FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN (1943)

THE CREEPING BRIDE:

FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN was re-released by Realart in 1949 and frequently ran in movie theaters right up until its appearance on TV as part of the SHOCK! program beginning in 1957. It was most often paired with DRACULA'S DAUGHTER, but it turned up as well alongside THE MAD GHOUL, THE MUMMY'S CURSE, and THE MUMMY'S GHOST. FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN was also a familiar offering in those years at cinemas that ran late-night spook shows and kiddie matinees.

Daily Times-News, Burlington, NC, April 28, 1951

Hamilton [OH] Daily News Journal, March 16, 1957
That's not a bad way to spend a quarter on a Saturday afternoon...

Like GODZILLA VS. KING KONG (1962), the title alone would be enough to drum up excited anticipation for FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN; the prospect of seeing Frankenstein's Monster and the Wolf Man whale the tar out of each other almost certainly sold a lot of tickets. Maybe seeing it in a movie theater with a lot of rambunctious kids hopped-up on refreshment-stand goodies on a Saturday afternoon or with nervously giggling popcorn-munching teenagers on a date-night makes all the difference with this movie, but watching it by yourself on television only emphasizes its faults.

Lima [OH] News, February 14, 1959

(...still, I'd rather watch FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN on WTOL-Toledo on Saturday night's Shock Theater than WTVN-Columbus' option of ENEMY AGENT. Channel 10's mystery movie WHO IS HOPE SCHUYLER? [1942] is not so bad, though... )

I'm not sure who to blame for this messy, de-centered movie-- Curt Siodmak's script is sloppy, but maybe producer George Waggner forced some last-minute changes that account for the biggest disappointments here. Tom Weaver and the Brunas brothers explain in Universal Horrors that one of the major changes was the excising of all the scenes of dialogue between Béla Lugosi's Monster and Lon Chaney, Jr.'s Larry Talbot; in so doing, a lot of plot exposition goes missing (I don't know how many times I had seen the movie before I realized that the Monster was supposed to be blind from the previous Frankenstein film). It also explains many of the odd aspects of Lugosi's performance as the Monster-- let's give the guy the benefit of the doubt and say that the edited-out dialogue would've made him appear less bizarre in his acting than he seems in the pantomime version that was released. Editing out those scenes make this already Wolf Man-centered film even more so, raising the question as to why this wasn't called THE WOLF MAN MEETS FRANKENSTEIN. (That this film is included in Universal's 2004 "Legacy Series" DVD set for the Wolf Man rather than Frankenstein underscores this.)

The germ of the idea that Talbot is searching the ruins of Frankenstein castle for the means of death after being buried alive for four years is good and grim, and this should give the movie a pop-existentialist tang. But that gets crowded out by all the other threads of the story, none of which are given much development, such as the changes that the Baroness Frankenstein (Ilona Massey) goes through in the course of the film and, even more mysterious, the motivations behind Dr. Frank Mannering's (Patric Knowles) actions. (What's more highly compressed in this movie? Mannering's decision to give up his post in a Cardiff hospital to chase Talbot? His switch to completely believing Talbot's "Oh, but I'm a werewolf!" story after all rather than continuing to insist that it is a lycanthropic delusion? His love affair with the Baroness? His decision to become a monster-maker?)

In addition to the holes and confusion within the story itself, there are also problems with FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN being able follow the larger story-line arcs laid out in FRANKENSTEIN, BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN, SON OF FRANKENSTEIN, and THE GHOST OF FRANKENSTEIN. But that's really not worth squabbling about-- a couple weeks back in comments to my post on THE MUMMY'S HAND, the argument came up that the non-chronological showing of films in the SHOCK! package meant that viewers experienced these films as discrete, stand-alone stories that couldn't be tied to any sort of narrative continuity that carried from one film in the series to the next. And that's probably the only way to view FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN in the end.

What works best about this movie for me, though, are some of the sets in FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN which create such an iconic monster-movie mood when I see them. For example, the Hollywood gothic Llanwelly cemetery might be the best graveyard scene in the Universal horror movie canon. (By the way, does anyone know how Talbot got from the cemetery to Cardiff and how he got that nasty head wound in the first place?) I also groove on the Frankenstein ice caves and the burned-out ruined cellar laboratory. And even though it is such a hokey-looking miniature, I still always love the castle at the foot of the dam-- just seeing it conjures up the sheer thrill of watching this movie on TV despite all of the disappointments.

