THE MAD GHOUL - "A New Sensation In Horror" (1943)

Tonight's Weird Wednesday presentation just keeps the Universal madball rolling with "The Mad Ghoul" from 1943.

He's not really mad or a ghoul, but "The Mad Ghoul" sounds better than "The Poor Sap Who Was Lied To And Manipulated By His Evil Professor."

 

The always phenomenal George Zucco is Chemistry Professor, Dr. Alfred Morris. He's got some different ideas about how the laws of nature work.

David (The Smiling Ghost) Bruce is the Professor's best student Ted Allison. The professor likes him so much, he decides to just ruin his life!

 

Ted's girlfriend Isabel is a singing sensation on her way up, and his friend Eric is her accompanist. Isabel was played by the enchanting Evelyn Ankers, and Eric is played by the always great Turhan Bey!

Dr. Morris is not only insane, he's also a back-stabbing manipulative bastard. He's telling Isabel how he's watching over and out for Ted, while draining the life out of him. It's no secret that Dr. Morris would also really like to get into Isabel's panties!

Seventy-seven years ago, but with that mask on, this looks like it could have been filmed yesterday! The Prof is handling some serious substance that when ignited has this zombie effect. First he tried it on monkeys, and now it's Ted's turn. Unfortunately, Ted is not in on the deal. The tube on the mask stops him from inhaling the crap!

Dr. Morris ignites the shit, and then calls Ted into the room and locks him in, and this is the result! I just can't get over how it affects his hair!

Hey Doc, I don't really feel that great!

One of the original 'Queens of Horror,' if the world was a fair place, Evelyn Ankers would be as well known as Marilyn Monroe, but who said the world was a fair place?

I found this cool shot on Pinterest, that shows just some of the classic horror films Evelyn was in! A couple years later, and they could have added "Weird Woman," "The Frozen Ghost," and "The Invisible Man's Revenge" to that uncanny list!

For obvious reasons like "The Mummy's Hand," "The Monster And The Girl," "The Mad Monster," and "The Flying Serpent," just to name a few, George Zucco was, is, and always be a core member of The Dungeon Hall Of Fame!

So, let's see, when he's not busy being a ghoul, Ted wants to marry Isabel, and the Doctor is also hot for her, but she's actually in love with Eric, so it is a bit of a cluster! 

Turhan Bey as Eric is always awesome no matter if the role is classy like this, or creepy like in "The Mummy's Tomb," another film that also had George Zucco in it.

Dr. Morris just keeps on stoking the fire of deceit! The lies that flow from his lips make you wonder why he was not a politician, instead of a Professor!

The Professor has given the order to Ted, "Kill Eric, then kill yourself!"

Just being a ghoul wasn't enough. A ghoul with a gun takes it to a different level!

Everything ain't so merry in Merryville tonight!

Isabel is on a small tour thrilling audiences from one town to the next with her warbling!

The Doctor has Ted cutting hearts out of bodies left and right, and all over the place! In order to keep him going, he needs a full tank of juice. Eventually somebody puts two and two together and notices that the killings and heart extractions are happening in the same exact places and times that Isabel is performing.

This reporter figures it all out, and sets up a ruse with himself as bait acting like a corpse. As smart as he was to figure it all out, he wasn't smart enough to see Ted standing there with a scalpel in his hand!

The hour and a minute this film runs is almost over, so there's no more time for any more made up stories.

When he was in a normal state, Ted figured out what the Doctor was doing to him, so he turns the tables on him, and Dr. Morris inhales a big bunch of the stuff, and ends up suffering the same fate as Ted, but since he no longer has anybody to cut out hearts for him, his fate is sealed!

THE INVISIBLE MAN'S REVENGE / THEY'RE MARKED...for DEATH! - 1944

Welp. looks like we've got another classic Universal movie today, this time, an eccentric scientist helps a fugitive running from the law become invisible, unwittingly giving him the power to exact revenge on his former friends and business partners...

