Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943)

Absolutely the worst movie.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

This was a movie that the two of us ended up watching completely by random chance (more on that later), and going in I think the both of us weren't expecting a whole lot. Monster team-up movies aren't typically synonymous with great cinema, and with this being the first one of those pretty much ever, it stood to reason that it was a precedent-setter. To our pleasant surprise, we both ended up enjoying it-- it doesn't offer much in the way of scares necessarily, but Lon Chaney Jr's Wolf Man is a really fascinating and compelling character, and some of the sets are very good looking. Also, it's short! It's a little over an hour! If you're reading this we can pretty much guarantee you that you have spent and hour and fifteen minutes doing something much less rewarding than watching this movie, so check it out.AND SPEAKING OF CHECKING IT OUT, the reason why this was a random watch on our part is because of our award-winning* brilliant** podcast, Tara and Andrew Versus the Scarecrow Video Movie Guide-- we're randomly selecting a movie from the aforementioned guide that neither of us have seen before, and then watching and talking about the movie as well as any interesting bits of information we were able to find out after doing some post-viewing research. We try to keep things pretty short, and this episode is only about twenty minutes, so if you think you might want to check us out you can find us at www.taraandandrewversus.com. Thanks for your potential patronage!

The Universal monster series combines two of its horror franchises – Frankenstein and the Wolf Man – in this atmospheric but thematically confused entry.Lyle Talbot (Lon Chaney, Jr.) lies at rest after the events that brought his end in "The Wolf Man" until a couple of greedy graverobbers choose the night of a full moon to open his tomb. A reanimated Talbot finds himself in London. Kindly Dr. Mannering (Patric Knowles) regards him merely as a "poor devil of unsound mind" and tries to do the last thing Talbot wants, restore him to full health.I can but echo the views of other user reviews by saying what we have here is a promising sequel idea undone by a lame second half. The spooky opening sequence follows the graverobbers as they sneak through a darkened cemetery. A howling wind, squawking crows, and eerie flute music fill our ears until the panning camera stops at the tomb. Once inside, they banter about all the jewels and cash poor Lyle was buried with, not noticing the moonlit hand rising from the opened sarcophagus until it is too late...Director Roy William Neill worked on Sherlock Holmes movies at this time, and invests this portion of the film with the same ominous mystery. The question of Talbot's apparent madness, and whether Mannering will figure out the supernatural truth of the matter, is developed well.Legendary make-up man Jack Pierce is on his game, too; unlike "The Wolf Man" we get here early on a full transformation sequence, a thing of wonder even when you see the dissolves. For his part, Chaney doesn't just lie there, but works his eyes, like a frightened boy at first, then as a cunning beast once the moon takes its full effect on him.Chaney is nearly as good through the rest of the film. His is a performance of existential futility. "Now I must go on living," he sighs, after learning the fate of the one man he hoped could bring him peace. "There's no hope for me to die."Unfortunately, that one man who he hoped would kill him is Dr. Frankenstein, which leads us to the second part of the story, the iceberg as it were. While being chased by angry villagers (they always are in these Universal movies), Talbot in Wolf Man form somehow falls into a snowy cave. There Frankenstein's monster (Bela Lugosi) rests in suspended animation. Somehow, Talbot gets the idea of reviving the monster to help him get what he's after.The gang's (almost) all here: Knowles, Lionel Atwill, Dwight Frye, but all playing different parts this time. In "The Wolf Man," Lugosi was the gypsy who infected Talbot with his werewolf state; now he's the monster Talbot relies upon for his "cure."The standout scene in the second half, oddly enough, is a village singalong that turns on the unfortunate lyric "For life is short but death is long," which really irks Talbot. He knows better.But the Frankenstein element is too forced, and after a while pulls in Dr. Mannering to play the role of mad scientist. Knowles is okay in light support but lost when we are asked to believe this placid character seized by the same delusions that pushed Victor Frankenstein five movies ago."I can't destroy Frankenstein's creation," he mutters. "I must see it at its full power."Of course, it is exactly that the audience wants to see. So what does the film do? After keeping the monster grunting in the wings for half the film, it sets up a big fight between it and the Wolf Man only to render it moot a minute later by a surprise flooding. Who builds a castle right under a dam anyway?The key problem with "Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man" occurs long before, when we are pulled away from England and the mystery story about Talbot's origins. I wasn't impressed with "The Wolf Man" but found the first half of this film a creepy and engaging continuation of its core idea. Too bad it transforms into a trumped-up monster mash that never finds its feet.