*****

Trailer, more ads, etc.

THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET (1942)

Shock Theater presents THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET....

As most Universal horror films, THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET starts off with delicious chiller atmosphere, expectantly foreshadowed by Hans Salter's familiar monster music played over surprisingly dull opening credits. It's gloomy and raining on Market Street, as a lone man stops on the corner and then proceeds cautiously to the ground floor office of a Dr. Ralph Benson. Within the office, he is greeted by Benson, played with his usual slimy efficiency by Lionel Atwill. We learn that the man is here to be used as an experimental subject for suspended animation. His payment: one thousand dollars for his starving family. Dr. Benson assures him that the experiment will be successful. Of course, it isn't, and as the police arrive in the morning, alerted by the man's wife, Dr. Benson makes his escape through a window....

It's difficult not to feel annoyed that Universal could not maintain the same level of tension and atmosphere throughout the rest of the movie. With an ever-growing emphasis on the more humorous characters of the film whom we are introduced to on a ship in which Dr. Benson makes his escape from England, MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET struggles to find a focus. In his last starring role, Lionel Atwill is the film's only welcome presence, but his devilish intensity and fiery briskness is depressed by the lackluster story. The male "hero" (hard to call him that as the character is emasculated from the start), played by Richard Davies, is the worst such male lead character in any Universal horror film I have seen.

In its original theatrical run, MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET was the lower half of a double bill toplined by THE WOLF MAN.

All of the film's effective moments come in the early Market Street scenes, which last perhaps a scant seven minutes. Clearly, the Mad Doctor should never have left Market Street.

Trailer here:

The Creeping Bride: 

How many horror-movie fans have actually seen this on commercial-broadcast TV? I pose this question because I was surprised to see just how infrequently THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET was shown in the usual "Shock Theatre/Creature Feature"-style time slots. In fact, it turned up more in the late afternoon and early evening, sometimes as part of of showcases with unintentionally amusing titles like "Hollywood's Best" and "Million Dollar Movie" (this movie is a long way from meeting either of those descriptors). Perhaps one reason for its appearance in those other programming niches is that it plays more like a tropical island adventure tale-comedy-romance than it does a horror melodrama.

Mirek first wrote about THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET back in June 2008 for this blog and emphasized the atmosphere of the first seven minutes or so when we visit Dr. Benson's lab in San Francisco one dark and stormy night. Most of the research that I've read about this movie says that these scenes were tacked-on as an afterthought-- the entire movie was originally set on the New Zealand-bound luxury liner and on the island after the shipwreck. This underscores for me the possibility that this film had been meant more as a South Pacific island adventure than a horror movie.

Gazette-Mail, Charleston,WV, November 22, 1959

It's worth watching for Lionel Atwill's work as Dr. Benson; the guy seems to be savoring his every line as the megalomaniacal research chemist who believes that he can find a way to make suspended animation a viable medical procedure for beating death. When he sets up himself as the "God of Life" among the island's "superstitious savages," things almost get a little bit Heart of Darkness, but Atwill's mad scientist is too incompetent to really pull off the Kurtz business. He's not a mad scientist because he's brilliantly unorthodox; rather, he's dangerous because he doesn't realize that he's not very smart at all. This is the one interesting idea-kernel at the center of this silly movie: what would happen if one of those sad, creepy misfits who would ordinarily be shunned by society was able to achieve absolute social power? (When the movie was made in 1941, this could very well have been meant as a pointed critique of the anti-social losers who had risen to the top by joining fascist political parties. And then in 1965, that theme gets applied to juvenile delinquents in Bert I. Gordon's VILLAGE OF THE GIANTS, I suppose...) There's not enough time in this movie to explore the theme, but it is in there somewhere.

I also like small parts of THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET because I'm a fan of director Joseph H. Lewis; as in a previous SHOCK! offering THE SPY RING, Lewis manages to smuggle in some cinematic style and atmosphere despite the microscopic budget and two-week shooting schedule. (One bit of business that's overdone, though, are the scenes where Atwill delivers anesthetic to his patients by advancing into the camera and smothering the lens with ether-soaked items-- Lewis does this three times in 61 minutes).

