Review: 'White Zombie' Blu-ray

White Zombie was the first major zombie film, though today's legions of walking dead devotees might find it bewildering unless they somehow came across a musty box of classic E.C. comics. Victor Halperin's film features the voodoo variety of zombies rather than the shuffling brain-eaters that gave them the bum's rush right out the crypt door. Current sensitivities being what they are, this is probably for the best since the original zombie stories were so entwined with real-world issues of race and slavery. Garnett Weston's script does indeed identify slavery as evil, but it takes the zombification of a white woman to get anyone in his film to do anything about it. Plus there's one highly uncomfortable scene involving a white actor in blackface, which is especially galling considering how many genuine black extras there are in this movie. Welcome to 1932.

Review: 'It's Alive'

A film as timeless and iconic as James Whale's Frankenstein is going to stir its share of myths and mysteries. Why exactly did Bela Lugosi not end up playing the Monster? Why did Universal's studio chief, Carl Laemmle, allow son Junior to make another one of those gruesome horrors dad found so detestable? How did the virtually unknown character actor Boris Karloff land such a career-making role? 

I won't go into the multitudinous theoretical answers to all these questions because Julian David Stone already did it for me. His new book, It's Alive, is a work of historical fiction that provides confident answers to the big questions floating around Frankenstein. Since his book includes no foreword or afterword, just the story, I'm not sure what Stone's methodology was or what sources he consulted, but ultimately when dealing with historical fiction, it's best to treat the material more as fiction than history. Otherwise, you may come away from watching Ed Wood believing all the incredibly entertaining bunk Tim Burton slapped up on the screen.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #2

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of golden age Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#2. Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948- dir. Charles Barton)

The monster rallies of Erle C. Kenton were basically pulling the entire Golden age of Universal horror into the grave of self-parody. Why not get out the shovel and finish the job? Once and for all, the monsters would be laughing stocks, and Karloff himself was so offended by the notion that he refused to appear in or even see the final appearances of the Frankenstein monster, Dracula, and the Wolf Man in Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein. The thing is, the monsters weren’t laughing stocks. They basically play it straight despite a couple of fleeting comedic moments such as the Monster shuddering at the sight of Costello or the count cracking wise once or twice. The humor was all up to Bud and Lou, and though they were hesitant about their first full-bore horror comedy, the blend of serious threats and screwball insanity was magical. After all, the monsters’ main allure was never really their scariness. It was the fun lying just beneath their scarred or furry surfaces. Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein draws that fun right out into the air and makes no apologies for it. Bud and Lou and Glenn Strange get top billing, but Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney, Jr., give this movie real legitimacy as an essential Universal horror film. The only possible way to have more fun while watching a movie is to check out the one in the next and final installment of Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors…

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #5

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of golden age Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#5. Dracula (1931- dir. Tod Browning)

Scoff if you will. Many have. They call it static, stagy, and hammy. They call it boring and inept. They can stake themselves as far as I’m concerned. Dracula is flawed in some ways, but the film’s overall effect is profound. This movie is so Gothic, so alluringly archaic, so deeply creepy you can practically smell the dank crypt air. Dracula builds atmosphere like few other films, and a horror movie is nothing without atmosphere. It also has Bela Lugosi, the man who embodies the count so completely that it is always unsatisfying seeing another actor portray him no matter how technically better the actor’s performance is. As iconic as Bela is, Dwight Frye arguably steals the film as Renfield. He’s crazed, but he is also funny, frightening, fearful, and strangely sympathetic. The entire opening sequence in Dracula’s castle is masterful: Dracula’s awe-inspiring appearance on his massive stairway, Renfield and Dracula’s sickly humorous dinner, the dreadful appearance of the vampire’s famished brides. Critics complain that the film loses all steam after it leaves Transylvania, but I prefer to think that the steam that opening sequence builds powers the rest of the picture. Frankenstein is technically a better movie, but no serious horror puts me in the Universal spirit like Dracula.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #8

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of golden age Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#8. The Black Cat (1934- dir. Edgar Ulmer)

