Friday, November 4, 2011

Post #1300 / FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER / Layton Film Productions Inc. - 1958

Welcome to a Special Friday Night Drive-In Redo with Tabonga, here at The Dungeon!.. It so happens that this is our 1300th post, so, what better way to celebrate than with another look at this horror classic from 1958! What a great storyline... Dr. Frankenstein's insane grandson attempts to create horrible monsters in modern day L.A.

Another fine example of fifties kitsch poster art! I used to have a set of lobby cards from this one.

The composed music is again by Nicholas Carras, who did the music for my last post, MISSILE TO THE MOON In Color. Of course, there's also the cool tunes by the Paige Cavanaugh Trio at the party in our soundclip.

Lettuce bring in our littlest Dungeon helper and button pusher, sure 'nuf, Rufus The Gnat!.. So, let's get the show on the road... Push the big red 'GO' button next to the glowing atomic pile, now, Rufus! Here's... FRANKENSTEIN'S DAUGHTER!

Here's a group of teens in their thirties! That's Harold (MUTINY IN OUTER SPACE) Lloyd Jr. as Don, Sally (THE UNEARTHLY) Todd as Suzie, John (MAD DOCTOR OF BLOOD ISLAND) Ashley as Johnny and Sandra (THE TERROR) Knight as Trudy.

Donald (ON THE THRESHOLD OF SPACE) Murphy plays Oliver Frank and Felix (CURSE OF THE FACELESS MAN) Locher plays Professor Morton, Trudy's uncle. For me, it always sounded like Felix had one too many marbles in his mouth when he did his lines.

Oliver tries to get uptight Trudy to loosen up a little.

Wolfe Barzell plays Elsu, Oliver's incompetent assistant. This is what he brings Oliver for a brain, a pile of yetch!

You've always treated me as a monster, Trudy... Now, you're going to be one!

My favorite indy monster maker was Harry Thomas, he was also responsible for the aliens' ping pong eyeballs in KILLERS FROM SPACE! He had some great 'behind the scenes' stories to tell.

Donald Murphy is great as Oliver, look at this subtle facial humor as he watches Trudy transform into a hideous monster.

After she escapes out the front door, Oliver has to go track her down before the police do. Look at her muscles!

One of the greatest movie newspaper headlines, ever!!

Oliver scores a date with Suzie and then procedes to show her what a sleazeball he is!

Oliver's filled with delight as he mows Suzie down with his bumper!

Harry Thomas said that when he made the mask, the producers had not informed him that the monster was supposed to be a female run over by a car, so, without knowing, he made the thing look like an old boxer run over by a truck! They had to film it the way it was because of budgetary and time restraints. Budget was $60,000.

This came to me when I was looking at the still.

The freakin' thing's a beast! First, stinging judo chops, then, a bone-crunching spinal adjustment!

Oliver has to shoot the thing up with some horse tranquilizers to get it calmed down!

The party's near the end of the movie, here, Paige Cavanaugh and his pals cut loose with a couple of classic fifties monster movie tunes!

A cat wearing this mask scares the holy crap out of Trudy!

Don doesn't seem concerned about Suzie gone missing as he belts out the tune, "Daddy-Bird."

Detective Dillon is played by Robert (FORBIDDEN PLANET) Dix, son of Richard (TRANSATLANTIC TUNNEL) Dix. He's dead within another minute.

Shadows at their best!

I always thought of John Ashley as pretty much a jock, but, when he tries to hit the monster with that beaker of acid, he completely misses! Luckily, it hits Oliver right on the bean!

Oliver goes down screaming!

While the monster is watching Oliver die on the floor, it accidently catches it's rubber suit on fire with a bunsen burner!

4 comments:

  1. the make-up on this really scared me as a kid when I saw it on Chiller Theater back around 1963..I cringe now when I think of the things that really scared me back then..lol

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  2. the things that used to scare still do, that might be psychological scarring though...

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  3. I'm a sucker for movies where someone has a fully-equipped monster lab in their suburban house.

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  4. Best thing about this movie is Sally Todd's sexy performance as teenage tease Suzy Lawler. Donald Murphy plays the best psychopathic mad scientist ever.

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