Bride of the Monster (1955)

... aka: Atomic Monster, The
... aka: Bride of the Atom
... aka: Monster of the Marshes

Directed by:
Edward D. Wood Jr.

Bride started life as a script called The Atomic Monster, written in 1953 by Alex Gordon, who'd go on to co-write the director's Jail Bait the following year. Wood so liked the idea that he completely rewrote it and then re-titled it Monster of the Marshes. Since he'd already befriended down on his luck / drug-addicted horror icon Bela Lugosi (who had already appeared in Wood's 1953 transvestite epic Glen or Glenda?) he was able to pay him a measly 1,000 dollars to star and had some money from donors to start the project. Production under the new title Bride of the Atom began in October 1954 at Ted Allen Studios in Hollywood, but had to be shut down after just a few days due to money problems. Seeking further funding, Ed turned to Arizona meat packing entrepreneur Donald E. McCoy, who forked over the majority of the budget in exchange for Wood casting his inexperienced son Tony McCoy in the heroic lead role, plus making sure there was an anti-nuclear war sentiment and explosion at the very end. The total budget ended up being 70,000 dollars, making it the highest-budgeted film of Wood's entire career. It is also believed to be his only film to turn a profit during its initial theatrical run. Filming was completed by 1955 and it debuted under the new title Bride of the Monster at the Paramount Theater on May, 11 1955. Samuel Z. Arkoff was involved in distribution of the picture and supposedly used some of the profits to form his American International Pictures (along with James H. Nicholson) the following year.

After fleeing his homeland, mad scientist Dr. Eric Vornoff (Lugosi) has taken up residence in an old abandoned house in the country along with his rotund, mute henchman Lobo (400-pound Swedish professional wrestler Tor Johnson). There, Vornoff works on his experiments in a hidden lab that's accessed through the fireplace, with aspirations of one day creating a race of "atomic supermen" to take over the world. In the meantime, he's content watching his “monster” (stock shots of an octopus) swim around as it guards the swamp waters outside. A couple of hunters seeking refuge from a storm have the misfortune of stumbling onto the home. One meets his fate in the monster's tentacles, while the other is captured by Lobo, brought back to the lab, strapped down to a table and dies after being hooked up to some electronic thingamabob. It appears Vornoff has yet to perfect his experiments.

Since there have been twelve disappearances around the marshes where Vornoff has set up shop in the past three months, Captain Robbins (Harvey B. Dunn) puts his best man Lt. Dick Craig (McCoy) on the case. Dick's engaged to be married to Janet Lawton (Loretta King), a pushy reporter who doesn't buy the garbage the police are selling her about people dying in the quicksand bogs or from alligator attacks. She believes that a monster is actually responsible and sets out to prove she's right. Not heeding advice of the police to stay away from the area, Janet goes out to Lake Marsh during a storm. She ends up running her car off the road, gets out, sees a snake, sees Lobo heading her way and passes out from the shock of it all. After taking a whiff of her fluffy white Angora hat and sticking it in his pocket to do God knows what with later, Lobo carries Janet back to the Old Willows Place. There, Vornoff uses his Dracula-like hand motions to hypnotize her.

Professor Vladimir Strowski (George Becwar) mysteriously shows up at the police station claiming to be an expert on prehistoric monsters who can help them in case there is indeed a monster lurking the swamps. Dick thinks he's “a strange sort of bird” and he's not far off. Strowski is actually a foreign agent sent there to try to locate Vornoff and bring him back to his country to help them create the “master race.” The doctor isn't having any of it though because his experiments had previously got him laughed at, ultimately banished from his homeland and separated from his wife and son. As far as he's concerned, he no longer has a home and all of his experiments are going to be for his own benefit. Strowski promptly gets fed to the octo-monster. Meanwhile, Dick and his partner Marty (Don Nagel) head out to the swamps, where they find both Janet and Strowski's abandoned cars. Dick decides to walk on up to the Old Willows Place to check it out. Can he get there in time to save Janet from becoming a woman of super human strength and super-beauty aka Vornoff's latest creation “The Bride of the Atom?” Will Dr. Vornoff pay because “He tampered in God's domain?” And will Lobo finally turn on his master (even a semi-retarded mongoloid can only stand so much whipping!) and get to experience the soft, comforting touch of the Atomic Bride's lacy new gown?

A lot of people watch this after seeing various silly scenes reenacted in Burton's 1994 Ed Wood bio-pic. I'm sure they were pleased to discover that movie didn't exaggerate. The dialogue is just as awful and stilted, the acting is just as wooden, the sets are just as cheap and wobbly, the octopus model (supposedly stolen from Republic Pictures' prop house... except they forgot to take the motor!) is just as unconvincing and the whole thing is just as rushed and poorly-made as it came off in Burton's film. There's also Wood's trademark liberal use of cost-cutting stock footage (lightning bolts, an octopus, an alligator, an atom bomb explosion...) as well as lots of close-ups of Lugosi's “sinister” eyes to bring to mind his earlier work in superior films like White Zombie (1932). This one certainly has its fans, as do many Wood films. Some even claim this is legitimately good but just misunderstood. It's not. It's awful. Hilariously awful, entertaining and not without its own weird charms, including a few poignant moments for Lugosi in his final speaking film role, but still awful.

