The Mummy's Ghost (1944)

The 1940s was one of greatest decades for filmmaking and it was also one of the worst. It is common for old codgers such as myself to complain about the endless reboots and sequels that are plaguing the cinema screens today; but this is nothing new and the 1940s was a fairly sequel happy decade. The biggest offender was Universal Studios and their endless monster movie series.  

First, let’s back track a minute: In 1932, Universal released The Mummy, a moody tale of supernatural romance (and essentially a reworking of Dracula) to great success. However, by 1936 Universal’s first cycle of horror movies had come to end with Dracula’s Daughter and the studio moved on to other projects.  In 1938, a Los Angeles theatre staged a triple feature of Dracula, Frankenstein, and King Kong, and the overall results were impressive. Universal capitalized on this momentum by putting into production the terrific Son of Frankenstein. The movie was a success and revitalized Universal’s monster movie brand, and other movies were quickly rushed into production. 

In 1940, Universal released The Invisible Man Returns (starring a young Vincent Price) and The Mummy’s Hand. Both movies were essentially reboots, though The Invisible Man Returns is connected to the original movie; Frank Griffin, the brother of the original Invisible Man, Jack Griffin, helps the protagonist escape from prison.   The Mummy’s Hand is full fledged reboot; it introduces new characters and divides the Karloff role into two characters, Kharis (the mummy) and Andoheb, a high priest of Karnak.  Andoheb controls Kharis by brewing nine sacred tana leaves and is determined to make sure the tomb of princess Ananka goes undisturbed.  The movie was shot on an extremely low budget; it features a flashback that lifts shots from the original movie that noticeably feature Boris Karloff.  It is a fun little B-movie with a likable cast and few creepy moments, but is a definite downgrade from the original.

In 1942, Universal would release a sequel, The Mummy’s Tomb, which features an even longer flashback and actually lifts footage from The Mummy’s Hand; the first twenty minutes is essentially a recap of the previous movie.  The main difference between the two, other than location (it moves the action to New England) is the presence of Lon Chaney, Jr. in the role of Kharis (Tom Tyler played Kharis in the previous movie).  No doubt this was a publicity move on Universal’s part to capitalize on the Chaney name by showing off Junior’s great versatility as an actor, but there is nothing distinguishable about Chaney’s performance. Universal could have gotten a similar performance out of a stuntman and saved a lot of money in the process. Though, The Mummy’s Tomb maybe the horror sequel that started the time honored tradition of killing off the survivors of the first movie; it takes place thirty years after the first movie and both returning cast members, Dick Foran and Wallace Ford, are offed by Kharis. 

Finally, this brings us to 1944 and the release of The Mummy’s Ghost. YAY!!!! The question you might ask is: Why even bother writing about this movie?  It’s, at best, a mediocre entry in a fairly forgettable series, so what could possibly be the appeal?  Spoilers for a crappy 72 year-old movie!!!!

It is true that for three quarters of its running time The Mummy’s Ghost is a fairly standard horror sequel: Kharis plods through the countryside strangling any yokel that gets in his way, while the local police are completely baffled by the whole thing. Meanwhile, it turns out that pretty college student, Amina, is the reincarnation of Kharis’ beloved princess Ananka. Thankfully, her boyfriend Tom is there to protect her and, more importantly, has convinced the local authorities that Kharis is a genuine threat. They pull their resources together and plan on trapping the monster.  The rest of the movie is just a formality: Kharis meets a fiery end and Amina and Tom live happily together.  Except that this doesn’t happen!  The movie does a complete 180 on us and allows Kharis to walk away with the girl at the movie’s end.  The townspeople set the trap alright, but Kharis doesn’t show up.  While the townspeople are setting up the trap, Kharis has abducted Amina and taken her to his guardian, Yousef Bey (John Carradine). Yousef begins to lust after Amina and wants to preserve her beauty forever by using fluid from the tana leaves.  This royally pisses Kharis off and he strangles Yousef, and then carries Amina away. Tom arrives too late as Kharis and Amina sink to the bottom of the swamp. THE END! The filmmakers make this ending more palatable by having Amina slowly transform into Ananka’s 3,000 year old corpse, but still, for all intensive purposes, Kharis gets the girl at the end. This is a fairly grim ending, especially for 1944. It is on par with having Dracula end with the count running off with Mina, while Jonathan Harker sobs uncontrollably.  It’s completely unimaginable. 

