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Showing posts from July, 2014

The Return of Doctor X (1939) - Vincent Sherman

I was excited to see this one. While others panned the original, I actually enjoyed the first entry to this franchise. Unfortunately, this movie is unorganized and unmotivated. It feels cold and without any real enthusiasm. That would explain why this hasn't found a very wide release or even a proper video release making it virtually impossible to find. I had been able to watch it online when I found it on accident while browsing for copies of Revenge of Doctor X from 1970.  Like the original, this movie features a fast talking, quick witted Journalist. After finding a young woman dead in her apartment, her body mysteriously disappears then re-appears alive and complaining about the journalist. This baffles the journalist, now ex-journalist after being fired, into trying to figure the mystery out. The strange journey leads him to find that the woman is in acquaintanceship with a strange doctor that has an affliction for blood control.  Interestingly enough the strange d

Tower of London (1939) - Roland V. Lee

Tower of London is a quasi-horror movie that is set in the medieval times; the movie follows the rise of King Richard III who took his seat on the throne by systematically killing everyone ahead of him. The film has some stellar performances from Basil Rathbone and Boris Karloff, and we even get a young Vinny Price as the timid Duke of Clarence. The movie is historically accurate, but of course it embellishes to shock and entertain. The movie is pretty epic and its battle sequences are heralded as some of the greatest ever made; there have been two remakes of this film and instead of reproducing the battles scenes these remakes actually reused the battle footage from this movie. This movie is strange in the fact that it uses drama to get the "horror" point across. The movie is in no way scary, but I can see how it may have been in the past. There are numerous murders committed by "The Executioner", played by Karloff, but the creepiest part is that 35 yea

Torture Ship (1939) - Victor Halperin

Torture Ship is torture to watch... yes I just said that. Yes, I am THAT guy. I barely got through this movie and it is hard to interpret and even harder to enjoy. The movie starts off with little explanation and leaves you with tons of questions and yawns. The acting is laughable and the storyline is ludicrous. I was on such a hot streak too: The Ape, then Sweeney Todd but now this failure of a film. This movie is a B-Movie through and through. It was obvious from the first five minutes of the film that it was going to be cheap and boring. From what I could piece together the plot is about a group of prisoners who are stuck on a ship with a doctor running experiments on them. What experiments? Who knows. How did they all get there? I don't know. Why did they even spend time making this movie? I don't know. The movie is short in the way of scares and very heavy in the way of "comedy". At least what they try to pass off as comedy. The whole thing is all uno

The Cat and the Canary (1939) - Elliott Nugent

The Cat and the Canary is yet another Old Dark House style horror movie with incredible wit and charm. It surprises you with it's quality and mystery. I guess you could say this is one of the rare Old Dark House films that actually gets the formula correct. This is much to my pleasure. The Cat and the Canary is a pretty great little movie. The plot is the same as it always is. A group of people, in this case a bunch of distant relatives, gather for the reading of a will. Then someone dies. They all figure out that they are trapped for the night. Then they start dropping off one-by-one. Insert a creepy police officer and Bob Hope and you have The Cat and the Canary. A shining stone in the dull pebbles that surround it.  I was weary to watch another movie about a haunted house, but this one pulls you in right from the beginning. Bob Hope really steals the show. His fast-paced humor is a perfect mix with the strange and mysterious. He keeps the movie smart. You actually lo