I personally found this to be an exciting film - from start to finish. It's all a matter of personal preference as to whether or not you will like this film (just like all films).This one I really enjoyed Lon Chaney's performance. Very intense and outstanding performance by Chaney. As usual Larry Talbot is wanting a cure or to simply die because of his unwanted infliction - he does not want to harm anyone.Bela Lugosi's Monster is good too - very terrifying. We all know it's hard to fill the shoes of Boris Karloff in the role as the Monster and I think that Lugosi was great - he did his best as always. AND it gives us an idea of what it would have been like if Bela Lugosi had not turned down the role for The Monster in 1931 (Frankenstein).The movie starts out good (maybe a bit slow for some) and builds up to an exciting ending where The Monster and The Wolf Man battle it out.A film worth watching if you enjoy Universal Classic Monsters.9.5/10

In this entry in the Universal Monsters series, our old friend the Wolf Man (Lon Chaney, Jr.) is unintentionally brought back to life a few years after his demise at the end of The Wolf Man (1941). In human form, he's actually Larry Talbot, and for the sake of plot expediency he already knows he turns into a wolf when the moon is full. Which it is, during almost the entire movie. After killing a couple of guys, Talbot winds up in a sanatorium run by Dr. Mannering (Patric Knowles). Talbot wants desperately to die so he can finally rid himself of this horrible curse, and the old gypsy woman (Maria Ouspenskaya) who he knew from The Wolf Man tells him only one guy can really help - Dr. Frankenstein himself.Only the good doctor's dead, dead as a doornail, killed when villagers blew up his castle in Son of Frankenstein. These same villagers are right angry that Talbot and the gypsy even bring up the Frankenstein name, for some reason. Anyway, it's not until the movie's nearly half over that we finally see the grand titular meeting, when Talbot stumbles among the ruins of the castle and finds the monster, encased in a block of ice. (It's in an ice cave, although I'm not sure where all the ice came from.) After thawing out the monster (played by an unrecognizable Bela Lugosi), Talbot searches in vain for the doctor's diary. But luckily, Frankenstein's daughter is still around, the Baroness Elsa (Ilona Massey), and she helps Talbot find the diary. Then it's up to Dr. Mannering to hook up Dr. Frankenstein's old apparatus and - get this - switch the wires so that instead of giving life to the Monster, energy is drained off of both him and Talbot. Things don't go as planned, strange as it may seem.There's plenty of that old Universal atmosphere, although the Monster's lurching gait looks kind of silly. Here's why it's not, though: he's lurching because he's blind. He's blind because the mind of Ygor in one of the earlier films was switched with that of the Monster. That's why Frank's Monster knows where some of the doctor's research is and why he lumbers about with his arms outstretched, as if he just needed a hug. Here's another fun fact - when the villagers are carrying a just-killed girl down the street, demanding justice, they're all carrying torches. Torches that are, yes, unlit. Even when they're searching the forest for the Wolf Man, the torches are unlit. These are not smart villagers.Some familiar Universal horror names are here, too. Lionel Atwill plays the mayor; Dwight Frye is one of the villagers. Martha Vickers, who was in the Bogie classic The Big Sleep a few years later, has an uncredited role, as does Jeff Corey.I saw this movie as part of an interactive event at the AFI Silver Theater in Silver Spring, Maryland, hosted by Count Gore de Vol. For these showings, the Count stops the movies a couple of times in order to play some trivia or other games, with fabulous prizes. The Count is always good for a hammy, light-hearted performance. Always a treat.The film itself isn't anything to write home about, unless you're really into the continuity thing. The timelines of the Wolf Man and Frankenstein movies don't neatly dovetail, but close enough for government work, as they say. Still a cool movie, made all the better by Count Gore de Vol.