Mark of the Vampire (1935)

Mark of the Vampire is a 1935 MGM horror movie (yes, MGM did make a few horror movies in the 30s) directed by Tod Browning. And it’s a vampire movie starring Bela Lugosi. In this movie he’s Count Mora rather than Count Dracula (the name change being necessitated by the fact that Universal were in a mood to sue anybody who dared to use the name Dracula).

Mark of the Vampire provokes violently mixed reactions among horror fans, the main reason being a certain plot twist, but I won’t say any more for fear of revealing spoilers.

My main reservation about this movie has always been based on the presence of Lionel Barrymore in the cast. In fact he gets top billing. Lionel Barrymore was the biggest ham in the history of cinema and he could annoying.

There’s also the vexed Tod Browning question. Browning has his admirers but he has a lot of detractors and the doubts about his abilities as a director mostly stem from dislike of his 1931 Dracula. I don’t hate Dracula as much as some people do. It has its problems with poor pacing and excessive staginess but it has its merits as well and I’ve slowly warmed to it, to an extent at least.

Mark of the Vampire is a remake of Browning’s 1927 mega-hit London After Midnight which had starred Lon Chaney Sr. It’s impossible to compare the two films since the last surviving print of London After Midnight was destroyed in a vault fire in the late 1960s.

The biggest problem with Mark of the Vampire is that it is partially a lost film as well. It ran into massive problems with the Production Code. It also suffered from a great deal of studio interference and was previewed many times and re-edited many times. Consequently this is a movie that was hacked to pieces. About a quarter of the movie was lost, and most of the cut scenes do not survive. All we have is a horribly butchered version. Unfortunately it appears that many of the scenes that were cut were scenes involving Bela Lugosi and Carol Borland - in other words some of the best bits of the movie were removed and destroyed. As a result there is simply no way to make a proper judgment on this movie.

The movie (or what remains of it) opens with the murder of a nobleman, Sir Carol Borotyn. The setting seems to be central Europe. Mosty it takes place in the late Sir Carol’s castle. It is set in contemporary times, in 1934 in fact.

Dr Doskil (played by Donald Meek) believes Sir Carol was killed by a vampire. The villagers and the servants tend to agree.

The police officer in charge of the case, Inspector Neumann (Lionel Atwill), scoffs at such superstitious nonsense. He believes he is dealing with a straightforward murder. Sir Carol was a very rich man. Several people stood to gain financially by his death - including his daughter Irena Borotyn (Elizabeth Allan), her fiancé Fedor Vincente (Henry Wadsworth), Irena’s guadian Baron Otto (Jean Hersholt).

Then Professor Zelin (Lionel Barrymore) arrives on the scene. He’s the Van Helsing character. He has no doubt that they are dealing with a vampire.

In fact probably two vampires. Local legends point to a certain Count Mora and his daughter Luna. The Count is naturally played by Bela Lugosi, with Carol Borland as Luna.

Both Irena and Fedor are attacked by the vampire but survive. Professor Zelin has plans to track the vampires down in their lair and destroy them.

Then we get that major plot twist.

I saw this movie years ago on VHS. Seeing it now on Blu-Ray obviously makes it easier to appreciate the visuals, and it is a good-looking movie. James Wong Howe’s cinematography is a major asset.

Dracula had made quite an impact in 1931 with its stunning gothic imagery. Mark of the Vampire is more polished and perhaps visually more impressive than Dracula. The special effects (such as the bats) are done quite well. The gothic atmosphere in the castle is achieved superbly. There are some wonderful spooky images. Luna's flying scene is a highlight.

Barrymore is not quite as irritating as I’d feared. Lionel Atwill is good. Bela Lugosi and Carol Borland are not called upon to do anything more than look disturbingly creepily vampiric and they manage that very convincingly. Elizabeth Allan makes a good heroine without being insipid.

The minor supporting players are there to provide comic relief. There’s way too much of that in the movie and it’s excruciating.

It has to be admitted that the amazingly convoluted plot makes no sense at all. None whatsoever.

Tod Browning had an up-and-down career during the 1930s, with the downs outnumbering the ups. He only made a couple of movies after Mark of the Vampire. The Devil-Doll, made the following year, is a rather good mad scientist movie. I’m quite fond of his final movie, Miracles for Sale (1939).

I liked Mark of the Vampire a bit more this time around. It’s livelier and more technically sophisticated than Dracula and it’s fairly entertaining. Whether you will decide that the ending ruins the movie is up to you. Recommended.

The Whispering Shadow (serial, 1933)

The Whispering Shadow is a 1933 thirteen-part Mascot serial starring Bela Lugosi. It’s a crime thriller with some elements of science fiction and of the fantastic thrown in, and with a hint of the gothic as well.

The Empire Transport and Storage Company has carved out its own market niche. It’s a trucking company but with some very high-tech features. The trucks are in constant communication with the central warehouse by radio-phone. The system seems fool-proof but unfortunately in practice it’s proving to be worryingly vulnerable. Four Empire trucks have been hijacked recently with fatal results for the drivers involved. A sinister figure knows as the Whispering Shadow is believed to be behind the hijackings. There is no real explanation as to why those particular trucks were targeted.

When another trucks is attacked and the kid brother of chief dispatcher Jack Foster (Malcolm McGregor) is killed the company decides to get serious. They hire the celebrated detective Robert Raymond (Robert Warwick) to take over security.

