Horror Movie Project

This movie has a masterful mix of old-style gangster pictures and a mad scientist horror film. It's great! You get both Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff doing their usual thing. Giving the movie some street cred. It plays out really smoothly and packs a big punch. It's the kind of quality I have grown to love from Universal.  A criminal with a secret stash of hidden money is paralyzed and dying after being involved in a hit and run during a get-away from a heist. A surgeon, and friend to a victim of that hit-and-run, performs a very risky operation. He transplants the brain of the criminal into that of his friend in hopes of recovering the location of that hidden money. However, he awakens a murderous and treacherous fiend that has a love for murder! It can be argued that this has too much action to be a horror movie. Some parts feel like No Country for Old Men but others are thrilling and suspenseful enough to definitely be horror. People argue that this movie has se

I am kicking off 1940 with You'll Find Out from 1940. A hilarious forgotten released to promote Kay Kyser. A popular big band leader from the 30's and 40's. The film is filled with comedy bits and witty charm that carry the plot along nicely. The production is exquisite. You'll Find Out is definitely a movie to check out. It's a shame it has been forgotten for so long. The film is about Kay Kyser and his band after they are hired to play at a spooky mansion for a young heiress. The heiress had been invited to this mansion to celebrate her birthday party. She doesn't know who invited her. However, she is sure someone is trying to kill her. For some reason she still decides to go. The mansion is filled with creepy artifacts and crap lining the walls. It does a really good job of putting it's own spin on the Old Dark House motif. Not to mention it also has some very good cameos from Lugosi, Karloff, and Lorre. The film is a parody/homage to the horror f

The Man They Could Not Hang was actually a really solid horror movie. Boris Karloff is always fantastic and this movie is no different. Karloff takes his little role in this picture and makes it way bigger and broader than expected. The film deals with tried and true horror surroundings. The Old Dark House aesthetic is in full effect here complete with a slow, brooding terror. The film is also far, ahead of it's time. It actually showcases an artificial heart and heart transplant before that kind of thing was ever heard of.  Dr. Henryk Savaard (Boris Karloff) has been working on unlocking the key to immortality. In his work, he's discovered how to bring a human back to life. His goal is to make it so that surgeons wouldn't have to be working against the clock during surgeries. A young man volunteers for the opportunity to be one of the first to be killed and brought back to life. However, Savaard is unable to finish his work. His secretary rats on him. Eventually leadin

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

Son of Frankenstein is the inevitable return of one of the icons of horror. I couldn't tell you if anyone was seriously waiting for this one. They have filled the thing with heavyweight horror actors like Bela Lugosi, Basil Rathbone, Lionel Atwill, Dwight Frye and of course; Boris Karloff. This movie is so heavy on the acting side that it begins to collapse in on itself and actually takes away from other aspects of the film. It feels off... This could have possibly been the greatest Frankenstein movie of all time; however, the plot does away with everything that the Monster learned in the previous film and pisses away all of the  character and story development that came with the original Bride of Frankenstein. The iconic look of the Monster is also severely tampered with; instead of wearing his usual dark suit as in the previous Frankenstein films he dons a fur vest and tall black boots. What? A fur vest? Who the hell does he think he is?  The movie is about Dr. Franke

Boris Karloff stars in this dramatic piece about a man that gets framed and put to death. However, his heart is revived by a Mad Scientist of sorts and he comes back to avenge his erroneous death! In a way...  Boris Karloff gives a pretty decent performance that's very close to his  Frankenstein  one. What can I say. The guy is a decent actor but he lacks range. I think his most stand out performances thus far, aside from Frankenstein , have been in The Black Cat and The Black Room . Marguerite Churchill wasn't bad. Her character got pushed into the background quite frequently. Ricardo Cortez was a great villain though. He was pretty sinister.  Karloff starts picking off his enemies one by one. However, he doesn't actually place a hand on any of them. It's pretty interesting and kind of reminded me of Final Destination . That was about the most interesting thing that the movie had going for it. The climax and general lead-up to the meat of the movie couldn&

