THE BLACK CAT / Boris And Bela Battle It Out - 1934

Here's a wild one co-written and directed by Edgar G. Ulmer back before Universal ruined his career. I stars our very favorite guys, Boris  as Hjalmar Poelzig and Bela as Dr. Vitus Werdegast, who I will refer to as Boris and Bela. It also stars David Manners as Peter Alison, Julie Bishop as Joan Alison, Egon Brecher and Harry Cording.

In this story, Peter and Joan Alison are honeymooning in Hungary and share their compartment on the train with the strange Dr. Werdegast. When they take the bus to the hotel, there is an accident that leaves Joan injured. The doctor takes them all to the home of an old 'friend' of his, famed architect Hjalman Poelzig, where he treats Joan's wounds. Unfortunately, Hjalmar is a Satan-worshipping priest, what could possibly go wrong?!

Peter and Joan Alison are on their honeymoon in Hungary when Bela comes into their compartment on the train. After Joan falls asleep, Bela tells Peter some very disturbing facts about his life, like, he was just released from prison after 15 years of incarceration as a political prisoner.

On the way to a hotel, the the bus slides off the roan in a hellacious rain storm. The group is near Bela's old friend's place so they head off to his fortress-like home.

Bela is familiar with the place and just comes into the house (where he was going in the first place) and has Joan laid on a bed where he tends to her wounds. Boris walks in on the group and has a very distasteful look on his face, almost evil...

Bela sees a black cat and totally freaks out. He kills the poor cat after he throws an object at it. Still crazy after all these years!

Boris, Bela and Peter are talking when Joan, on medication, comes into the room and seems really out of it. For some reason now, she gives Bela the evil eye while swooning over Boris, a perfect host! When Joan gets frisky with Peter, Boris grabs his statue of a nude woman... It seems like Boris has some special plans for Joan!

What Bela is there for, is, he wants to know what happened to his wife! It seems that Boris was also in love with Bela's wife, he tells Bela that he married her after he went to prison, but she died and hung her in the dungeon so that he could always admire her beauty! WTF!

There's another black cat that Bela has to be afraid of. Love this shot!

Peter and Joan have had it with Boris and want to leave, but, they'll have to get through Thamal first. It doesn't go well for the couple, the brute knocks Peter out and he's tossed into a dark locked room, Joan faints and is carried back to her room.

Bala's the good guy here. He goes in the comfort Joan and reveals to her that Boris is an evil Satan-worshipping priest that has an eye on her, but he's there to help. Bela has had a plan for revenge from the beginning, and is playing along for just the right moment to occur.

In the meantime, Bela's daughter Karen walks in on Joan and they chat until Boris comes in and breaks it up. You see, Boris is either 'married' to her or just living with her!

The night is perfect, a storm is brewing, all his minions are due to arrive any time and get the party started! This scene is similar to the one in CURSE OF THE DEMON.

Wow, Satan-worshippers really have a crazy cool way of looking at things! This works good here... WHAT THE HELL!!

Now get ready for this one, Thamal is actually working for Bela!! Yeah, that's right!

In a tussle after the ceremony to sacrifice Joan is broken up, Thamal has been shot and Boris attacks Bela, trying to choke him out.

But Thamal is one tough SOB and he jumps on Boris to save Bela. He then helps Bela put Boris into some chains to subdue him, then he collapses and dies!

Bela has a good talk with Boris, and lets him know what he has in mind for him...

Thankfully, you only get to see Boris attacked with a scalpel in the shadows!! But you do get to hear all the screams!

But alas, Bela is shot by Peter when Bela tries to help Joan get the door key, because Peter thinks Bela is attacking her! So, since the place was built over an ammo dump, our hero has the solution. He tells the couple to leave quickly, and pushes the lever down to create a short circuit in the electrical systems...

And the place blows to holy Hell, bringing our tale to an end. This was one wild movie, you need to check it out when you get a chance, only 65 minutes long!

DER GORILLA VON SOHO - "Gorilla Gang" (1968)

 

It's time for another Edgar Wallace Wednesday down in The Dungeon, so hold on to your popcorn, and get ready for "Gorilla Gang!"

 

Edgar Wallace haunts all of us each and every day, and yet most people don't even realize it, but trust me, he's watching!

It's Cinco de Mayo, so I decided to watch a German film with Spanish sub-titles while drinking Margaritas, and I suggest you do so too!

One thing for sure, no matter what language it's in, anything is enjoyable when it has a soundtrack composed by Maestro Peter Thomas.

"Der Gorilla Von Soho" was also known as "Gorilla Gang."

In Spanish, that translates roughly to "Pandilla de Gorilas."

To you it might just look like some goof in a gorilla suit, but the reality is that it's

"A monster that strikes fear into the heart of a whole city!"

"A strange bar in London's Soho District...........

 ............Conceals many a mystery!"

 

Strange indeed! 

The wealthy patrons get drunk and either paint, or take pictures of a bunch of semi-nude Adam & Evil models!

As always, there are those tricky Edgar Wallace elements, like this safe with a pistol in it that shoots the unsuspecting person who opens it, square in the chest!

Sir John is not in this film but is replaced with another perv from Scotland Yard, the amazing Hubert von Meyerinck as Sir Arthur, who was also in a ton of other Edgar Wallace films like "The Man With The Glass Eye," "The Hunchback Of Soho," and "Again The Ringer." 