There’s an extraordinary amount of plot packed into the first episode, not to mention several action set-pieces. Several intriguing characters are introduced - such as jewel thief Jasper Slade and magician Professor Strang (Bela Lugosi). There are cool gadgets. There’s a shadow that speaks. There’s a wax museum. There’s a prison breakout. There’s a full-scale attack on the company’s headquarters - by autogyro! There’s a death ray! There are at least half a dozen very suspicious characters. And it’s paced like a speeding locomotive.

It all has something to do with the most fabulous of all jewel collections, the jewels of the Tsar of Russia.

The pacing doesn’t flag at all. There’s no time wasted on extended dialogue scenes. Any exposition that needs to be done is done at a run. Then it’s time for more action.

The central mystery is the identity of the Whispering Shadow and that mystery is fairly well concealed. Don’t make the mistake of assuming it’s going to be Bela Lugosi - he did several serials and did not always play villains. There are several other very strong suspects. There’s some fairly good misdirection in this serial with all sorts of clues that point to different suspects.

The misdirection is not just to do with the Whispering Shadow’s identity. There seem to be a lot of people after those jewels, some of whom think they have legitimate claims and some of whom are obviously merely crooks. There are political agendas and it’s not clear precisely who is working for whom. The plot twists are actually reasonably nifty.

The Whispering Shadow is a diabolical criminal mastermind with access to terrifying and murderous technologies such as television. He is also a master of radio technology which is of course invaluable for killing one’s enemies at a distance. This particular serial is a celebration of technology's potential for mayhem!

There are too many flashbacks but you have to remember that you’re supposed to watch a serial like this over a period of twelve weeks, in which case the flashbacks would probably be quite useful. Modern viewers often make the mistake of watching an entire serial over a period of just three or four nights. It doesn’t really work. I try to watch no more than one episode per night and to take a few breaks so that I usually end up watching a twelve-episode serial over a period of maybe two-and-a-half weeks. It makes it a lot more fun.

The acting is very much in the hyper-active B-movie melodrama mode but that’s as it should be in a serial. Malcolm McGregor does make a pretty fair square-jawed action hero. Viva Tattersall overacts delightfully as Professor Strange’s daughter Vera.

The Alpha Video DVD release, on two discs, is unfortunately rather poor. Sound quality is adequate but image quality is definitely not good. On the other hand the other available versions are either public domain or grey market so there’s no reason to think they’d be any better. The Alpha Video release is watchable and if you’re a fan of serials it’s worth putting up with the less-than-stellar picture quality.

If you’re not a fan of serials than The Whispering Shadow is probably not the best place to start. But if you are a fan of serials you should find plenty of enjoyment here. Recommended.

Dracula (1931)

I’ve seen Universal’s 1931 Dracula quite a few times and it’s never impressed me but since I now own it on Blu-Ray I thought I’d give it another try.

Of course the biggest single problem with this movie is that it was so influential and has been imitated, quoted, homaged and parodied so many times. Everything about the movie became a horror movie cliché. What you have to keep always in mind is that in 1931 these were not clichés. At the time of its release this film was new, fresh and exciting. While Murnau’s 1922 Nosferatu was the first vampire movie for the vast majority of viewers in 1931 the Universal Dracula would have been their first exposure to the vampire film. In its day it had genuine shock value. It was not just the horror content but also the sexual implications. Dracula’s victims are almost all female and there is a very strong element of seduction in his hunting of his victims.

While Bram Stoker’s novel was well known and the stage adaptation had been very successful it’s also fair to say that most of the plot elements that are now so very familiar would have been new to most of the movie’s initial audience.

Dracula also marked the first appearance of the Universal gothic aesthetic. While that aesthetic would itself become something of a cliché there’s no question that in 1931 this movie must have been an extraordinary visual experience.

So in order to have any chance of appreciating this movie you have to try to forget all those imitations and parodies and just judge it on its own merits.

This naturally also applies to Bela Lugosi’s performance.

This at least is what I tried to do this time and it did help, to some extent at least.

The first twenty minutes is in my view as good as anything you’ll see in any gothic horror movie. We’re told what we need to know in very economical fashion but mostly the focus is  on building the atmosphere. Which is accomplished with outstanding success. There are just so many superb visual moments in this early part of the film. The first scene in the crypt below Dracula’s castle, the first glimpse of an undead hand opening a coffin lid, the celebrated scene on the staircase when Renfield first encounters the Count, the wonderfully eerie scenes with the three brides of Dracula - all absolutely superb.

After the first twenty minutes the scene shifts from Transylvania to England and the movie starts to lose impetus. There are not quite so many opportunities for visual pyrotechnics and upper-class English drawing rooms just aren’t as wonderfully spooky as medieval Transylvanian castles. There are still some very striking images but as the movie relies increasingly on dialogue rather than mood it becomes much less interesting.

There is a school of thought that the strengths of this movie are due to brilliant cinematographer Karl Freund while its weaknesses are the responsibility of director Tod Browning. That might be going too far but certainly the visuals are consistently superior to the story-telling. In fact there are accounts of the making of the movie that suggest that Browning had little interest in proceedings. That would certainly explain the fact that the movie loses direction halfway through and never quite gets back on track.