I have been notified by a few people that I need to re-watch this movie. Give it another day in court as a man once said. I don't think I paid much attention when watching it the first time. I will re-watch it and write something again but below is my original review.  In the 1930's, Boris Karloff seemed to be making a bunch of Edgar Allan Poe pictures. Poe has popped up numerous times throughout the Silver and Golden Age of horror. There have been countless remakes of his work. This one in particular takes the Poe story in a completely different direction. This movie deals with a mad scientist that is obsessed with Edgar Allan Poe type torture devices. Some of the performances are really hard and make me cringe. However, I enjoyed this movie. I wouldn't suggest watching it though unless you are a hardcore Karloff or Lugosi fan. The coolest thing about this movie would have to be the doctor's torture room; He devised a pretty incredible torture chamber w

The Black Room is a magnificent little movie from 1935 starring one Boris Karloff. He really hits a home run with his performance in this one. He plays the treacherous Gregor and even-keeled Anton, twin brothers prophesied to bring about the end of their lineage through murdering each-other. The story is set in the eighteenth century and has amazing design. The shots are vivid and beautiful for such an early production. I am so used to watching these low budget productions I sort of forget what a mainstream picture actually looks like.  Like I said above, this movie is all about Boris Karloff's performance. It's perfect for anyone studying film or anyone that's curious about Karloff's work away from his usual fare. Acting as a twin isn't something that's that fantastical. However, it is something that is butchered a lot. No one beats Schwarzenegger in Total Recall. Karloff does a great job of keeping the same essence with the characters but having little

One of the biggest films that James Whale ever directed was 1931's Frankenstein. The movie was so big that Universal Pictures asked Whale to come back and helm a sequel; thus The Bride of Frankenstein was born. This film is filled with suspense and terror, cheers and jeers. The Bride of Frankenstein is a rare type of movie; this is a sequel that actually holds its own when it goes toe to toe with its predecessor.  I have been watching a lot of James Whale horror movies lately; he must have been one of the hardest working horror directors in the 30's. This movie is very special and acts as sort of a platform for Whale to express his sexuality. Although not outlandishly displayed it is speculated that the movie has huge homosexual overtones: The relationship between the hermit and the monster, and the relationship between Dr. Frankenstein and Dr. Pretorius are two overt examples. This movie has been torn apart by modern film scholars.  The movie starts right where t

So I decided to watch... well the next movie that came across my desk. Never heard of this little gem before. It seems like a pretty big deal movie too. Where had I been? We have both Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi! Both! Like I need to say this but they are tremendous actors in this genre and both preform incredibly. Hugely iconic. The story is bizarre and loosely biased on an Edgar Allan Poe tale. Yes, this is yet again another Poe inspired movie. These movies are a dime a dozen right now. However, this one does it right. The story is memorable and fun. A couple meets a weird Doctor (Bela) on a train. They get into a pretty horrible accident and people are killed. It's pretty obvious, but they never speak of this again. Instead The doctor and the couple continue on. They all stumble, pretty conveniently, to the Doctors destination. A house owned and built by Boris Karloff's character, a psychotic and Satan-worshiping architect. The story states that the architect st

Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney, and Boris Karloff are some of the greatest horror movie actors of all time. They have so many legendary performances under their belts. There were other actors and actresses that were legendary in their own right. Basil Rathbone and Fay Wray are two prime examples, but they just don't stand up to the chops of Karloff or the master of disguise Chaney. That being said Boris Karloff delivers what I believe to be the greatest performance in the first 15 minuets of this movie and peters out. How do you take one of the best actors of horror and make him look amateur? I really appreciate what the director here is trying to do, this was an independent movie. The film had a very small budget, yet it didn't look like they wanted to scale anything down. The movie looked very clean and even pulled off a minor explosion, but it lacked in the story and really sagged in the middle. Boris' makeup was horrendous. The movie is about an archaeologist w

The Internet Movie Database lists this as a horror movie. I don't find it to be that exactly. Boris Karloff churns out a pretty chilling performance as the evil and sadistic Dr. Fu Manchu. A doctor with a touch for the dramatic and a love for torture. He gets a lot of pleasure out of torture. It may not be a true-to-the-color horror picture but it is a decent delve into the terror realm. A group of scientists, on an expedition are searching out the sword of Genghis Khan for study. However, Fu Manchu want's to get his grubby hands on the sword so that he can raise Khan from the dead and he would come destroy the entire Western World, especially the white dudes. Manchu really doesn't like white people in this movie. He actually says in a speech to his followers "Kill the white man and take his women!" The effects were really good, they did a cool Tesla Coil thing in Fu Manchu's laboratory. They made the movie look really neat and clean. The copy I watche

