Night of the Ghouls (1959)

Since I did Bride of the Monster during the first Schlocktober, I felt obligated to do another Ed Wood flick this year... and I also decided to defy expectations by going with one of his more obscure ones. Sorry to those hoping I was going to do Plan 9 from Outer Space, but you'll have to wait for that some other year. In any case, Night of the Ghouls is the Ed Wood movie that everyone, myself included, seeks out once they've gone through his most well-known stuff. Even though it is a rather significant one in Wood's filmography, as it was his last stab at legitimate horror before his career went into the gutter and he spent the rest of his life writing and making pornography, it hasn't gotten the same amount of coverage as Glen or Glenda, Bride of the Monster, and Plan 9. In the Tim Burton movie, it was only mentioned briefly during the epilogue, where it was noted that Tom Mason, the chiropractor whom Wood roped into doubling for the late Bela Lugosi in Plan 9, appeared there as well and was allowed to show his face this time. The first time I ever saw anything of it was when James Rolfe talked about it in the second part of his "Ed Wood-A-Thon," and yet, none of the images or information he gave stuck with me like the others. When I finally got around to seeing Night of the Ghouls, I'd forgotten that it was something of a sequel to Bride of the Monster, with Tor Johnson again appearing as Lobo, and that it wasn't actually released to the public until the 1980's. (Even though 1984 is, technically, its release date, it didn't feel right to designate a film that was shot in the 50's with it, so I decided to put 1959 as the year, since that's when it was given a preview screening.) James himself also didn't have much to say about it, noting, "It's actually a more competent film [than Plan 9], it doesn't have as many memorable bloopers, but it doesn't have the same entertainment appeal." 

And that's how I feel about it as well. I do remember laughing my ass off at some of the ridiculous sights during the seance scenes, like the floating trumpets and the bed-sheet ghosts, but I didn't remember much else about it. Upon re-watching it for this, it became clear that this is, indeed, not only Ed Wood's dullest but also his most aggravating horror flick. It's dull because you don't have the gravitas and class that Bela Lugosi managed to bring to these otherwise incompetent, no budget pieces of junk, and are instead stuck with a bunch of actors who, while mostly decent, are not as compelling. Also, as James said, while it is more competent in its filmmaking, the way it's shot and edited sucks the energy out of it, leaving you with little more than scenes of people who are either standing around, spouting Wood's clunky dialogue, or wandering around an old house in-between the ridiculous seance scenes. As for the aggravating part, that comes from how nonsensical and difficult to follow those scenes are, and from Criswell's continual, overbearing, and inane narration, which rivals Keye Luke's constant talking in Gigantis, the Fire Monster for sheer redundancy. And as if that weren't enough, they give the protagonist occasional voiceover as well! These issues could be chalked up to Wood never getting the chance to re-edit and "finesse" the movie as he planned but then, given who we're talking about, he might've ended up making it worse. Still, while I will be able to compliment the film on some points, believe it or not, this is a low point, even for Wood.

As Los Angeles County deals with numerous instances of juvenile delinquency and drunk driving, which is often reported as the worst crimes the local police have to deal with, something less-publicized but infinitely more horrific begins brewing elsewhere. One night, a teenage couple falls victim to a ghostly woman in black, but the murder is attributed to a "maniac" in the press. At a police station in East Los Angeles, Lt. Dan Bradford is called in while on his way to the opera with his girlfriend. When he arrives, he speaks with Captain Robbins, who tells him about a farming couple, Henry and Martha Edwards, who earlier drove by the old house found on Willows Lake, which Bradford investigated several years earlier. Though the house was destroyed by lightning, it has since been rebuilt, and while on their way to visit Henry's ailing sister, they had a frightening encounter with a spooky woman dressed in white, with long fingernails, who emerged from the house. Robbins tells Bradford that, after the couple reported what happened, he had to send them over to the hospital for a sedative. Also learning that this is the latest in a series of incidents that have taken place there, Bradford agrees to go out to the house and investigate, with the jittery Officer Kelton being sent after him as backup. There, Bradford, unaware that he's being watched by the woman in black, walks through the front door and is met by Dr. Acula, a gentleman in a turban who tells him that there are many others in the house, both living and dead. Bradford convinces Acula that he's there for that very reason and is allowed in. He's shown to a room where several people are gathered around a table, as Acula performs seances so they can speak with their departed loved ones. At the same time, Kelton arrives on the property, only to run back to his patrol car and desperately radio for help after he encounter both the White and the Black Ghost. It turns out that Acula is actually a conman who scams wealthy people out of their money, and the "White Ghost" is actually played by his lover, Sheila. Using Lobo, the badly disfigured former assistant to Dr. Vornoff, Acula plans to do away with the nosy cops, unaware that there may be actual ghosts lurking about.

Again, this was at the end of Ed Wood's "Golden Age," if you will, as the movies he's most remembered for were behind him, he was becoming less successful at raising money, and the one bit of "star power" he had, Bela Lugosi, had died in 1956. In fact, it's believed that Wood may have written Night of the Ghouls, or Revenge of the Dead, as it was known during shooting, before Lugosi's death and had planned for him to star in it. Evidence of this is how the villain's name is Dr. Acula, which was the title of an unmade movie he'd planned to do with Lugosi. And after a preview screening in Los Angeles, during which Wood decided that the film, which was already a major patchwork, needed more editing, he'd planned to put in archival footage of Lugosi, as well as remove some of the moments with Criswell and even change the title. But he was never able to make these changes, as he was so strapped for cash that he wasn't able to pay the film laboratory what it was owed for developing the negative. Thus, the lab kept the film and Wood abandoned it and moved on, directing his last mainstream film, 1960's The Sinister Urge, a crime-drama with exploitation elements. Having already written a 1959 "nudie cuite" flick, Revenge of the Virgins, Wood would spend the rest of his life working almost exclusively in the sexploitation genre, writing stuff like Orgy of the Dead, The Photographer, Mrs. Stone's Thing, and directing Take It Out in Trade, Necromania, and The Young Marrieds (his last three films as director, at least by himself) in the early 70's.

