never heard of. Good people (Tom Conway too), awful title, sounds like Ed Wood. How about “Curse of the Gorilla”? Or maybe there’s a salacious quality to “Bride of the Gorilla” that just couldn’t be passed on.
November 21st, 2009 at 9:36 am
I’m going to have to admit that I’ve seen none of the three, although I may have them all on tape. If they ever played on TCM, then I know I have.
While cleaning out the half of the garage that Judy would like to park her car in this winter, and yes I know that that particular deadline is rapidly approaching, I’ve come across boxes and boxes of home-made tapes, made up to 10 or more years ago, each with 3 or 4 movies on them. Never watched, never catalogued.
How sad is that?
PS. They’ve only been in the garage since spring — before that they were scattered all over the house — and it was a cool summer, so they play fine. They do have to be moved, though, but where?
November 21st, 2009 at 4:24 pm
Steve,
Send’em to me and I’ll… hmm, well, I’ll do something with them, maybe… sometime….