(1932)
Dir - Charles Brabin/Charles Vidor
Overall: MEH
A very strangely flawed and dated work, MGM's adaptation of Sax Rohmer's novel of the same name The Mask of Fu Manchu is unmistakably both offensive and ridiculous. Casting Caucasian actors in yellow-face was certainly the style at the time, (and even still three decades later, Christopher Lee would portray the title villain in no less than five such films), but the movie goes to greater lengths to characterize everyone not Asian as unflatteringly as possible. Fu Manchu's master plan is to "kill the white man and take his women", his daughter, (Myrna Loy, also in yellow-face), practically climaxes as she watches a dashing, hunky white guy get tortured, Manchu has a bunch of loincloth-clad, non-speaking African slaves that act as muscle, and any other Asian people present are depicted as either doped-up in a morphine den, getting drunk in a brothel, or blindly following Manchu in his racially-driven quest. Meanwhile the movie is brimful of plot holes to the point of silliness and many of Manchu's would-be inventive torture devices ultimately end up getting easily thwarted. It is a curious view if not a very proud effort for those who made it.
(1936)
Dir - Michael Curtiz
Overall: MEH
Highly prolific, Hungarian born Michael Curtiz, (Casablanca, Angels with Dirty Faces, Yankee Doodle Dandy), made The Walking Dead for Warner Bros. based off of a script that was heavily revised before shooting. This was in part due to the issues that Boris Karloff had with it, notably its similarities to Frankenstein. While it is still easy to connect the lines between this and Karloff's star-making Frankenstein in the final version, (he plays a character who is brought back to life in a doctor's laboratory and has stunted movement and speech afterwards), the story is quite different. It is also nowhere near as strong, kind of vaguely toying with the concept of a supernatural, higher entity that appears to be in play, seeking out justice for Karloff's wrongly convicted protagonist. Being a part crime drama as well and only just over an hour long, the film does not really spend enough time exploring its themes, rather stumbling to its conclusion with most of the avenues left uncharted. Karloff is a bit wasted as well, though he does as admirable of a job with what he has as can be expected.
(1939)
Dir - Nick Grinde
Overall: GOOD
The first of four mad doctor themed films that Columbia made with Boris Karloff, (the first three of which were directed by Nick Grinde), The Man They Could Not Hang is done and over with in a mere sixty-four minutes which suits the trim, filler-less plot just as well. While the entire cast is as forgettable as they come, Karloff is all you need as the doomed, once kind and respected turned revenge-seeking Dr. Savaard who goes through a complete 180 arc as convincingly as he does quickly. There is a reason actors like he were able to consistently transcend any material they were given as Karloff's refusal to unnecessarily ham it up keeps any would-be lack of plausibility at bay. It also makes the dire nature of the situation come through where we not only feel for him, but his victims as well. The script for TMTCNH is wound pretty tight, up until the ending at least which is regrettably rushed and a little anticlimactic. This was followed by the similarly titled The Man with Nine Lives, Before I Hang, and The Devil's Commandments within the following two years, further typecasting Karloff as Hollywood's go-to horror movie doctor.
No comments:
Post a Comment