This ending should be shocking, but the problem is that Ramsey Ames (as Amina) is not a particularly good actress.  She’s an attractive woman to be sure (most Hollywood starlets are) but her personality doesn’t register onscreen and she doesn’t do herself any favor with her stiff line delivery (Virginia Christine fares much better in the role in The Mummy’s Curse).  Robert Lowery is affable enough, but is fairly forgettable.  It doesn’t help that the two actors are upstaged by a dog; Tom has a pet dog named Peanuts, who can detect evil a mile away. This wouldn’t a problem if Kharis were an interesting villain, but he is a complete bore. He also isn’t much of a menace: Kharis’ victims could easily outpace him if they just walked away at a brisk pace, instead of just screaming their heads off;  Kharis walks with a limp and has one good hand, yet is some how able to get a drop on armed civilians.  It is rather appalling direction by Reginald Le Borg, who takes the direction “Kharis walks through the streets” literally. 

John Carradine fares much better as Yousef Bey;  a priest of Arkham and Kharis’ protector.  Carradine’s performance reminds me of a televangelist that  often gets caught with his pants down; he begs forgiveness for his sins but indulges in them nonetheless.  Bey has lived a fairly rigid existence, devoid of any sex and pleasure; therefore, when he sees an attractive woman up close, it makes sense that he would have a crisis of faith. He doesn’t want to offend his Gods, but holy crap, there’s a hot girl in the same room as him. What should he do? Carradine is appropriately creepy and helps liven up the proceedings. He is the only interesting character in the entire movie. 

There is also a fairly interesting meta moment in The Mummy’s Ghost; an elderly watchman is listening to a horror radio program and the ominous narrator intones, “Did you ever meet a killer, my friends? You will tonight. A killer is at large, my friends. He enters the darken study of Doctor X, the mad doctor of Market Street. In the darken shadows of the room the doctor waits. There’s a scuffle. Screams. Gunshot.  Crash.”  Seconds later, the Mummy breaks into the museum and a scuffle breaks out with the watchman, followed by screams, a gunshot, and a crash. It’s interesting to see self awareness in an older horror movie. It’s become a staple in modern horror movies, but in the 1940s a knowing wink to the audience was  unheard of.  

Credits
Cast:  John Carradine (Yousef Bey), Ramsey Ames (Amina), Robert Lowery (Tom Hervey), Lon Chaney , Jr. (Kharis), Barton MacLane (Inspector Walgreen), George Zucco (High Priest – Andoheb), Frank Reicher (Professor Norman), Harry Shannon (Sheriff), Emmett Vogan (Coroner), Lester Sharpe (Doctor Ayad), Claire Whitney (Mrs. Norman), Oscar O’ Shea (Watchman), Martha Vickers (Girl Student).

Director: Reginald Le Borg
Screenplay: Griffin Jay, Henry Sucher, Brenda Weisberg.
Running Time: 60 min.

Dracula (1931)

When I finally caved in and bought a DVD player, one of the first DVD sets I purchased was “The Monster Legacy DVD Gift Set,” which included fourteen movies, and small busts of Dracula, the Frankenstein Monster, and the Wolf Man; all for the reasonable price of fifty six dollars! It was money well spent as I was concerned.  As a kid growing up in the 80s, the local station used to play these movies every Saturday night (and a few Hammer movies thrown in for a good measure).  There were books in the school library devoted to the classic monsters and I frequently checked them out.  Therefore, it pains to me say that I find the original Dracula, starring Bela Lugosi, to be incredibly dull. It is the one film in the collection that is an absolute challenge to watch; House of Dracula may be a terrible movie, but at least it is entertaining.

The first twenty minutes, set in Transylvania, are superb and heavy on the atmosphere: Terrified villagers warn Renfield not to go up to Castle Dracula; the eerie scene of Dracula’s brides rising up from their coffins; the wonderful tracking shot of Dracula staring directly into the camera; and  Dracula slowly descending down a stairway that is covered in spider webs. These are all spine-chilling scenes and it is easy to understand why audiences in the 1930s were terrified by them.  The movie takes a turn for the worse when it switches locations to London and turns into a photographed stage play.  

 

This criticism isn’t anything new, in his 1967 book, “An Illustrated History of the Horror Movie,” Carlos Clarens writes,"The sequence of Renfield at the castle has a pleasant Gothic flavor, but, as soon as the action moves to London, the picture betrays its origins “on the boards,” becoming talky, pedestrian, and uncinematic. We are told, when we should be shown, about the “red mist” that heralds the arrival of the vampire and about the werewolf seen running across Dr. Seward’s lawn.”