Universal horror did not always rely on supernatural horror. In fact, what may be it’s most horrifying horror of all had no supernatural elements, though its characters deeply believe in the powers of evil. Karloff is no longer the conflicted creature of Frankenstein. He’s all evil as an Alistair Crowley stand-in who matches wits with Bela Lugosi as a psychiatrist out for revenge. Universal tried to pass The Black Cat off as a Poe adaptation, but it has zilch to do with its namesake story. Yet, as many have pointed out, Poe would likely have approved of the film’s perversity and bleakness. Edgar Ulmer’s noir-ish style and the Art Deco sets give The Black Cat a personality distinct from any of the other Universal horrors of its era. However, it is Karloff and Lugosi who make this picture such delicious fun, and they get to wrap their tongues around some of the most memorable dialogue they ever spoke: “Supernatural perhaps, boloney perhaps not.” “The phone is dead; even the phone is dead.” Even when the dialogue isn’t especially clever, the actors’ relish makes it so, as when Karloff makes the line “He has an intense and all-consuming horror of cats” sings like a Stradivarius.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #9

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of golden age Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#9. The Wolf Man (1941- dir. George Waggner)

Having exhausted literary sources during the first phase of its Golden Age of monsters, Universal managed an original creation to really bring its next phase into focus. More rooted in the practical/tragic human issues of turning into a snarling beast beneath the moon than Werewolf of London had been, The Wolf Man finally got the werewolf picture right. The originality of its story is not the only thing that sets The Wolf Man apart from Universal’s earlier horrors: it also eschews a Gothic, period setting in favor of a contemporary, fairy tale milieu. Yet the new monster was such an instant smash that he was deemed an acceptable playmate for Frank and Drac. Lon Chaney, Jr., gets to do what he does best as he grimaces and wrings his hands as Larry Talbot. Jack Pierce gets to do what he does best as he covers Chaney’s face in yak fur, fashioning his final memorable monster. The Wolf Man also stands out from most of the earlier Frankenstein and Dracula pictures because of its consistently interesting cast. Dracula was a touch of a drag whenever Bela or Dwight Frye wasn’t on screen, but you never feel as though The Wolf Man is wasting your time as long as Claude Rains, Evelyn Ankers, the unforgettable Maria Ouspenskaya, and yes, Bela, are on screen.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #16

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of classic Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#16. Son of Frankenstein (1939- dir. Roland V. Lee)

Universal’s second Frankenstein sequel, and its final Frankenfilm with Karloff as the Monster, is too long by 30 minutes and that little kid is a menace, but boy oh boy, is Bela Lugosi ever a blast to watch as Ygor! Tired of the franchise and an increasingly limited role to play, Karloff seems to cede the film to Lugosi, who is only too happy to steal the show as the diabolical survivor of a botched hanging. Ygor uses the Monster as a pliable tool of revenge in a sheepskin vest. Lionel Atwill is also terrific as the police inspector with a chip on his shoulder and splinters in his arm.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #18

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of classic Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#18. The Raven (1935- dir. Lew Landers)

Like Son of Frankenstein, The Raven gives Bela Lugosi the opportunity to upstage Boris Karloff, which must have given Lugosi no end of pleasure. He plays a sadist and Poe enthusiast with his very own pit and pendulum. The film has nothing to do with the title poem aside from a rather haunting dance performance inspired by “The Raven. ” So what? Karloff is low key as a criminal who attempts to skirt the law by getting plastic surgery. Note to Karloff and everyone else: do not hire Bela Lugosi to perform plastic surgery on you.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #20

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of classic Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#20. Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932- dir. Robert Florey)

This delirious and rather perverse adaptation of Poe’s timeless terror tale is a great opportunity to watch Bela Lugosi rant and rave as an ape-wrangler with a perilous unibrow. His scheme to prove the theory of evolution by injecting gorilla blood into women is insane, and if you think about it, there are some pretty disturbing sexual implications there. Karl Freund milks the premise for all its horror value with his Gothic, expressionistic cinematography. And for once, the comic relief does not completely fall flat.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #22

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of classic Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#22. Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943- dir. Roy William Neill)

It’s not exactly Universal’s most elegant monster movie (Lugosi is an even worse monster than Lon Chaney, Jr., and the failure to explain the fact that his fumbling is due to blindness makes the performance seem even worse than it is), but Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man still has the major distinction of being horror’s first monster rally. That’s a big deal considering all the fun that would follow in flicks such as House of Frankenstein, House of Dracula, and the divine Abbott & Costello Meet Frankenstein... not to mention non-Universal rallies such as the Godzilla movies and The Groovie Goolies. Still, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man can stand on its own with some deliciously Halloweeny settings, director Roy William Neill’s active camerawork, and the return of Maria Ouspenskaya and Chaney to their most iconic roles.

Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors: #30

Halloween season simply isn’t Halloween season without a regular dose of classic Universal horror (1923-1963). Every day this October, I’ll be giving you a steady IV drip of it by counting down Psychobabble’s 31 Favorite Universal Horrors!

#30. The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942- dir. Erle C. Kenton)

By far the weakest of the Frankenstein movies, The Ghost of Frankenstein still has a bit going for it, the most notable thing being more time with Bela Lugosi in his best role: Ygor. The rest of the cast is strong too with appearances by such monster mainstays as Lon Chaney, Jr. (admittedly, not a great monster), Lionel Atwill, Evelyn Ankers, and Ralph Bellamy. We also see the first hob-nailed boot step in the Monster’s journey toward morphing into cuddly Herman Munster as he helps some kid get her ball down from a roof. Sure, he kills a couple of goofballs while doing it, but no one ever said redemption happens overnight.

And Now for No Other Reason Than Universal Horror is Awesome, Here Are 20 Horrific Sketches...

I whipped up some sketches of classic Universal horror characters. Here they are...

Review: 'Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff: The Expanded Story of a Haunting Collaboration'

With the release of Ed Wood in 1994, “Karloff! That Limey cocksucker!” quite nearly replaced “I never drink…wine” and “The children of the night…what music they make” as the go-to phrase when doing a bad Bela Lugosi impression. Tim Burton’s movie hipped the larger film-going public to some of the real-life seething that went on during the filming of such Lugosi/Boris Karloff collaborations as The Black Cat and The Body Snatcher. However, Burton’s superb yet cartoonish film provided little of the complexity behind this classic Hollywood “rivalry.” For that, one would have to take a trip to the local Waldenbooks and pick up a copy of Gregory Mank’s Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff: The Story of a Haunting Collaboration.

Originally published in 1990, the over 350-page book attempted a more nuanced view of a relationship that couldn’t simply be boiled down to a venerated horror star and a jealous, drug-addled also-ran. Swelling with an additional 250-or-so pages in 2009, the now Expanded Story of a Haunting Collaboration went into even greater depth with additional information and interviews. By Mank’s analysis, Lugosi and Karloff may have enjoyed a rather friendly working relationship while making Son of Frankenstein, and the alleged hatred Lugosi felt for Karloff may have really been directed at a Hollywood system that constantly ground the vampire under its merciless stake.

Karloff is not completely without blame in this mostly one-sided clash of titans. While he never had an explicitly nasty thing to say about Lugosi, his patronizing insistence on referring to his co-star as “poor Bela” in private and public could not have endeared himself to the actor who could be quite proud despite demeaning himself in Poverty Row and Ed Wood pictures.

Mank’s valiant attempt to uncover how Lugosi and Karloff really felt about each other was doomed to go without a definitive answer, but that barely matters when the rest of the story is so fascinating and well told. Mank goes deep into the movies they made together with nearly scene-by-scene analyses without neglecting the most important pictures they made without the other. So we get very satisfying histories of Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, and other key films, as well as quite a bit of information about other key players in those films such as James Whale and Colin Clive.

Last updated nearly a decade ago, Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff: The Expanded Story of a Haunting Collaboration is now enjoying a new printing though not another updating. That’s generally fine since there probably haven’t been many new revelations about the Karloff/Lugosi rivalry in recent years since so many of their other collaborators have died. Mank’s incessant leching over Lugosi and Karloff’s female co-stars is more than a little dated and brings nothing but discomfort to the storytelling, but if you can get past that, you will find that Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff: The Expanded Story of a Haunting Collaboration remains one of the great studies of classic horror films.

Psychobabble’s 10 Tips for the Perfect Retro-Halloween

In a confusing, modern world in which everyone wanders around aimlessly in their virtual reality helmets while playing Pokemon pogs on their telephones and listening to auto-tuned teenagers sing about their vaginas, Psychobabble offers Halloween as an oasis of retro sensibilities. Not politically retro. That would be gross. I just mean Halloweenally retro. Take off the helmet. Put down the phone. Turn off that singer who is still a teenager and consider listening to one who was a teenager fifty years ago (may I suggest The Crystals’ and their “Frankenstein Twist”?). It’s time to buckle down and allow the waves of nostalgia in.

