The Devil's Messenger (1961)

That was an excellent one.

So much average

Fun premise, good actors, bad writing. This film seemed to have potential at the beginning but it quickly devolves into a trite action film. Ultimately it's very boring.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Lon Chaney Jr. after playing Wolfman, Dracula. Mummy, Frankenstein, now takes on the Devil...with a Rolodex. Satayana (Karen Kadler) a suicide victim has the option of delivering packages to individuals or go to hell. She chooses the packages which give us three film shorts including a 50,000 year old woman frozen in ice with plucked eye brows, mascara, and eye shadow. The very ending was typical of many sci-fi films of the era. Worth a peek if you got an hour. Available on numerous multi-packs.

Lon Chaney as Satan—how could I not watch this movie?!? Well, he's the best thing about this anthology directed by Curt Siodmak regarding Beelzebub's using a suicide victim, Satanaya(Karen Kadler) to bring him souls from earth, and in return he'll see about giving her a tribunal to reward her for doing his bidding. Don(John Crawford), a fine photographer but lout to women, "kills a woman" while on vacation in Massachusetts, his psyche slowly unraveling as the guilt begins to overcome him. Essentially, the first tale is about a man coming apart at the seams, his frailties as a misogynist getting the better of him as a photograph he took of the "murder victim" torments him. The second tale concerns a scientist, Dr. Siestrom(Frank Taylor), who becomes obsessed with an "anthropological find", basically a woman encased in ice, found in a mine, even murdering an anthropologist in charge of *studying* her, so he can have her all to himself. It will prove to be his undoing when attempts to melt the ice and release her from the icy tomb. The third tale follows a man who has been suffering nightmares about a building, visits a psychic informing him that she sees in her crystal ball that he will be dead by midnight. He wants to know the one who will commit this deed and she tells him it will be her! So he rushes out telling her she'll have to find him first! John Rainer(Michael Hinn) and the fortuneteller spend most of this tale discussing the murder that is supposed to occur in a manner of time, the supposed victim deliberating on how he'll survive (contemplating killing her in order to live). The final scene, after Satanya is successful in "luring" her former lover to hell, has Satan unveiling his plan to give us the atomic bomb to destroy ourselves so he can have more space (since hell is becoming crowded!). Chaney is a delight as a gleeful Satan, seemingly having a ball in the role, but this collection of Swedish television shows, edited into a movie format, barely linked together, are mostly dull, cheap, with a lack of real thrills. The third tale, involving Rainer's trying to escape a tragic fate foretold to him by a spooky psychic, is the most atmospheric while the second tale, regarding the scientist and the frozen girl he has become infatuated with, is the silliest. My favorite sequence of events comes in the first tale where every time John looks at a photograph, the girl he killed seems closer and closer; it's a simple but affective way of symbolizing death's drawing nearer and nearer. Before each tale, Satan gives Satanya an object (camera, crystal ball, etc) to take back to earth as a means to kick-start the proceedings. Chaney's eyes light up when his Prince of Darkness addresses Satanya's comments on having to return to participate in bringing him new victims as he mentions that they contribute to their own demise--he just assists them!

First of all, the use of a hell-like place is sort of fun. The problem is, it is handled so poorly and so dully by Lon Chaney, Jr. that is becomes pointless. More of a problem than that are a trio of pretty dull stories. They are highly predictable with weak endings. A decent writer could have been given these three premises and made them very scary. As it is, we start with the photographer who must be psychotic. He murders a young woman who doesn't want her picture taken. Then images keep reappearing. The second, and weakest, is about a deranged anthropologist who kills his rival so he can hook up with a woman, frozen in a chunk of ice. It doesn't get much more asinine than this. The most intriguing is about a man who is told by a fortune teller he will be killed by midnight "and by her." The setup is good. Things work their way out. But the ending is a real disappointment and fizzles. These are TV like and apparently were, originally. Chaney must have really fallen on hard times. He looks old and tired. But he does have a document for mankind at the end. They should have sent it back.

My wife gave me this video for Christmas 2004 and I was stunned by how awful the production was. I noticed in the first story the man who later played Sheriff Bridges in the Waltons, John Crawford. Neat story. Beautiful woman in the photo by the way. But what makes this a good "awful" film is the macabre appearance of Chaney Jr. as the devil. His face is bloated like Ted Kennedy's. Shame he wasted away in his later years. Crappy quality on the same DVD as Vincent Price's "SHOCK", but worth a look if you like old films that have never played on late night TV. Cheesy special effects abound in this, as well as over-acting. But what the hell? Just because a flick doesn't win an Oscar doesn't mean it isn't watchable.