Tag Archives: Universal Pictures

Halloween Havoc!: DRACULA’S DAUGHTER (Universal 1936)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

After the success of BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN , Universal decided it was time for a sequel to everybody’s favorite vampire, Dracula , with James Whale scheduled to direct. Whale opted out, putting DRACULA’S DAUGHTER in the hands of Lambert Hillyer , an old pro who dated back to silent William S. Hart Westerns, and was more comfortable with sagebrush sagas than Gothic horror. The result was an uneven film saved by Gloria Holden’s performance as the title character, Countess Marya Zaleska.

I’ll give Hillyer credit for some atmospheric scenes scattered throughout the movie. The opening scene at Carfax Abbey, cobwebbed as ever, picks up where DRACULA left off, with Edward Van Sloan’s Van Helsing (inexplicably renamed Von Helsing here) caught by constables shortly after staking the undead Count. The Countess burning the body of her vampiric father, hoping to free herself of her curse, is spooky, as is the return…

View original post 360 more words

Halloween Havoc!: THE INVISIBLE RAY (Universal 1936)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer


THE INVISIBLE RAY, the third Universal teaming of Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi , is probably the least discussed of their seven films together. And I don’t quite know why, because I find it an entertaining meld of horror and science fiction that holds my interest for its 80 minute running time. The two stars are well spotlighted, with Bela as one of the good guys (for a change!) and Boris giving a hammy but well crafted performance as a scientist unhinged by his newest discovery.

A curly-haired Karloff stars as Dr. Janos Rukh, awaiting the arrival of a group of his fellow scientists for a demonstration of his Invisible Ray as a storm rages outside. Rukh’s wife Diana and blind Mother Rukh greet them: Sir Francis Stevens and his wife Lady Arabella, French astro-chemist Dr. Felix Benet, and Lady Arabella’s nephew Ronald Drake, who’s along for the ride. Rukh…

View original post 426 more words

Halloween Havoc!: WEREWOLF OF LONDON (Universal 1935)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

Lon Chaney Jr.’s Lawrence Talbot wasn’t Universal’s first Wolf Man . That honor goes to Henry Hull in WEREWOLF OF LONDON, a chilling but lesser film in the Universal canon. This one reminds me more of DR. JEKYLL & MR. HYDE than any of Chaney’s lycanthropic outings, and Jack Pierce’s makeup job is a little light in the hirsute department (more on that later).

British botanist Wilfred Glendon travels to Tibet to search for the rare mariphasia lumina lupina, a flower that only blooms in moonlight. Trekking into a forbideden valley, he is attacked and bitten by a werewolf. Returning to London with his find, Glendon is confronted by the mysterious Dr. Yogami, who says they’ve met before. Unbeknownst to Glendon, Yogami is the werewolf in question, who wants the phosphorescent moonflower as an antidote for his own lycanthropy. Yogami manages to steal the two blooms, leaving Glendon to transform…

View original post 373 more words

Halloween Havoc! Extra: DR. JEKYLL & MR. HYDE (Universal 1913) Complete Silent Movie

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

Who was the First Universal Monster? Was it Bela Lugosi as Count Dracula? Lon Chaney Sr. as The Hunchback? No – it was King Baggot in the dual role of Robert Louis Stevenson’s immortal DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE way back in 1913! Baggot, considered the first Hollywood “superstar”, essayed the part in this two-reel effort, and was directed by Herbert Brenon, whose silent resume includes a pair of Betty Bronson vehicles (PETER PAN and A KISS FOR CINDERELLA), DANCING MOTHERS with Clara Bow, and Chaney’s LAUGH, CLOWN, LAUGH. I hope you enjoy this slice of Hollywood Horror History as the all-but-forgotten King Baggot stars in DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE:

View original post

Halloween Havoc!: BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN (Universal 1935)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

James Whale’s brilliant BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN is one of those rare occasions where the sequel is better than the original… and since the original 1931 FRANKENSTEIN is one of the horror genre’s greatest films, that’s saying a lot! Whale’s trademark blend of horror and black humor reached their zenith in BRIDE, and though Whale would make ten more films before retiring from Hollywood moviemaking in 1941, this was his last in the realm of the macabre. It turned out to be his best.