James Whale, Carl Laemmle, and Boris Karloff all come together for the best forgotten gem. This team already brought you one of the biggest horror movies in Frankenstein. So you know your getting yourself into some quality. The movie is a parody of the horror films that had come before it in previous years. It's comedy is really smart and the horror element is perfect. The Old Dark House stands tall next to Frankenstein. It joins the ranks of the best films of the 30's.  On a stormy night, three young people seek refuge in an old dark house. It is inhabited by a scary couple of old people. An old man and woman. The woman has a voice like a paint scraper. The ghoulish people have a Butler that looks friggin' insane. Then they are joined by two others. The whole group is being terrorized all night by that crazy butler who chases people around. Then he lets his pyromaniac brother loose. Hilarity ensues. The whole movie has this really weird vibe to it you can feel the

Now we get to The Mummy from 1932. Not to be confused with the Brendan Fraser comedy series that goes by the same name. No. This movie is one of those "Original Monster" movies from Universal Pictures. Carl Laemmle Jr. and Boris Karloff are responsible for the bringing this classic tale to the silver screen. The Mummy is a great old movie that was followed up by a ton of useless sequels. So far the movie has been remade a couple of times, once in 1959 by Hammer Horror and in 1999 with Brendan Frasier. This film, starring the amazing Boris Karloff as Imhotep begins with him being resurrected accidentally by two archaeologists. In one pretty laughable scene, Imhotep who is newly risen from the grave, passes through a scene prompting one of the archaeologists to nearly die laughing. They try to stop him but Imhotep escapes into Cairo. Then posing as a modern Egyptian man, he finds two other archaeologists and has them begin to dig where his ancient lover was buried to

This movie is the quintessential Frankenstein piece. The Monster is so iconic and the story is timeless. Everything that follows this is just a copycat. Boris Karloff puts out a great big masterful performance as the powerful and destructive monster. While other actors including Dwight Frye make this film so interesting and greatly acted introduction into "Talkie" horrors.  I mean acting with sound was brand new. Only in it's infancy. Its really amazing if you stand back and look at it. I was always taught growing up that I should not fear the monster, but I should feel bad for him. Admittedly, I really feel bad for the poor guy. It seems to me that he is just a misunderstood zombie-esqe type dude who just wants nothing more than to fit in. Unfortunately he doesn't know his own strength, and he is clumsy. Its kind of like the Gorilla with a kitten thing where the Gorilla is given a kitten and he loves it and loves it until he squeezes it to death. The Gorilla

I really dislike monkeys as antagonists in movies, its bizarre I know, and I can't exactly tell you why I dislike bad monkeys. I just can't ever get into that storyline. Well I couldn't until now. The Ape from 1940 happens to be the ONE ape movie that I can really enjoy. This is in no way a good movie I am just a fan of the story here. It was really good. Bela Lugosi stars as Dr. Bernard Adrian; a mad scientist who has vowed to save the life of a young woman struggling against polio. Meanwhile there is an escaped gorilla terrorizing the country side. Long story short the doctor ends up in a gorilla suit. Sorry for spoiling that for you. Just take it. Bela's acting is nothing short of amazing here and he really carries the entire film. It looks like it was really low budget and the whole idea behind the movie is ridiculous to the point that it is amazing. The movie has very little in the way of violence or anything very scary; most, if anything happens off camera. Also

Black Sabbath from 1963 is an Anthology Horror film that is both corny and frightening in parts. The movie is dated and some of the material doesn't really hold over well, however the movie has become an inspiration for film-makers like Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avery. The movie features three parts that are introduced humorously, albeit a bit morbidly, by Boris Karloff; the movie was made in the early sixties and it has a sort of psychedelic aesthetic and art to it.  The three stories: "The Drop of Water" is a tale of terror about a woman who steals a ring from a dead woman only to be haunted by the deceased woman. "The Telephone" is a creepy tale about a woman being watched by a crazed ex-pimp who was thought to be dead. The last is "The Wurdulak" about a man who becomes a vampire and turns his family and the people close to him; this tale is the weakest in the line up.  The movie's art direction is very 60's acid-trip inspire