Lugosi almost single-handedly created our idea of the film vampire - aristocratic, cultured, exotic and very theatrical. The cape, the middle European accent, the piercing stare, pretty much all the stereotypical vampire characteristic go back to Lugosi. In Murnau’s 1922 Nosferatu (an unauthorised adaptation of Stoker’s novel) Max Schreck makes the vampire bestial and rather disgusting. It’s a powerful performance in its own way but Scheck’s vampire is a mere monster. In literature there had certainly been aristocratic vampires but it was Lugosi who made the cinematic vampire a gentleman (albeit a slightly creepy gentleman). The many parodies of Lugosi’s performance have made it seem almost ridiculous but that’s perhaps a little unfair. Lugosi would certainly go on to give much better performances (in movies like White Zombie, The Black Cat and The Raven).

The early part of Dracula is very cinematic. Once the Count arrives in England though it becomes more and more simply a filmed stage production, and the performances (including Lugosi’s) become more stagey and much less effective. Edward Van Sloan as Van Helsing gives a performance that is both overly melodramatic and rather dull. Dwight Frye is certainly memorable as Renfield although again it’s essentially a silent movie performance.

Although I’m inclined to judge it less harshly than in the past overall Browning’s Dracula is still a bit of a disappointment, particularly since the essential ingredients were there for a great horror film, most notably the superb Universal gothic aesthetic and Lugosi as the Count.

Universal’s Blu-Ray release looks very good although the menus are unbelievably aggravating. There are plenty of extras - a couple of documentaries and an audio commentary by David Skal. The most exciting extra though is the Spanish-language Drácula, shot at the same time as the English version. It’s interesting enough to be worth its own post which will follow shortly.

Black Dragons (1942)

Black Dragons, released in 1942, was the third of Bela Lugosi’s Monogram pictures produced by Sam Katzman and it’s a slightly unusual spy thriller with (of course) some sinister overtones. And it gives Lugosi the chance to play dual roles.

The story deals with a ring of Japanese Fifth Columnists in the US just after the outbreak of war. They’re not actually Japanese - they’re American traitors working for Japan. In 1942 this was just the sort of thing audiences would have gone for, Fifth Columnists being a popular subject in low-budget potboilers at the time.

Lugosi plays Dr Colomb, a mysterious figure who seems to be taking an interest in this subversive organisation, although it’s not a sympathetic interest. The members of the espionage ring start getting bumped off one by one with a Japanese dagger left at the scene of each murder.

Dr Colomb has moved himself into the home of a Dr Saunders. The doctor’s niece Alice (Joan Barclay)  isn’t quite sure what to make of him. She’s a bit frightened of him but not as frightened as you might expect.

All the murder victims were guests at a dinner party held at Dr Saunders’ home, the purpose dinner party being to advance the plans of the Fifth Columnists to wreck the US war effort. Many of their plans focus on fomenting strikes to disrupt war production although out-and-sabotage is also on the agenda.

Dick Martin (Clayton Moore) is a handsome young US counter-espionage agent assigned to investigate the case, his method being to romance Alice Saunders in order to find out exactly what is happening at the home of Dr Saunders.

Lugosi had made a big impact in White Zombie in 1932 with extreme close-ups of his eyes being used to emphasise his hypnotic powers. A similar (although slightly less effective) technique is used here. Sinister hypnotic powers were something that Lugosi was supremely good at suggesting. He also manages to convey a somewhat ambiguous tone. We assume that (being Lugosi) he’s the villain but he appears to be extreme hostility to the other villains. He’s in fine form, which is just as well since he has to carry the movie pretty much single-handedly.

The other cast members range from adequate to embarrassingly wooden although Joan Barclay isn’t too bad.

Director William Nigh was an incredibly prolific B-movie director, uninspired but competent enough and he at least keeps the pacing pleasingly taut. Writer Harvey Gates had a career that followed much the same pattern - prolific but without notable distinction. His screenplay does at least have quite a few interesting touches.

The plot takes a definite turn towards the outrageous in the latter part of the film as the unexpected truth is revealed about the spy ring, and about Dr Colomb.

The movie tries hard to convey an atmosphere of breathless excitement and succeeds reasonably well, within its B-movie limitations.

This movie is in the public domain. The Elstree Hill DVD offers a transfer that is unimpressive but watchable (and marginally better than Alpha Video standards). The sound is the big problem - it’s uneven and muffled. Alpha Video have also released this one. Black Dragons might not be a great film but it’s interesting enough to deserve better treatment on DVD.

Black Dragons is an enjoyable espionage-themed potboiler with a few definite touches of horror. If you’re a fan of sinister hypnotist movies or a Lugosi fan, or even just a fan of slightly offbeat 1940s spy B-movies, it’s worth a look. Highly recommended. 

The Raven (1935)

The Raven is one of the lesser known Universal horror movies of the 30s and it’s a bit of a neglected gem. This 1935 production was one of the several occasions on which Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff were paired and it gives both actors a chance to shine, although it’s Lugosi who dominates and effortlessly walks off with the acting honours.

Supposed adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe’s works generally have little actual Poe in them and this movie is no exception. Poe is however a influence on one of the major characters so I guess Universal felt they were entitled to claim it as a Poe adaptation.