Also in the cast are Paul Marco as Kelton the Cop (a role he'd repeat in numerous other Wood films), Wood's girlfriend-at-the-time Dolores Fuller in a small role as a file clerk and an uncredited Conrad Brooks, who can be seen sitting on a bench outside of the police office. Many of the actors (Johnson, Marco, Nagel, Dunn) would return for the follow-up, Night of the Ghouls (1959), which didn't get released until the 1980s. Because of Wood's cult popularity and the film's public domain status, it's been released on DVD and VHS by too many different labels to name here. The 2008 release from Legend Films also includes a colorized version of the film.

SBIG

Unearthly, The (1957)

... aka: House of the Monsters
... aka: Night of the Monsters

Directed by:
Boris Petroff

Oft-dissed, this low-budget time-waster (which was later poked fun of on an episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000), managed to keep me reasonably entertained for 70 minutes. Not that it's particularly good, and it's certainly not original, but it's also not without merit. The acting is uneven, but passable, for the most part, the science is silly, there are a few (unintentionally) hilarious moments, the make-up fx work from Harry Thomas is good and the Island of Dr. Moreau-inspired shock finale is surprisingly potent after a slow build-up. I was also surprised to discover that the works of Ed Wood had actually influenced other films immediately upon their release. How else can you explain the presence of slow-witted behemoth Lobo; who was transplanted here from Wood's semi-famous 1955 mad doctor tale BRIDE OF THE MONSTER (1955) with same actor (Tor Johnson) playing the part? The poster - complete with a seal promising it was "guaranteed to frighten!" - is pretty amusing, too. Good thing that wasn't a money-back guarantee!

Emotionally troubled Grace Thomas (Allison Hayes) - who has just suffered from a nervous breakdown - checks in at a large, remote clinic run by Dr. Charles Conway (John Carradine). Well actually she's been lured there under false pretenses by her own psychologist, Dr. Wright (Roy Gordon), who apparently doesn't think much of her despite the fact she's very kind and extremely polite. Not to mention a hottie. Dr. Conway doesn't want his "patients" to have any ties to the outside world, so Dr. Wright promises to arrange it to look like Grace has killed herself. In the meantime, she's led to believe that the clinic will cure her of her bouts of fright.

We're also introduced to an array of other characters who populate the clinic. There's Conway's assistant, icy blonde Dr. Sharon Gilchrist (Marilyn Buferd), who's in love with Conway, jealous over the attention he lavishes on the beautiful Grace and serves up midnight snacks of milk and sedatives. Then there's Danny (Arthur Batanides), a loud, obnoxious, chain-smoking neurotic who wants to break someone's neck for serving him cold toast and claims "It's a lousy world!" Natalie (Sally Todd) is a lovestruck, romance novel reading nympho who needs to "co-ordinate" herself. A thief and murderer named Frank Scott (Myron Healey) shows up fresh from a prison escape with an alias ("Mark Houston") and is blackmailed into doing Conway's bidding. And then there's hulking manservant Lobo (Tor J.), who also does the doctor's bidding and is described as "an overgrown moron" who has the "strength of a Hercules and the brain of chicken."

Naturally, Carradine's mad scientist is conducting unethical experiments and all of his patients are guinea pigs unaware of what's in store for them. Dr. Conway is interested is prolonging youth and vigour and feels he can do so by surgically implanting an artificially-developed "17 gland" (?!) and then shooting his test subjects up with a blast of radiation to kick the gland into gear. Unfortunately, his procedure hasn't quite worked out and sometimes the patient ends up a little lobotomized and/or deformed. One of his failed test subjects is a zombie-like man confined to a chair in the cellar with limited, jerky movement. Another female patient ends up getting her face horribly wrinkled. And well, let's just say those aren't the only two glandular experiments that haven't worked out.

Carradine had played this same exact egomaniacal, sociopathic mad doctor role a dozen times before this one and gives a typical John Carradine egomaniacal, sociopathic mad doctor performance here. You could make a drinking game out of the amount of times his character reminds us that he's a brilliant scientist who loves his work, so every other stoic line is something like "I am a scientist, thinking is my business!" or "As a true scientist, nothing is impossible!" or "They've always called the greatest scientists crazy!" During a completely bloodless (!) organ transplant surgery, Carradine dryly barks out orders to his assistant: "scalpel, sponge, sponge, clamp, clamp, clamp, wipe my brow, clamp, sponge, number 23 scalpel, brow, sponge..." as she hurridly tries to keep up with him. The transplant is done in about 90 seconds. Durng another amusing scene, Carradine plays Bach's 'Toccata and Fugue in D Minor' on the organ after dinner to try to cover up any noise being made while a patient upstairs is being drugged and prepped for surgery.