It stars Jon (MONSTER FROM THE SURF) Hall, Leon (MEXICAN SPITFIRE'S ELEPHANT) Errol, John (THE UNEARTHLY) Carradine, Alan (PHILO VANCE'S SECRET MISSION) Curtis, Evelyn (THE WOLF MAN) Ankers, and Gale (THE BLACK CAT) Sondergaard.

It's a twisted tale to start with, Bob Griffin has made his way back to London from South Africa after he became ill and ended up in a mental hospital. He has escaped from South Africa by killing two interns at the hospital. Running from the law, Griffin shows up at his partner's home and demands his cut of the fortune (of which he has the contract with him) from their diamond mine (business partner Sir Jasper Herrick and his wife left South Africa after they thought Griffin would die from his illness) but finds out that they lost most of the money in an investment that went south.

Griffin gets angry and tells Herrick that he wants everything they have including their home! And their daughter, Julie!!.. But after Griffin has a drink, he becomes dizzy and faints. Thinking they're dealing with a madman, Jasper and Irene take the contract and then have their butler dump the body near a nearby lake.

At the lake, Griffin wakes up but is still dizzy, and falls in the water. Luckily, Herbert Higgins is strolling by and pulls him out of the lake. He takes Griffin home with him and lets him stay there while he recovers.

Griffin, paranoid, goes wandering (he had to leave the place he was staying because of the police) and comes across a large stone house. It's the home of the scientist, Doctor Drury. Asking for help, he tells the doctor that he's hiding from the police, and that he was being unjustly accused. The doctor lets Griffin come in, and he shows him his mad lab.

Then the doc shows him his faithful invisible German Shepard, and tells him the story of how one intruder found that out the hard way!

So, after Griffin becomes invisible and pummels the doctor, he heads off into the night.

Griffin sneaks into Jasper's house and gives him a big surprise, and has him write out a letter of guilt dictated by the invisible bully, and then he leaves.

He goes back to Herbert's place and spooks the Hell out of his friend!

But, Herbert doesn't have the rent money and is getting kicked out. So, Griffin comes up with a scheme. They go to the pub and bet 5 pounds that Herbert can hit the bulls eye with all his darts. the big guy on the right top takes him up on the bet. After Griffith assists Herbert by running the dart to the center of the bulls eye a number of times, the little guy shoots a dart off of a squeeze box and it hits its mark. The guy who's betting with Herbert finally loses his cool!

He takes his money back from the little guy and is ready to clock him when Griffin steps in and knocks the big guy out cold. Everyone thinks Herbert hit him!

Griffin is creeping around the doctor's house one night.

He sees the doc give his dog a transfusion where it becomes visible again!

Griffin has the doctor call the police, asking for Mark Foster, Julie's beau, to have him come to his house where he can find the invisible man. What Griffin wants Foster for is to drain his blood for the transfusion, and to get rid of him so that he can marry Julie. But, Mark is not there, so Griffin decides to use Dr. Drury, calling the police back (as the doctor) to say he didn't make the call.

Then Mark shows up and the officers tell him the odd story of the phone calls. Mark (a newspaper reporter) grabs a policeman and they drive out to the doctor's place to check the story out.

In the meantime, Griffin has finished the transfusion and starts the place on fire! The dog (now visible) escapes the house and follows Griffin through the woods.

Now visible himself, Griffin goes back to Jasper's house and tells him and the butler that he's a guest who is there to stay for a while, and his name's not Griffin, it's Fields!

Griffin's new plan is to get rid of Mark and marry into the money with Julie!

Herbert drops in to say hello to his friend, but the crazy man is thinking about using Herbert's blood for the next transfusion!! The little guy weasels his way out of the sticky situation, so, Griffin wants him to kills the dog that keeps howling and is driving him crazy. Herbert agrees after Griffin says that he'll give him 1,000 pounds to take care of the dog!!

But at lunch when Julie and Mark are there, Griffin starts to turn invisible again. He runs out of the room saying that he had cut his hand with a knife.