Jean Thatcher (Irene Ware) is gravely injured in an automobile accident. The doctors fear that little can be done to save her. Her one chance would be if Dr Vollin could somehow be persuaded to take on her case.

Dr Richard Vollin (Bela Lugosi) is a great surgeon now retired from practice and devoting himself to his obsession with Edgar Allan Poe. With great difficulty Judge Thatcher, Jean’s father, persuades Vollin to save his daughter. Jean is soon fully recovered. She is seeing quite a bit of Dr Vollin. He’s a rather fascinating man and he did save her life and it doesn’t occur to Jean that seeing so much of him might not be entirely appropriate. Her motives seem innocent enough. She is intrigued by his devotion to Poe and even choreographs a dance routine inspired by Poe (she is a professional dancer). Her dance routine is actually a key scene (and is quite effective), marking the point at which Vollin’s fantasies take over from reality in his mind.

While Jean may think her friendship with Vollin is harmless her father does not share her views. He fears that she will become infatuated with the doctor. In fact, as he discovers when he broaches the subject with Vollin, it is the doctor who has become infatuated with the young woman.

Vollin seems to relate Poe’s obsession with the lost Lenore in his poems to some event in his own life. In any case he has clearly started to see Jean as some kind of embodiment of Poe’s Lenore. Vollin has no intention of giving her up and then fate offers him a means of overcoming her father’s objections, in a permanent and fatal way. As we will discover Dr Vollin likes permanent and fatal solutions, especially if they’re slow and painful. An escaped killer, Edward Bateman (Boris Karloff), shows up on his doorstep. He believes that his life of violence and crime is a result of his ugliness. He has been told that Dr Vollin has the skill to alter a person’s face, to make an ugly person attractive. This is what he wishes Vollin to do for him. But Vollin has his own plans for Bateman.

This is one Karloff-Lugosi pairing in which Lugosi gets a role just as meaty, and in fact in this case much more so, as Karloff’s. Dr Vollin is of course a dangerous madman but he’s a cultured and sophisticated madman as well. This is the kind of part Lugosi relished and he makes the most of it. Karloff got top billing and was paid twice as much as Lugosi for this film. While this shameful treatment by Universal must have rankled at least this time Lugosi could console himself with the knowledge that he’d landed the plum role, and the biggest role as well.

Karloff is overshadowed but he is not entirely left out in the cold. Bateman is as mad and as dangerous as Vollin but he’s a somewhat tragic figure. Tragic monsters were meat and drink to Karloff and as always he extracts just the right amount of pathos without veering into excessive sentimentality or self-parody. The problem is that Karloff never could play American mobsters convincingly. Initially he seems ill at ease and seriously miscast but once Vollin transforms Bateman into a monster the problem becomes relatively unimportant. Karloff couldn’t play American mobsters but he could certainly play monsters.

This movie is also a joy to fans of the two great horror icons because not only are they both present, they have plenty of scenes together. The manipulative and grotesque relationship between these two very different madmen is the key to the film and it plays out quite effectively.

Irene Ware gets to do a great deal of screaming. She’s perfectly adequate in her role. A weekend house party hosted by Dr Vollin, a party that will end as the kind of party Poe would have imagined in his nightmares, gives an array of character actors the opportunity to practise their over-acting skills. They’re there to provide the totally unnecessary and inappropriate comic relief. Fortunately screenplay David Boehm and director Lew Landers (billed under his original name Louis Friedlander) keep the focus on Lugosi and Karloff as much as possible.

One of the great strengths of Universal’s horror movies of this era was the studio’s ability to provide such movies with exactly the right kind of sets and to make them convincing and interesting. The Raven doesn’t boast the glorious visual excesses of The Black Cat or even Son of Frankenstein but it still looks great and Dr Vollin’s Poe-inspired chamber of tortures should be enough to keep fans happy. The Pit and the Pendulum device is a particular highlight.

Lew Landers was a competent journeyman director. His most valuable contribution to this film is that he keeps things moving along at a very brisk pace.

This movie had popped up on DVD before but the transfer on the disc included in their Bela Lugosi Collection is a significant improvement. There’s some grain but if anything it adds to the atmosphere. More importantly the contrast is excellent. Sound is very good as well and overall Universal have done a fine job. The set itself (comprising five movies on a doubled-sided DVD) is an absolute must-have for any self-respecting fan of these two great horror actors or of the Universal horror movies in general.

This movie’s biggest problem has always been that it was a Poe adaptation that appeared a year after an earlier Universal Poe movie, The Black Cat, a movie that was in every way bigger, more ambitious, more spectacular and more successful (and was a box-office smash hit). In fact The Black Cat is one of the all-time great horror movies. The Raven can’t compete with that. What you need to do is to to forget the comparisons. The Raven is a much more modest effort but it’s great fun and it features one of Lugosi’s most enjoyably outrageous performances. Highly recommended.

White Zombie (1932)

White Zombie, released in 1932, was one of the first zombie movies. And it remains one of the best.

Neil Parker (John Harron) and his fiancée Madeline (Madge Bellamy) arrive in Haiti where they are to be married. On the ship carrying them to Haiti they had met Charles Beaumont (Robert Frazer). Beaumont had persuaded them to postpone their wedding until they reached Haiti. Beaumont had become besotted by Madeline and now he is determined to have her, no matter what methods he has to adopt. Beaumont asks Monsieur Legendre (Bela Lugosi) to help him. Legendre agrees, but Beaumont is not sure he is prepared to pay Legendre’s price. But eventually Beaumont decides that he will pay any price, even Legendre’s.

