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| The Soul of a Monster (1944) | |
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| Topic Started: Mar 13 2010, 02:45 PM (474 Views) | |
| rodney | Mar 13 2010, 02:45 PM Post #1 |
Charter Member
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George Winston is a good guy. He's a surgeon, but if he can help, he'll help. Doesn't matter if you've got the money or not, he's in it to make people better. The kind of guy that we could use these days. Only trouble is, he's really sick. On his deathbed even. His wife, fed up with the injustice of it all, calls upon the powers of anyone or anything, good or evil, to save his life. As you guessed, his life is saved, but not by the good, but by Lilyan, who we assume is an agent of the devil. Before long, he leaves his wife and allows his best friend to die on an operating table after Lilyan runs said friend over with a car. At the end, he finds The Lord, and thwarts Lilyan. I'm not big on spoilers, but in this case, who cares? Columbia tried awfully hard to mimic Lewton with this film, but it falls short on all counts. They must've thought that you create suspense by having nothing happen, and the ridiculously religious resolution just caps this one off as a real dud. I do have to give a shout out to the gang over at Yammering Magpie Cinema who I bought this from. It's a clean 16mm transfer and all but the pickiest people would be happy with it. I don't think they've been mentioned on this site before, but what I've seen from them is quite good. They're at www.yammeringmagpie.com |
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| Laughing Gravy | Mar 14 2010, 11:40 AM Post #2 |
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"They must've thought that you create suspense by having nothing happen." Love that line. Describes a lot of films I've seen! |
| "I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley | |
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| shelbyvinje | Mar 15 2010, 06:59 PM Post #3 |
Lee Meriwether fan
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I'll have to upgrade. Mine came from VHS. It's a very odd film because it's both film noir and horror together in the same movie. Magpie has a lot of nice films, but it's still a hit and miss. Their copy of THE BENSON MURDER CASE was awful and I couldn't watch it. But their copy of ISLAND OF LOST SOULS was perfect (after I bought two crappy quality copies from other vendors over the past year). Magpie got a bunch of DVDs from me recently, so I expect a number of them to be on their site soon. |
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| rodney | Mar 16 2010, 04:33 AM Post #4 |
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Charter Member
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I should point out that I am certainly not an anti-religion, anti-faith person. I just found this movie (What gives you the soul of a monster? Not having faith in God!) to be a little over the top. |
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| Laughing Gravy | Mar 12 2012, 08:37 AM Post #5 |
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The film opens with a series of vignettes with the whole town talking about the nice, saintly doctor who caught an infection from one of his pro bono patients and lies on his deathbed, hearin' the saintly chariots a-comin'. Why, even a German Shepherd voices concern about it (no, really). The doc's wife isn't taking death for an answer, though ("Prayer is cheap - why doesn't it work?!?" she says, sounding as if she's having a bad experience with a $7 coffee maker from Walmart) and calls on dat ol' Debbil to cure her man, and he sends Rose Hobart, who was apparently told by the director to "act really scary by dressing to the nines, showing no emotion whatsoever, and chain-smoking." The doc pulls through but turns nasty, chasing a guy with an icepick for what seems like 45 minutes, and killing that German Shepherd we discussed earlier. This is one of the 1940s monster movies with no monsters in it; whenever somebody wanted to make a dull monster picture, they apparently called writer Ed Dein, who also penned Calling Dr. Death, Jungle Woman, The Leopard Man, and The Cat Creeps. It's only 61 min. long, so it has that going for it. "The man who walks with evil walks ALONE!" This would be a good companion piece to The Next Voice You Hear, another not-so-good Christian parable "shocker". How much better this would've been had they just filmed the poster!!!! 
Edited by Laughing Gravy, Mar 12 2012, 08:40 AM.
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| "I'm glad that this question came up, because there are so many ways to answer it that one of them is bound to be right." - Robert Benchley | |
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| CliffClaven | Mar 12 2012, 10:26 AM Post #6 |
Balcony Gang, Foist Class
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No mention of "The Walking Dead"? Boris Karloff, a wrongly executed man brought back by science, has inexplicable knowledge of who was responsible, and quietly goes forth to confront them -- not to wreak vengeance, but just to ask, in his spookily gentle way, why. A spiritual element is there, with hints of higher justice as the villains seal their own fates, but it's kept mysterious in an otherwise "realistic" thriller. |
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| AndyFish | Mar 13 2012, 04:41 PM Post #7 |
Movie Watcha Foist Class
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This is available on Netflix instant view along with a few other gems serial fans might like including the Spy Smasher feature and VALLEY OF THE ZOMBIES which I thought was pretty good. |
| www.hebsandfish.com | |
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5:15 AM May 22