Mark is lured to the basement where Griffin locks him in, then begins to pummel the unsuspecting victim. The maniac knocks Mark out and puts him on a table where he starts performing the transfusion...

Herbert cannot control the dog and it gets loose and goes directly to the basement door where it scratches and howls.

The police show up and knock a hole in the door and the dog jumps through and goes directly at Griffin. By the time the cops break in, it's too late, the invisible man is Dead!! Mark recovers and there's a happy ending.

If the world doesn't end, we'll be back on Wednesday with who the Hell knows what, here at The Dungeon!!..

THE MAD DOCTOR OF MARKET STREET - "Genius - Or Fiend?" (1942)

The first Saturday Night Special of the year 2021 is a cool little classic titled "The Mad Doctor Of Market Street," that was made in 1942, and clocks in at just a minute over and hour, which in my world, is exactly how long any film should be.

 

This is a tale of a Doctor who isn't intentionally bad, but becomes a killer when his whole world turns to shit, after a patient of his dies from his experimentation!

Indeed "The Mad Doctor Of Market Street" is a Universal movie, and if Universal Studios ever opens back up, I'm sure you would be able to recognize this set on the tram ride.

The classic Lionel Atwill is Dr. Ralph Benson, and when I say classic, I'm talking "House Of Dracula," "House Of Frankenstein," "Man Made Monster" etc.

Dr. Benson is working on trying to bring people back from the dead. He just paid this poor stiff a thousand dollars to be put under, but something has gone wrong, and he can't bring the guy back from the dead as planned!

The Police get involved, and Dr. Benson bails, and disappears into the night!

Next thing you know he shows up on this ship headed to Australia!

The authorities somehow know he's on this cruise, and they're pretty sure he has changed his identity, but even though all he did was shave off his beard, still nobody recognizes him.

Benson hears this Detective talking about him, so he pushes him overboard to shut him up!

Una (The Maltese Falcon) Merkel as Aunt Margaret, provides a lot of the delightful comedy relief, and in this scene, she is going around telling everybody what she heard about the man overboard, and the man who did it, even the murderer himself!

Next thing you know, the ship is on fire and engulfed in flames, and everybody has to get loaded into the life boats.

One lifeboat that has Dr. Benson, a couple of crew members, Aunt Margaret and her niece Patricia, and a big palooka named Red Hogan in it, washes up on the beach of some island in the middle of nowhere, and they don't get the warmest welcome in the world from the locals.

Patricia was played by Claire (The Black Cat) Dodd, and Red was played Nat (Scared To Death) Pendleton who won the heavyweight wrestling silver medal in the 1920 Olympics.

One of the native women on the island is sick and dies, and Dr. Benson miraculously brings her back to life, and stops the natives from throwing all their asses in a big bonfire. Actually she had just had a heart attack, and was not dead, and the shot of Adrenalin he gives her, snaps her back to life!

 

Now the natives think Dr. Benson is a God!

Here's a great shot of the supporting cast. The other two guys are, on the left, John (I Married A Monster From Outer Space, High Sierra) Eldredge as Ship Officer Dwight, and Richard (The Falcon In Danger) Davies as Jim, the Deck Stewart and Patricia's lover.

Jim and Patricia are falling in love, and Dr. Benson doesn't like it, so he chooses Jim for his next 'bring 'em back to life' experiment!

The only way that Patricia can save Jim is to marry the Doctor!

The natives put a nice wedding ceremony together for them.

In the end, everything goes completely to Hell for the Doctor. In a failed escape attempt, Dwight ends up drowning one of the native boys, and when the Doctor cannot resuscitate him, the natives all turn on him, realizing that he's a phony, and not a God after all.

In the confusion, the rest of the gang manages to escape, and a rescue team spots them just in time, lands on the beach, and scoops them up and takes them up and away to safety, and the Doctor is left behind to fend for himself, which is not going to go well for him at all.