Neil and Madeline had already heard rumours of zombies when they first arrived at the island. Missionary Dr Bruner (Joseph Cawthorn) assures Neil that the legends of zombies have some basis in reality. Neil will soon discover just how true that is, when his new bride becomes one of the walking dead.

Beaumont had assumed that he would get Madeline but he is horrified by the zombie Madeline. Legendre has meantime decided he wants Madeline for himself.

Legendre, popularly known as Murder Legendre, has his own private army of zombies. He had learnt the secret of creating zombies from a voodoo witch-doctor. Legendre’s private zombie army is composed entirely of his former enemies, a fact that appeals to Legendre enormously.

Neil gives way to drink and depression but he never entirely gives up hope of restoring Madeline to normality and to himself and he has a powerful ally in Dr Bruner who has a considerable knowledge of local superstition.

Bela Lugosi fans always point to this movie as one of his finest performances, and they are quite right to do so. It’s a good meaty role that suits him perfectly and Lugosi is superb. This is Lugosi at his most charming and at his most sinister and we have no difficulty in believing that he is a man who can exercise a hypnotic control over both the living and the dead.

The other actors are distinctly subsidiary although they’re mostly adequate. Robert Frazer is very melodramatic as Charles Beaumont, which is exactly the kind of performance this movie demands. Madge Bellamy has the right kind of mysterious gothic beauty.

Victor Halperin directed and does a fine job. His brother Edward acted as producer, the movie being made by their own production company. Victor Halperin quite rightly focuses his attention on Lugosi’s mesmeric evil and the close-up shots of Lugosi’s eyes became a major icon of 1930s horror. Halperin consistently creates an atmosphere of stifling tropical evil and his style is pleasingly visually inventive. The movie was made on leased lots at Universal which partly accounts for the high production values.

Garnet Weston wrote the screenplay based on a novel by William B. Seabrook. His screenplay captures the atmosphere of voodoo-ridden Haiti extremely well.

This movie uses matte paintings very effectively. They look artificial and this enhances the nightmare-like quality of the film. The climactic sequences at the castle by the sea are wonderfully atmospheric.

This movie has fallen into the public domain and many of the DVD editions floating about are less than impressive, including the one I saw from an outfit called Payless. While the transfer was a long way from being premium quality it was quite watchable.

This is a good movie anyway but Lugosi’s performance elevates it to the very front rank of 1930s horror movies. This movie is essential viewing for any horror fan and is very highly recommended.

Voodoo Man (1944)

Voodoo Man was one of the pictures Bela Lugosi made for Monogram after signing with the studio at the beginning of the 1940s. Lugosi had, quite reasonably, come to the conclusion that he had no future with Universal. Monogram were at least offering him starring roles. Lugosi’s Monogram pictures are often disparaged, sometimes quite justifiably, but they did include a few good movies. Voodoo Man, made in 1944, was one of the best.

This was a moderately ambitious effort for the Poverty Row studio. The cast includes a couple of reasonably big names in the horror world, John Carradine and George Zucco, as well as the headliner Lugosi. They also put at least some effort into the sets. And unlike some of Lugosi’s Monogram films this is a fully fledged horror movie.

A young scenario writer from Hollywood, Ralph Dawson (Tod Andrews), is on his way to a small town to marry his sweetheart, Betty Benton (Wanda McKay). His car runs out of gas but luckily for him he gets a lift from Stella (Louise Currie). He then discovers that Stella is going to be matron of honour at his wedding. They find the main road closed but follow a detour sign but then Stella’s car mysteriously gives out on her. Ralph sets off for a nearby house but when he returns Stella is gone. He thinks no more about it until he gets to his fiancée’s house and is informed that Stella has not shown up.

In fact Stella is just the latest in a long line of young women who have gone missing in this county. What the viewer knows but the protagonists don’t is that the girls have been kidnapped by Dr Richard Marlowe (Bela Lugosi). Dr Marlowe’s wife died twenty-two years earlier but he still has hopes of bringing her back to life, by a mixture of science and voodoo. To do this he needs to capture the will to life of a suitable girl. So far he hasn’t found the right girl but he has built up a collection of beautiful young zombies.

Nicholas (George Zucco) runs the local gas station but in fact he’s the one who sends the girls to Dr Marlowe. Nicholas also happens to be a voodoo priest and is helping Dr Marlowe in his efforts to bring his wife back to life. Dr Marlowe’s henchmen also include a creepy simple-minded pervert named Toby (John Carradine).

Stella escapes from Dr Marlowe but she’s been zombie-fied and she just stares blankly into space saying nothing. Ralph, Betty and Betty’s mother can’t figure out what is wrong with her but luckily a doctor who specialises in such cases just happens to arrive on the doorstep and he offers to do what he can for the unfortunate Stella. Of course this doctor is none other than Dr Marlowe! And not long afterwards Stella disappears again - she has been called by Nicholas’s voodoo powers.

The local police have been trying to find the missing girls without any success. Ralph is no on hand to give them a helping hand although it has to be said that any success that he has is more due to good luck than to his non-existent skills as an amateur detective.