Mary Shelley’s got a story to tell…

William Hurlbut’s screenplay start with a prologue set during the proverbial dark and stormy night, with Mary Shelly (Elsa Lanchester ), Percy Bysshe Shelley (Douglas Walton), and Lord Byron (Gavin Gordon ) discussing Mary’s shocking novel “Frankenstein” as clips from the 1931 film are shown. Then Mary tells them there’s more to the story, and we pick up…

View original post 785 more words

Halloween Havoc!: THE BLACK CAT (Universal 1934)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

THE BLACK CAT has nothing to do with Edgar Allan Poe , but don’t let that stop you from enjoying this thoroughly dark, twisted film. Not only is it the first teaming of horror icons Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi , it’s their only movie together that plants the two stars on equal ground. It’s also the best film ever made by cult director Edagr G. Ulmer , who’d never again get the opportunity to work at a major studio, or the chance to work with a pair of legends like Boris and Bela in one film.

Bela is Dr. Vitus Verdegast, eminent Hungarian psychiatrist, returning after 15 long years in a Russian prison camp to “visit an old friend” at Marmaros, “the greatest graveyard in the world”, where tens of thousands died during WWI. Vitus is forced by chance to spend the train ride with American honeymooners Peter and…

View original post 540 more words

Halloween Havoc!: THE INVISIBLE MAN (Universal 1933)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

James Whale’s FRANKENSTEIN set the bar high for horror, and his follow-up THE OLD DARK HOUSE is one of the blackest comedies ever made. But with THE INVISIBLE MAN, Whale raises that bar by combining gruesome terror with his macabre sense of humor. THE INVISIBLE MAN doesn’t get the respect of other icons in the First Horror Cycle (Frankenstein’s monster, Dracula, Imhotep), but Claude Rains’s outstanding performance as the mad scientist Jack Griffin, driven to insanity by the chemicals he’s pumped into his veins, is as sick and deranged as any you’ll find in the genre… and the fact Rains does much of his acting using only his voice is an amazing feat, and a testament to the man’s acting genius.

Whale’s opening shot sets the eerie tone, as a solitary figure, his face swaddled in bandages, trudges through a snowstorm and enters the Lion’s Head Inn seeking solitude. The…

View original post 516 more words

Halloween Havoc!: SECRET OF THE BLUE ROOM (Universal 1933)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

The horror cycle of the early 1930’s cast its dark shadow on other film genres. SECRET OF THE BLUE ROOM is one of those “old dark house/locked room” mysteries showing that influence; it’s a creepy, atmospheric little movie about mysterious murders, with horror vet Lionel Atwill front and center among the suspects. There aren’t any “monsters” here, but some good chills courtesy of director Kurt Neumann, who later directed the 1950’s sci-fi horrors KRONUS, SHE DEVIL, and THE FLY .

It’s a dark and stormy night (naturally!) at Castle von Hellsdorf, and Irene, daughter of Master of the House Robert, is celebrating her birthday with three suitors: Captain Walter Brink, Frank Faber, and Tommy Brandt, while outside, a mysterious stranger lurks. The conversation turns to ‘The Blue Room’, kept under lock and key after three strange (some say supernatural) murders occurred many years ago, always at One AM. Tommy, eager…

View original post 320 more words

Halloween Havoc!: FRANKENSTEIN (Universal 1931)

Posted on by gary loggins

gary loggins's avatarcracked rear viewer

Two hundred years ago, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley unleashed her novel FRANKENSTEIN upon an unsuspecting world. The ghastly story of a “Modern Prometheus” who dared to play God and his unholy creation shocked readers in 1818, and over the past two centuries has been adapted into stage plays, radio dramas, television programs, comic books, and the movies, most notably James Whale’s seminal 1931 FRANKENSTEIN, featuring not only a star-making  performance by Boris Karloff as the Creature, but ahead of its time filmmaking from Whale.

Director James Whale and his star

James Whale had directed only two films before FRANKENSTEIN (JOURNEY’S END and WATERLOO BRIDGE), but the former stage director certainly adapted quickly to the new medium of talking pictures. The story had been made three times for the silent screen, but the new sound technology adds so much to the overall eeriness of the film’s atmosphere. Whale was obviously influenced by…

View original post 580 more words

Trailer: Halloween

Posted on by Arleigh

Halloween 2018

October 19, 2018. Keep that date in mind.

It’s the date for the latest entry to the Halloween franchise. It’s to be a sequel to the original film. It will also discard every other Halloween sequel ever made. So, for those who are so anti-remake/reboot this should alleviate any of those triggers.

David Gordon Green (who co-wrote this sequel with Danny McBride and Jeff Fradley) directs this sequel as a continuation of the events which happened with the original film. A follow-up that’s 40 years in the making, literally.

So, once again, remember October 19th and make sure to check this film out. I have a sneaking suspicion that it’ll be the true sequel to Carpenter’s classic.