Here's some more info from the German Wikipedia site about Hubert provided by my Editor in Berlin that is pretty interesting.

 

 "I remember a gay actor we called 'Hubsi,' Hubert von Meyerinck. He never boasted of it himself, but on Kristallnacht he ran across Kurfürstendamm shouting, 'Whoever among you is Jewish, follow me.' He hid people in his apartment. Yes, they existed, the decent people whose words you could believe that it was difficult to become a resister in those days. People like Meyerinck were marvelous, wonderful."
- Billy Wilder: in an interview with Der Spiegel, Special, June 1997

This gorilla looks like he just got back from the hair stylist!

The Gorilla Gang use this ambulance as their getaway car after they pull a job.

In one scene, the gorilla dives into the open back door!

"With one vicious slash they severed the jugular vein of an entire city!"

 

 

"People disappear mysteriously!"

The fact that she has the "Sergeant Pepper" album hanging on her wall, and the other exposed record is by the phenomenal jazz pianist Ahmad Jamal, shows that this gal has got good taste in music, but too bad that's not going to be good enough to save her life.

"Nobody knows the hideout of the horrible monster," but that doesn't stop them from trying!

Victims get drowned so that the gorillas can get the insurance money! The difficult part was filling out all the paperwork!

Darn, who'd a thunk? 

It wasn't a gorilla at all, but just some moron in a gorilla suit instead!

Just in case you missed it on the last gorilla movie, here's Glen Armstrong again with the classic

"Gorilla Suit Blues."

Even after the whole ordeal is over, horndog Sir Arthur continues to investigate in his own special way!

THE ASTOUNDING SHE-MONSTER- "Evil... Beautiful... Deadly" (1957)

This Saturday Night Special is a Sci-Fi classic called "The Astounding She-Monster," and I can't believe we didn't already do it years ago, but I guess not. How ridiculous, the poster is even part of our header collage!

"The Astounding She-Monster" came out in 1957, and is not nearly as bad as people say it is, and a lot more watchable than at least 50% of the crap made today! It had an estimated budget of $18,000, or the equivalent cost of lunch for the crew of a film today.

The cast consists of six actors, period, and stars Dungeon hero Robert Clarke!

Pin-up model Shirley Kilpatrick had the role of the She-Monster. Shirley died in 1971 at the age of 35, but I cannot find out why or how, but what you can find are lots of cheesy photos of her with a quick search of her name!

Here's what's happening. This trio kidnapped a rich heiress with plans on making a lot of ransom money and are heading for higher ground.

 From left to right we have perennial heavy Kenne Duncan as Nat Burdell, who had 273 credits including Dr. Acula in Ed Wood's "Night Of The Ghouls." Nat was also a good drinkin' buddy of Ed's and made him executor of his estate!

 Next to him is Marilyn Harvey as the gagged kidnap victim Margaret Chaffee. The next woman is Jeanne Tatum as the drunkard girlfriend of Nat, Esther Malone, and driving is Ewing Miles Brown as the other thug, Brad Conley. Ewing's nickname was Lucky, and he lived to be 97, so I guess he was compared to most of the rest of the cast.

Driving along, Brad suddenly sees what he thinks is an apparition, and crashes the car.

The cops are after them, and they need to lay low, so they get out and start walking.

Robert Clarke as geologist Dick Cutler and his dog Egan saw a bright light come down from the sky, and headed back to their cabin in the woods..............

..............When Nat and the gang show up, and start making trouble!

Esther is very thirsty and kills a fifth of whiskey almost all by herself.

Tough guy Nat likes to slap dames around, and it's starting to piss Dick Cutler off!

Brad sees the strange woman at the window, and decides to pursue her, and after emptying his pistol into her without any results, she approaches him, and her mere touch is enough to kill him.

When Brad doesn't come back, Nat goes out looking for him, but finds the space woman instead, and fires way more bullets than his pistol could ever possible hold.

Meanwhile Esther is left alone to keep her eye on Dick and Margaret. She has a bit of a problem staying focused!

Nat finds Brad's dead body and drags it back to the cabin. Dick explains that it looks like her hand print is charged with radium, and tells Nat that he needs to go see a doctor immediately since he came in contact with Brad when he brought the body back.

"The She-Monster" breaks in through the window of the cabin, and all Hell breaks loose!

They decide to douse her with gasoline and light her up like Dr. Danger, but that doesn't work either!

She chases Nat to the edge of a cliff, and he is able to sidestep her, and she plunges to her death, so he thinks, but she just shakes it off, and gets back up!

Probably the weakest part of the film is the poor use of day for night towards the end! I mean seriously, does this look like night to you?

 

Everybody except for Dick and Margaret get knocked off, including "The She-Monster," and the only thing left is her medallion!

 

Inside it, they find a letter that says that "The She-Monster" wasn't a monster at all, but more of an emissary sent to get Earth to join up with the rest of the civilized Universe. It was all just a big case of misunderstanding and miscommunication!

Because of a lot of similarities, "The Astounding She-Monster," and "Beast From Haunted Cave" would make a riveting double feature for any fan of 50's Sci-Fi, and I'm sure you would agree!