By the standards of Monogram movies this is a surprisingly decent-looking production. The budget was minuscule but director of photography Marcel Le Picard manages to get some quite atmospheric shots. Director William “One-Shot” Beaudine was renowned for his refusal to do retakes. His ability to bring in movies on time and on budget was a major asset to a studio like Monogram. He was certainly a fast worker but he was also a competent professional and it shows. The sets look fairly good with enough mad scientist and voodoo paraphernalia to make things convincing.

Lugosi is definitely this movie’s highlight. He obviously knew this was a good part and he throws himself into it with enthusiasm. He demonstrates that when given a good meaty role that suited him he could still produce the goods. This is the kind of vaguely sympathetic mad scientist movie where the scientist is tragically misguided rather than evil, the sort of role that Boris Karloff did so well. Lugosi shows that he could play such roles extremely well if given the chance. He conveys some real emotion and his performance is quite moving at times.

George Zucco does well and he approaches his role with gusto. John Carradine goes so far over-the-top that he’s off the scale as the shambling idiot Toby who is just a bit too fond of zombie-fied young ladies. Even the lesser supporting players are quite competent.

The focus here is on entertainment. There are numerous movie in-jokes. The pacing is brisk and unlike some Monogram movies this movie is never in danger of becoming dull. And a major plus is the absence of the usual excruciating comic relief.

It has to be emphasised that (contrary to the general opinion) this is not a so-bad-it’s-good movie. It’s very much a B-movie but it’s a good B-movie with a fine cast and it works as an effective little horror flick.

This movie is only available on DVD as a Rifftrax release with one of those tediously and embarrassingly unfunny MST3K-style accompaniments. Luckily the DVD does offer the option of watching the movie without the Rifftrax accompaniment. There’s quite a lot of print damage in parts but otherwise the picture quality is reasonably good.

Voodoo Man is one of the best of Bela Lugosi’s later movies (in fact it probably  is the best). A thoroughly enjoyable horror B-movie that deserves more respect than it’s ever received. Highly recommended.

The Black Cat (1934)

The Black Cat is one of the most highly regarded of Universal’s 1930s horror movies (there are many who rate it as the best of them) and it’s a movie that lives up to its reputation.

Director Edgar G. Ulmer didn’t know it then but this would be the first and last time in his career that he would have a generous budget and the resources of a major studio behind him. His affair with, and subsequent marriage to, the wife of Universal boss Carl Laemmle’s nephew would see him banished to the world of the Poverty Row studios. In fact he ended up at PRC, the absolute bottom of the rung. Ulmer later became the darling of the auteur theorists and his low-budget movies are today taken very seriously indeed.

The Black Cat was an idea that had been kicking around Universal for quite a while. Finally Ulmer and Peter Ruric came up with a screenplay that was deemed to be acceptable and the green light was given. The movie was released in mid-1934. It received venomous reviews from critics but the public didn’t care and they made it Universal’s biggest hit of 1934.

The budget was modest compared to some of Universal’s other early horror movies but Ulmer was always a fast and efficient worker and he got the maximum benefit out of the budget.

Edgar Allan Poe’s name was given prominence in the publicity for the film but the story as filmed has no connection with anything ever written by Poe (although it does capture some of Poe’s spirit).

A young American couple, Peter Alison (David Manners) and his new wife Joan (Julie Bishop), are travelling through central Europe on the Orient Express when they meet a distinguished Hungarian psychiatrist, Dr Vitus Werdegast (Bela Lugosi). Dr Werdegast is returning home after an absence of many years. During the First World War he had become a Russian prisoner after the Austro-Hungarian fortress of Marmorus had been betrayed to the enemy, a betrayal that cost the lives of thousands of men. Dr Werdegast believes that the man who sold out the fortress was his old friend Hjalmar Poelzig (Boris Karloff). He also blames Poelzig for the deaths of his wife and daughter. Dr Werdegast is returning to take his revenge.

Poelzig is now a renowned architect. His ultra-modernist home was built on the ruins of the  Marmorus fortress. The charabanc in which Peter and Joan Alison and Dr Werdegast are travelling crashes on a mountain road in driving rain. The driver is killed but the passengers survive, although Joan is slightly injured. They make their way on foot to Hjalmar Poelzig’s house. Dr Werdegast and Poelzig will become involved in a dangerous game, with Joan as the stake.

That’s really all there is to the plot. This thin story was one of the faults for which the movie was lambasted at the time of its release but it proves to be an unimportant weakness. This is a movie that relies on atmosphere, stunning visuals and bravura acting and these elements are present in such quantity that no-one is likely to notice the threadbare nature of the script.

The Black Cat was the first movie to pair Universal’s two horror icons, Karloff and Lugosi. Karloff landed the more interesting and colourful role but Lugosi gives such a superb and subtle performance that he is no danger of being overwhelmed by Karloff. The performances of these two great stars complement each other perfectly. The other players are of no importance, and in fact it’s hard to think of a movie in which David Manners was important. Lucille Lund as Karen looks suitably mysterious while Julie Bishop (known at the time as Jacqueline Wells) manages to scream on cue.

Ulmer started his film career as an art director and it’s the brilliance and decadent extravagance of the visuals that makes this one of the great horror landmarks. This movie abandoned the gothic imagery of earlier Universal horror films. That decision turned out to be a masterstroke. The extreme modernist look of the house and of the interiors proves to be far more alienating, weird and threatening than tired gothic visual clichés.