Hayes (immortalized as the title character in ATTACK OF THE 50 FT. WOMAN) is a fine actress but stuck here playing a sometimes annoyingly naive character ("I'll do as you wish, doctor!"). Still, she commands attention in all of her scenes simply because she's so damn gorgeous to look at and is often clad in form-fitting attire that shows off her statuesque figure. Healey is a little wooden but somewhat likable as the fugitive, Buferd does OK as the loyal but frustrated assistant and both Todd and Batanides try their best to be convincing nuthouse patients, with varying degrees of success. Johnson is very, very funny here, makes hilarious facial expressions throughout and gets such side-splitting lines as "Ohhh... Pretty girl. Ohhh... Prettttty!," "FerdiNAND?" and "Time for go to bed!" So while the film is nothing spectacular, there's some definite redeeming camp value contained within.

Hey, director / producer Boris Petroff liked the end result so much that he decided to remove his name from the credits and replace it with "Brooke L. Peters!" In many ways, this film was a family affair. Petroff's wife Jane Mann wrote the original story and co-scripted, and his daughter Gloria Petroff appears in the pre-credits sequence clawing Lobo's face and screaming. Petroff also made ANATOMY OF A PSYCHO (1961), which was also written by his wife.

Unearthly is an easy title to find. It's been released multiple times to both VHS - by Rhino and WEA Corp.; including a special version available with the MST3K commentary - and on DVD. The Image Entertainment disc includes a very good quality, nice-looking print of the film, but the special features are nearly nonexistent.

★★

Black Sleep, The (1956)

...aka: Dr. Cadman's Secret

Directed by:
Reginald Le Borg

Usually the recipient of very negative reviews (nonsense!), this is great fun for classic horror fans and nowhere as bad as its reputed to be. Wrongly convicted of the murder of a money lender, Dr. Gordon Ramsay (Herbert Rudley) awaits his death on the gallows. The day before his execution is to take place, aristocratic scientist Sir Joel Cadman (Basil Rathbone) offers Ramsay a second chance at life under a new identity via "the black death;" a dark powder from the West Indies that will cause just a temporary demise as long as an antidote is administered within twelve hours. With nothing to lose, Ramsay signs over burial arrangements to Cadman, agrees to assist him in his experiments upon his revival and takes the drug. After dying and being brought back, Ramsay accompanies Cadman to his secluded castle home and the two begin their brain experiments on cadavers. Helping the men are a pair of surgical nurses; older, dedicated Daphne (Phyllis Stanley) and younger Laurie (Patricia Blair), who always seems to be on edge. And it's no wonder she's a bit jumpy... Every time she's left alone, a grunting, limping mental defective named Mungo (Lon Chaney, Jr.), who Cadman allows to freely wander around, tries to strangle her!

Ramsay discovers that Cadman isn't actually using cadavers in the experiments, but living humans, who have been drugged, kidnapped and dropped off by gypsy tattooist Professor Odo (Akim Tamiroff, providing much welcome comic relief). He also discovers that Cadman's chief objective with his experiments is to gain knowledge that will help him revive his wife Angelina (Louanna Gardner), who's been in a coma for eight months. A secret panel hidden behind the fireplace holds another secret. Behind it is a long staircase. Up leads to the surgical room, but down leads to a torture chamber full of disfigured, deranged cast offs from Cadman's previous experiments.

Aside from Rathbone and Chaney, the film completes its awesome all-star cast with supporting roles for Bela Lugosi, Tor Johnson and John Carradine. Lugosi (looking pretty feeble in his last role) plays mute butler Casimir, who has absolutely nothing to do other than stand in the background and open and close doors as people come and go. A blank-eyed Johnson has a small part as a basement dweller and, just like Lugosi and Chaney, is given no dialogue. Carradine fairs best in a brief, but hysterically funny role as Bohemund, a deranged profit. Looking like he just walked off the set of THE TEN COMMANDMENTS in a long wig, long beard and robe, the actor spends his screen time ranting, raving and beating people over the head with his walking stick!

Rathbone and Tamiroff both give great performances, but the real surprise here is Hudley, who receives sixth billing to all the genre greats, yet easily manages to hold his own with a natural and appealing performance. It's too bad the actor would never appear in another genre film. The film is set in 1872, though the production isn't elaborate enough to ever stray from the cheap looking sets. The brain surgery sequence is very well done, though, and surprisingly grisly for the time, with Rathbone poking and prodding inside a victim's head. Cerebral fluid even gushes out at one point! The make-up designs on the basement mutants are minor but passable. The ending is hectic, rushed and sometimes unintentionally funny, but one thing it's not is boring.

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All things considered, I can say with some certainty that most horror buffs will get a kick out of what they see here... granted they can find a copy. As of this writing, the film has never been released on video or DVD. Your best bet is checking the program guide for Turner Classic Movies, who air it every once in awhile.

★★1/2