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House of Mystery (1934) - William Nigh


This movie is extraordinarily mediocre. Nothing about it stands out, not even the witty banter. Which there is an abundance of. A stereotypical cast of characters is trapped inside of an Old Dark House type story line with an escaped Ape knocking people off one by one. A horrible constable comes to investigate, but does a horrible job and people keep dying off. This isn't a story line that that we haven't seen before. In fact nothing about this movie is that original. Aside from the origin of  the Ape is haunting this house.

The story-line deals with a guy that kills an Ape in India in 1910. He gets cursed and his curse is "supposedly" killing off anyone that comes in contact with their inheritance. Because of the curse a giant Ape is running around snapping necks. The acting is horrible and forgettable. There is almost no character development and the development that happens is boring and stupid. Yes, stupid.

The lead actress is so bizarre looking. Just look at her eyes in the poster. To the director's credit, he did a good job of keeping her profiled. Not really too many scenes with Wide-Eyes looking directly at the camera. The actors were all pretty bland. They were obviously written without much diversity. Yeah, they have their quirks and annoyances. However, they all feel the same. It is so generic. They had so many killer ape movies back in the thirties. This was definitely bottom of the barrel in terms of that. Horrible.

I wont recommend House of Mystery since there are so many other good movies out there from the thirties. These movies are starting to become really mundane. Hopefully, they can move out of these Old Dark Houses and into something a little more fun and interesting. Please. 


  • Also known as Curse of Kai
  • Old Dark House storyline combined with Ape antagonist!
  • Filmed with a Balsley and Phillips Sound System in Mono!

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