The striking images provide the perfect accompaniment to the outrageously decadent and bizarre themes with which the screenplay is packed. Pretty much every evil and every perversion and every form of madness that the screenwriters (and the audience) could imagine will be found here, from necrophilia to Satanism. Hjalmar Poelzig has a room in which he keeps his collection of perfectly preserved corpses, including that of Dr Werdegast’s wife. It’s a shocking idea made even more eerie by the visual presentation of it. This blending of bizarre ideas with bizarre images continues throughout the movie. Every other element of the movie, from the acting to the music, is exquisitely and artfully blended to absolute perfection.

This is one of the five movies in Universal’s Bela Lugosi Collection DVD boxed set. I’d seen this movie a few years ago in a terrible print on a budget DVD. The difference between that awful print and the excellent print included in this boxed set is striking to say the least.

The Black Cat is one of the masterpieces of the horror genre. A movie every horror fan must see.

The Black Sleep (1956)

The Black Sleep was released just one year before Hammer’s The Curse of Frankenstein. Hammer’s cycle of gothic horror movies would soon make black-and-white horror movies like The Black Sleep look very dated. The Black Sleep does indeed look back to the past, to the great Universal horror films of the 30s and 40s, but today that no longer seems to be such a great problem. We can judge this movie by its own standards and accept that it is a worthy successor to the Universal movies.

The casting is another feature that makes this movie’s debt to the past very obvious. Basil Rathbone, Bela Lugosi, John Carradine and Lon Chaney Jr had all starred in Universal horror films. In 1956 that might have been a weakness but to modern fans of classic horror movies it’s a distinct plus.

Basil Rathbone is Sir Joel Cadman, famous as a very distinguished surgeon, but in reality a mad scientist. It is 1872. Dr Gordon Ramsay (Herbert Rudley) had been a pupil of Cadman, but now he lies in Newgate Prison awaiting execution for the murder of a money lender. Cadman visits him in his cell the night before the execution and gives him a drug to drink in the morning. He tells him it is a strong sedative that will allow him to endure the horror he is about to face.

When next we see Dr Ramsay he is in his coffin, but he is not dead. Sir Joel revives him and informs him that it is the morning after his execution. The sentence had not been carried out because Dr Ramsay had been fund apparently dead in his cell. But he was not dead. The drug Sir Joel had given him was the Black Sleep, a drug that produces a state of suspended animation indistinguishable from death. He has saved Dr Ramsay’s life, and Dr Ramsay is now to be his assistant.

Cadman is conducting experiments on the brain. He is unquestionably a genius and has gone further than any previous researcher in unlocking the secrets of the brain. Apart from his scientific curiosity he has another reason for his zeal to discover the brain’s secrets - his wife lies in a coma, the victim of a brain tumour. Cadman hopes to use his knowledge to save her. Cadman is aided by the gypsy Odo (Akim Tamiroff) who supplies him with subjects for his experiments.

The secret laboratory of Sir Joel Cadman is soon revealed to be a chamber of horrors, inhabited by the pathetic shells of men and women who had been subjects of his experiments. Men like the great Dr Munroe, now a shambling murderous monster known as Mungo (Lon Chaney Jr). There are other secrets hidden in Cadman’s laboratory, secrets that have great relevance to Dr Ramsay’s own awkward position.

Dr Ramsay had initially been grateful to Cadman for saving his life, but after discovering the nature of Cadman’s researches he is filled with horror. But what can he do? He cannot go to the authorities since that would mean that he would face execution. He must continue to aid Cadman in his experiments whilst hoping for an opportunity to escape from this nightmare.

While Lugosi, Chaney and Carradine share top billing with Rathbone and Tamiroff, the real star is Basil Rathbone. He has by far the most important, and also the most interesting, part. He makes a splendid mad scientist. It’s an understated performance, which makes it all the more chilling. Sir Joel Cadman is a man of science, a humane and civilised man, who also happens to be quite mad.

This is classic mad scientist stuff, with Sir Joel Cadman belonging to the sub-category of mad scientists who started out as sincere seekers after knowledge who somewhere along the way lost the plot and became, without realising it, monsters.

Tamiroff has fun as the gypsy. Lon Chaney gets little to do apart from shuffling about and trying to strangle people. Poor Bela Lugosi gets little more than a non-speaking bit part. In 1956 he had to take any work he could get but it’s still sad to see him reduced to such insignificant roles. John Carradine’s role is also small but he makes the most of it, overacting outrageously as one of Cadman’s patients who is convinced he is Bohemond the crusader, on the way to liberate Jerusalem from the Saracens.

Director Reginald Le Borg does a competent job. The visual style of the movie is clearly inspired by the classic Universal horror movies, and that’s no bad thing. The sets look reasonably impressive and in general the movie looks better than you’d expect given its low budget.

The Black Sleep has been released by MGM as a made-on-demand DVD. It’s shamefully overpriced but it’s a nice enough print although it would have been even nicer if they’d released it in its correct aspect ratio. As it is this is probably the only opportunity you’re going to get to see this movie so such minor annoyances have to be overlooked.

The Black Sleep is thoroughly entertaining gothic horror and is highly recommended.