Beyond Atwill and Lewis and the mutant fusion of horror, comedy, romance, and South Seas island picture (and it's as messy as it sounds), THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET is sort of entertaining in a goofy, Poverty Row horror kind of way. I almost want to like it, but top-billed Una Merkel's shrill, grating Aunt Margaret and Nat Pendleton's distracting mugging as boxer Red Hogan is a deadly, unfunny combination. The two of them all but snuff the life out of this motion picture for me.

"PSSST!! PSSST!! PA-TRICCCCC-IA!!"

THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET drinking game: take a shot of liquor every time that Nat Pendleton rolls his tongue along the inside of his cheeks like he's doing in this still. But beware the "weenie roast" scene!

I don't know much about these South Pacific island adventure movies; I've read that they were very popular with audiences over the years. The filmmakers do they best that they can with camera set-ups and blocking to give you the impression that this is a sizable tropical island rather than some Universal studio lagoon beach. The natives on the island are of the usual hokey Hollywood ooga-booga variety and there is plenty of grunting and mumbling gibberish that is supposed to pass for language. African-American actor Noble Johnson-- last seen around here a few days ago in whiteface as Janos the Black One in MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE-- returns in the MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET as chief Elan; he really makes the most of this very limited material and comes off better than you might expect. It's a shame, though, that Dr. Benson's hubristic fall at the hands Elan is alluded to off-screen rather than shown.

Listing in the Lowell [MA] Sun for WLVI-Boston's 10PM double-feature, Friday October 27, 1967. It's a full ten years after the launch of the SHOCK! package on TV and so outside of my usual scope of investigation, but I had to reproduce the listing here-- how's that for some clever programming of a late-night double-feature?!? And what a completely bizarre description of what THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET is about...

*****

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Now on Blu-Ray as part of the Universal Horror Collection Vol. 2.

The SHOCK! Package

Pictured above is the front cover of the promotional spiral-bound book released by Columbia's television division, Screen Gems, in October 1957 for its SHOCK! package. The SHOCK! library consisted of 52 films, all from Universal's vaults. The list:

The Black Cat
Calling Dr. Death
The Cat Creeps
Chinatown Squad
Danger Woman
A Dangerous Game
Dead Man's Eyes
Destination Unknown
Dracula
Dracula's Daughter
Enemy Agent
Frankenstein
Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man
The Frozen Ghost
The Great Impersonation
Horror Island
House of Horrors
The Invisible Man
The Invisible Man Returns
The Invisible Ray
The Last Warning
The Mad Doctor of Market Street
The Mad Ghoul
Man Made Monster
The Man Who Cried Wolf
The Mummy
The Mummy's Ghost
The Mummy's Hand
The Mummy's Tomb
Murders in the Rue Morgue
The Mystery of Edwin Drood
The Mystery of Marie Roget
Mystery of the White Room
Night Key
Nightmare
Night Monster
Pillow of Death
The Raven
Reported Missing!
Sealed Lips
The Secret of the Blue Room
Secret of the Chateau
She-Wolf of London
Son of Dracula
Son of Frankenstein
The Spider Woman Strikes Back
The Spy Ring
The Strange Case of Doctor Rx
Weird Woman
Werewolf of London
The Witness Vanishes
The Wolf Man

Intentions, Intentions

My intention is to copy here the old blog, adding larger graphics and new information. I know that many of these films are now getting Blu-Ray treatment, whereas before, when the old blog was starting out, it was just DVDs. Please bear with me, as I have a thousand other things to take off. The reproduction of the old blog will take time, as well as new info and graphics.

The Return of SHOCK!

It is November 12, 2019. A little after midnight. In doing some research, I came across our old blog dedicated to the Shock and Son of Shock packages, and what was happening at that time relating to horror. I very much liked what I saw. I noted that my co-author of the old blog, Creeping Bride, not only had a splendid writing style, but was knowledgeable about this phenomenon--and inquisitive,which means a lot when you are doing any type of research. I also noted that she disappeared without a word and no one has heard from her (I assume it's a "her") since then.

It been a while since the last post, and that "while" is an understatement. It's been years, and a lot has happened. But the work surrounding these two packages is not done. The work continues. So this is a return. The return of SHOCK! And, of course, his little son.