Tag: Bela Lugosi
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Plan 9 from Outer Space
Ed Wood’s 1957 Magnum Opus is the epitomy of the so-bad-it’s-good movie. Far from the worst picture if all time, this is one of the most entertaining films in movie history, and unmistakingly a work of an auteur. 7/10
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The Black Sleep
While Basil Rathbone, Herbert Rudley & Akim Tamiroff pull their weight in this talky 1956 monster mash, it’s incomprehensible that Lon Chaney, John Carradine, Bela Lugosi & Tor Johnson have all been consigned to shuffling mutely in the corners. 5/10
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Bride of the Monster
Ed Wood’s 1955 schlocker is a love letter to the film’s star Bela Lugosi and the monster movies of the thirties, and as such it is quite charming, despite its ineptitude. And despite ill health, Lugosi is magnetic in his last first billing. 5/10
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Top 10 Sci-Fi Films of the 1930s
In the 1930’s science fiction finally made the leap from European screens to Hollywood. More than anything, the SF invasion of the thirties can be attributed to Universal Studios’ resurrection of Victorian horror stories, many of which had a clear SF element to them. The new Talking Pictures brought on…
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Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla
Often cited as one of the worst films ever made, this 1952 low-budget mad scientist/jungle comedy is better than its reputation – if you can get past Sammy Petrillo’s Jerry Lewis imitation. 3/10
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Return of the Ape Man
This 1944 faux-sequel to Monogram’s The Ape Man marked the end of Bela Lugosi’s stint at the Poverty Row studio. Here he is joined by a good cast and a seasoned director who nonetheless fail to bring life to this illogical “thawed-out-cave-man” yarn. It is better than its predecessor, though. …
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Voodoo Man
Horror icons George Zucco and John Carradine join Bela Lugosi in his last film at Poverty Row studio Monogram, for one of the most bizarrely funny so-bad-it’s-good sci-fi horror films of the forties. Unfortunately giggles aren’t enough to lift this film out of the ruts, although it is a must-watch…
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Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man
Universal’s first monster mashup, made in 1943, is an audience divider. Some enjoy it as a brainless schlockfest, while others find the denigration of the Frankenstein franchise painful to watch. Arguably miscast from the start as the Frankenstein monster, Bela Lugosi saw all his lines cut in the editing room. 4/10
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The Ape Man
Bela Lugosi tries to convince the audience that he looks like a gorilla by wearing a false beard in Monogram’s 1943 cheapo directed by William “One Shot” Beaudine. A treat for fans of really bad movies, this one is a real clunker. 1/10
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The Corpse Vanishes
Bela Lugosi is kidnapping brides from the altar in order to extract their precious bodily fluids, which he uses to keep his 80-year old wife young and beautiful. This Monogram cheapo from 1942 could have been batshit crazy fun but tries too hard to be a snappy Warner crime thriller. 3/10
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The Ghost of Frankenstein
The magic is all but gone from the fourth Universal Frankenstein picture, made in 1942. Although well-paced and entertaining, the film stumbles on a ridiculous, self-contradictory script, a low budget and a Lon Chaney Jr. who isn’t up to the task of replacing Boris Karloff as the monster. 5/10
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The Devil Bat
Poverty Row studio PRC’s 1940 horror comedy is a terrible movie. Bela Lugosi plays a perfume maker who creates a Franken-bat and trains it to murder people wearing the new aftershave he sells them. Lugosi winks at the audience in a wonderful performance, and the madness of it all simply…
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Black Friday
Even if Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi were the marquee names for this 1940 gangster/brain transplant mashup written by Curt Siodmak, it is unheralded actor Stanley Ridges who steals the show in his dual role as fussy professor and cold blooded mobster boss. 5/10
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Son of Frankenstein
Basil Rathbone is the son of Frankenstein who moves back to his father’s castle, only to find Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi hiding in the basement. The latter gives what is perhaps the performance of his lifetime in this visually stunning movie, which unfortunately treats Karloff’s classic monster with little…
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The Invisible Ray
Universal’s 1936 mad scientist yarn boasts Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi in an uneven but entertaining death ray film. Lugosi is seen in a rare heroic role, and Karloff is typecast as a mad scientist. Oh, and human organisms are only part of astro-chemistry controlled by forces from the sun,…
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