There are few things more old-fashioned than the notion that the vale between the natural world and the spirit world will lift up and a host of ghosts will sneak under it and start partying on our turf every October 31^st.. That’s some silly shit. So it would be highly inappropriate to celebrate such an old-fashioned holiday in a new-fashioned way. Here are Psychobabble’s ten tips for recreating the perfect retro Halloween experience.

1. Hang Beistly decorations.

Halloween is not an icy pool. You don’t just leap into it on October 31^st and leap right back out again. It is a warm bath. You sink into it slowly and lounge, preferably for an entire month. Part of that involves decorating your home. Many people spend all of their energy hanging ghouls and skeletons all over the outside of their homes, which is all fine and good for showing your neighbors how festive you are, but you should never neglect the inside either, since you probably spend more time indoors than out on the lawn. Whether you’re decorating inside or out, you cannot have a truly retro Halloween without some Beistle decorations. You know them. They’re those grinning cats and jack-o-lanterns, wrinkly witches, and dancing skeletons rendered in shades of orange, black, yellow, and green on die-cut cardboard. These designs have been in use since the Beistle Company began in 1900 and were particularly ubiquitous in the seventies and early eighties. Few visuals will instantly conjure those old-timey Halloween feelings than Beistle decorations, though you are also welcome to hang up some of those toxic melted plastic popcorn decorations depicting ghosts, witches, and cats. They’re retro too. Expensive animatronic serial killers and giant inflatable Adam Sandler vampires from Hotel Transylvania are not.

2. Send mail using actual paper and actual mail boxes.

366 Days at the Drive-In: Day 286

The Date: July 12

The Movie: Mark of the Vampire (1935)

What Is It?: Tod Browning’s sound remake of his own London After Midnight still sports a disappointing denouement, but the spookiness that precedes it is aces. Great, creepy graveyard sequences, and it’s always a pleasure to see Bela Lugosi donning the cape, even if he isn’t doing so as Dracula. That surreal scene where Carroll Borland descends from the ceiling on giant bat wings is worth the price of admission alone.

Why Today?: On this day in 1880, Tod Browning is born.

366 Days at the Drive-In: Day 274

The Date: June 30

The Movie: The Invisible Ray (1936)

What Is It?: In one of the last gasps of the first wave of Universal horror, the studio’s two biggest legends—Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff—are scientists who form an uneasy alliance after Karloff captures a ray from the Andromeda nebula that leads him to a pre-historic meteor in Africa. The partnership gets a bit complicated when that meteor turns Karloff into a psycho King Midas in Reverse. The Invisible Ray is almost like a two-decades-early bridge between the Gothic horrors of the thirties and the atom-age paranoia of the fifties with lightning storm-soaked castles sharing the screen with radiation-derived monsterism.

Why Today?: Today is Meteor Watch Day.

366 Days at the Drive-In: Day 128

The Date: February 5

The Movie: White Zombie (1932)

What Is It?: United Artists’ bid to get in on the monster craze is the only top-notch zombie picture of the thirties, and Lugosi kills as the brilliantly named zombie-master Murder Legendre. The composite score is excellent.

Why Today?: On this day in 1919, D.W. Griffith, Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, and Douglas Fairbanks incorporated United Artists.

366 Days at the Drive-In: Day 121

The Date: January 29

The Movie: The Raven (1935)

What Is It?: Edgar Allan Poe’s deathless poem is merely the stone in this stone soup that finds Bela Lugosi as a mad doc with a yen for Poe and torture who gives Boris Karloff a cut-rate face lift and everyone else the heeby jeebies. Sadistic fun.

Why Today?: On this day in 1845, “The Raven” is first published in The Evening Mirror.

366 Days at the Drive-In: Day 29

The Date: October 29

The Movie: The Black Cat (1934)

What Is It?: The single greatest showdown between Karloff and Lugosi throws Poe out the window and drags in some serious sadism and art deco architecture.

Why Today?: Today is National Cat Day. But don’t tell Lugosi’s Dr. Vitus Werdegast… he has an intense and all-consuming horror of cats…

366 Days at the Drive-In: Day 26

The Date: October 26

The Movie: Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman (1943)

What Is It?: The first monster meeting matches Lugosi’s monster against Chaney’s Wolf Man and the stitches and fur fly. A dry run for  Universal's more expansive monster rallies to follow. Too bad they didn't let Lugosi's monster speak though.

Why Today?: Today is Howl at the Moon Day.