This is absolutely correct! Of course, one might argue that the movie is scarier because it doesn’t show us these things and allows us to use our imagination instead. That argument doesn't apply to this movie; the lack of visual effects is due to necessity rather than artistic deliberation. This was a fairly low budget movie, after all.  The “werewolf running across the lawn” bit is great example; if this was accompanied by a creepy sound effect, or score, then it might be a chilling  moment, instead all we are given is David Manners’ half hearted line delivery.  A wolf running across your lawn isn’t something you see every day, but Jonathan Harker doesn’t seem all too concerned about it.  Manners wasn’t particularly happy to be cast in Dracula and it shows; much to his chagrin, he would  be cast as the juvenile lead in two more Universal Horror movies, The Mummy and The Black Cat. The limitations of Manners’ acting are even more apparent when you compare his performance to that of his leading lady, Helen Chandler, who is a more interesting, and livelier, performer.  Chandler’s performance is uneven, but she is very good later on in the movie, when Mina, after having been bitten by the Count, tries to fight her more basic instincts. The scene where she flirts with Jonathan and then stares his neck, waiting to make her move, is a wonderful moment and Chandler is quite scary with her wide eyed stare.  It is the only real noteworthy moment in the final twenty minutes. 

It doesn’t help that most of the second half is set in Dr. Seward’s parlour; most of the time, the camera remains stationary as actors walk into frame, say their lines, and then exit. This portion of the movie drags on and often feels like a proud parent recording their children in a high school production (sans the nonstop zooms). This is a dull group of actors: Edward Van Sloan plods through the scenery while delivering endless exposition, while everyone else scratches their heads in complete confusion.  Bela Lugosi and Dwight Frye (as Renfield) will occasionally show up to breathe some life into the proceedings, but otherwise it is completely aimless. There is never any sense of urgency among the protagonists and, as a result, it doesn’t feel like the movie is building towards anything:  Jonathan repeatedly objects to Van Helsing’s methods; Mina keeps acting strange; Van Helsing ticks off Dracula; and Renfield tries to warn Mina about “the master.”

After a half hour of this nonsense, the movie finally switches locations to Carfex Abbey, Dracula’s new “home.” Hey, maybe we’ll be treated to an exciting one on one face off between Dracula and Van Helsing.  Dracula views the professor as a worthy adversary, so maybe the two of them…..NOPE (spoilers for an 85 year-old movie)……the famed count is killed off screen (his death is signified by a barely audible groan). This ending doesn’t hold a candle to the one in Frankenstein (also released in 1931): Victor Frankenstein finally takes responsibility for his actions and faces off with his creation inside a wind mill. This is a genuinely exciting scene sparked by Boris Karloff’s terrific turn as the Monster.  

Dracula is remembered today for Bela Lugosi’s iconic performance as the Count; his stilted line delivery and theatrical mannerism, which would be a debit to most actors, helps add an air of mystery to Dracula. There are historians that claim the Spanish – language version (shot at night time on the same sets as the Browning production) is a superior movie and from a technical stand point they are correct. Unfortunately, Carlos Villiarias, as Dracula, lacks Lugosi’s screen presence; he often makes funny faces to express his anger.  While Dracula is Lugosi’s most famous performance, it is by no means his best:  I prefer his turn as the demented, broken necked shepherd, Ygor, in Son of Frankenstein.  The more over the top Lugosi is, the more enjoyable his performances are.  It is really Dwight Frye that steals the movie with his creepy performance as the tragic Renfield; the likable real estate agent that is driven into madness by Dracula. The shot of him standing at the bottom of a ship’s stairway, staring into the camera with a mad look in his eyes and a huge grin plastered on his face, is one of the most unnerving moments in movie history.

Dracula is a mixed bag – an exciting twenty minutes, followed by nearly an hour of boredom (with a few bright spots thrown in).  If it is every on television, or streaming online, I recommend you watch the opening twenty minutes and then promptly find something else to watch.

Cast: Bela Lugosi (Count Dracula), Helen Chandler (Mina), David Manners (Jonathan Harker), Dwight Frye (Renfield), Edward Van Sloan (Van Helsing), Herbert Bunson (Dr. Seward), Frances Dade (Lucy), Joan Standing (Maid), Charles Gerrard (Martin).
Director: Tod Browning
Screenplay:  Garrett Fort (adapted from the 1924 stage play by Hamilton Deane and John L. Balderston).
Based on the novel by Bram Stoker.
Running Time: 75 min.