The Mysterious Mr Wong (1934)

These was a bit of a vogue in Hollywood in the early 1930s for murder mysteries in a Chinatown setting. These provided the perfect subject matter for the pre-code era, combining exoticism with usually a fair helping of sleaze (white slavery being another favourite pre-code subject). The Mysterious Mr Wong is slightly different - it’s like a Chinatown murder mystery with a dash of Fu Manchu.

The eponymous Mr Wong (played with dash by Bela Lugosi) is a tong gang leader who wants a great deal more power than simple crime can offer. He has heard the legend that the great Chinese sage Confucious distributed twelve gold coins to his followers and that anyone who can collect all twelve coins will thereby gain unlimited occult powers.

Mr Wong has eleven of the coins and is hot on the trail of the twelfth coin. His quest has left behind it a trail of corpses - Mr Wong’s methods of coin collecting do not involve sitting in auction rooms.

The series of murders all this has entailed have come to the attention of wise-cracking reporter Jay Barton (Wallace Ford). He doesn’t know what he’s on to but he knows he’s on to something big. He knows this is more than just a tong war.

In between his reporting duties he’s romancing feisty (and also wise-cracking) switchboard operator Peg (Arline Judge), who will find herself drawn into Mr Wong’s web.

This is a production by Poverty Row studio Monogram so don’t expect high production values. The movie does however have many of the virtues of the classic Hollywood B-movie - it’s fast-moving, it’s reasonably action-packed and it has some good hardboiled dialogue. Plus it has Bela Lugosi in a role that allows him to have a lot of fun, and it’s a role he makes the most of.

It’s not a great movie by any stretch of the imagination and Wallace Ford is an acquired taste. Personally I quite enjoy fast-talking wise-cracking movie reporters and Wallace Ford does this sort of thing pretty well. Arline Judge is excellent and the banter between the two of them is entertaining.

The screenplay doesn’t really capitalise on the potential of the coins idea. We’re not told exactly what powers the coins will confer. While Lugosi is very good the script lets him down a little - he needed to be given more scope for making Mr Wong a full-scale Fu Manchu-type diabolical criminal mastermind. The character of the Chinese secret service agent needed to be developed a bit more as well.

The exotic Chinatown setting and Bela Lugosi make this movie worth seeing, as long as you set your expectations fairly low. Amusing and moderately enjoyable.

It’s in the public domain but the transfer on the DVD I saw (from Mill Creek) was actually reasonably OK.

Ghost of Frankenstein (1942)

Ghost of Frankenstein was Universal’s fourth Frankenstein movie and not surprisingly it was the weakest up to that date. It’s still fun though.

Those villagers are at it again, this time they’ve decided to burn Castle Frankenstein to the ground. Unfortunately they not only fail to kill Ygor, they also inadvertently bring the monster back to life. Ygor and his friend the monster set off for a neighbouring town in search of the original Dr Frankenstein’s second son, Ludwig. Dr Ludwig Frankenstein specialises in diseases of the mind, which is convenient.

Trouble starts immediately as the monster tries to retrieve a ball for a small girl, killing two townspeople in the process. The monster is arrested but of course they can’t hold him. Ygor and the monster take shelter in Ludwig Frankenstein’s house and Ygor blackmails him into helping the monster. Ludwig comes up with a fool-proof plan - to replace the creature’s diseased brain with a healthy one. Luckily he has one on hand, the brain of his young assistant, conveniently killed by the monster. Ygor has his own ideas however.

Bela Lugosi once again plays Ygor, and once again steals the picture. Cedric Hardwicke’s lifeless performance as Ludwig Frankenstein and Lon Chaney Jr’s similarly dull monster make this easy but Lugosi is in good form and was probably always going to steal the limelight anyway. The script makes him the dominant character, as he was in Son of Frankenstein, and Lugosi makes the most of this.

Lionel Atwill also does well as Ludwig Frankenstein’s rather sinister chief assistant Dr Bohmer who is a much more interesting and complex character than Ludwig Frankenstein himself. Bohmer had been Ludwig’s scientific mentor until an unfortunate mistake wrecked his career and his ambitions to restore his reputation are along with Ygor’s machinations provide the main engine that drives the plot.

As was usual with Universal’s monster movie the script went through several hands and some major changes before shooting began.

The absence of Boris Karloff is a major loss. It’s even more unfortunate that Basil Rathbone, who had been excellent as Ludwig’s brother Wolf Frankenstein in Son of Frankenstein, was not on hand.

Son of Frankenstein in 1939 had been the last attempt by Universal to continue their tradition of high quality horror A-pictures. They would make occasional good horror films after this but they would be good B-movies rather than A-movies. Ghost of Frankenstein lacks the superbly imaginative set design of its immediate predecessor in the Frankenstein cycle. One thing you have to say for Universal though - even their B-pictures looked great. Production values here are surprisingly high and the cinematography (by Elwood Bredell and Milton R. Krasner) is excellent and as with all the Universal monster movies the movie looks suitably moody and gothic.

Erle C. Kenton was at best a skillful artisan but he at least keeps the pacing very tight. This movie marked a significant downturn in Universal’s Frankenstein cycle but Ghost of Frankenstein is by no means a bad film and it’s still exciting and entertaining.

Worth seeing for Lugosi, and an enjoyable enough movie on its own merits.

Universal’s DVD presentation is exquisite.