Night of the Ghouls remained unseen by the general public until 1984, thanks to Wade Williams, a film archivist and fan of Wood's films from Kansas City, Missouri. After he acquired the rights to Plan 9 from Outer Space in 1982, Williams learned about the film and why it had never been released from Wood's widow, Kathy. So, he paid the long overdue fees himself, receiving full ownership of it, and released it on home video. He's also the one who officially changed the title to Night of the Ghouls; in 2023 (oddly, the same year of Williams' death at the age of 80), a 35mm print of the preview version, with the original title of Revenge of the Dead, was discovered in Canada.

It's bad when the writer/director can't seem to keep his own story straight, as even though Night of the Ghouls is meant to be a sequel to Bride of the Monster, there's a glaring error in that the lead character of Lt. Dan Bradford (Duke Moore) is said to have investigated the house on Willows Lake when Dr. Vornoff performed his experiments there. But if you've seen Bride, you'd know that Bradford was not in the movie at all, and it was Captain Robbins (who's in this movie, but played by a different actor) and Lt. Dick Craig who did the investigating, the latter getting caught up in Vornoff's experiments, along with his fiancee. Still, for whatever reason, this movie insists that Bradford was the investigator on the previous case, which is why Robbins insists on sending him to investigate the property following the Edwards' encounter with the White Ghost. Also, in his narration, Criswell says that, unofficially, Bradford is a "ghost chaser." Thus, he reluctantly agrees to give up on his expected night at the opera and go up to the old house, spending the whole movie dressed up in formal evening wear with tails (he also had a top hat, which he discards). Once inside the house, he's met by Dr. Acula and, clearly figuring what his racket is from the get-go, acts as if he's a prospective client and is allowed in. After witnessing one of Acula's phony seances, Bradford takes the opportunity to search the house, finding some strange things, but is then captured by Acula and Lobo, the latter of whom locks him in a room. However, Bradford manages to escape and, with the help of Officer Kelton and some reinforcements, begins breaking up Acula's operation. However, they're not the ones who ultimately stop him.

Dressed in a suit with a turban, Dr. Acula (Kenne Duncan) initially puts on the front of a true swami, speaking eloquently about the dead, some of which he claims roam the house, and not caring for Bradford's intrusion, until the lieutenant tells him that he's a prospective client. With that, Acula leads him into the depths of the house, through some very dark hallways, and tells him that strange things happen when midnight comes around. Once they meet up with the others in the draped room where he performances his seances, Bradford learns that Acula has several wealthy clients eager to speak with deceased loved ones. He appears to provide them with such an opportunity, although Bradford, and the audience, can tell it's all a sham, as he's using silly gimmicks and his associates to create these illusions. And during the seance, Acula, whose name is actually Karl, is momentarily called away when his lover, Sheila, who plays the White Ghost, warns him about how Officer Kelton is hanging around outside, as well as about the Black Ghost, who she's seen several times. He's dismissive of her claims, telling her, "Sheila, you're a fool. I'm the one that creates ghosts around here. Me, me, nobody else. Don't tell me my pitch is having its effect on you, too." He also refuses to give up on his racket, as it's about to pay off big time, and he uses the badly scarred, half-dead Lobo to restrain and imprison Bradford after he finds him snooping around. He also uses Lobo to take care of Kelton when he manages to get inside the house, taking him away when he walks in on the seance. After receiving a check for $10,000 from a man who hopes to speak with his deceased wife, Acula decides to leave and set up shop somewhere else to avoid the police when they come searching for Bradford and Kelton. However, the police show up much quicker than he expected, and Acula and Sheila try to make a run for it, through a mortuary room. But then, it's discovered that Acula's ability to raise the dead wasn't as fraudulent as he believed.

In her role as the White Ghost, Sheila (Valda Hansen) is meant to scare away any intruders, as she does near the beginning when Henry and Martha Edwards drive too close to the house. But she gets scared herself by the sight of the Black Ghost, especially when she sees Officer Kelton fire on her with no effect. She later tells Dr. Acula, or Karl, about this, but he dismisses what she says and instead makes her get back to work as part of his con (her acting in that scene is absolutely terrible). The check for $10,000 that he later gets is enough to quiet her nerves for the time being, and he tells her that they're going to run off with it and set up somewhere else. Of course, the police promptly arrive to help Bradford and Kelton, and Acula and Sheila try to escape while their other conspirators hold them off. However, when they duck into the mortuary room, they're faced with a group of undead men, whom Acula unknowingly resurrected. They attack him, intending to take him with them back to the grace, and Sheila takes the opportunity to escape outside. But once outside, she runs into the Black Ghost, who uses hypnotic powers to force Sheila to follow her, telling her that she must join the others in the grave.

Tor Johnson's Lobo is one of three characters from Bride of the Monster who actually return here, and one of only two played by their original actors. Having survived the fire he got caught up in during that film's climax, as well as the house being destroyed by lightning, Lobo, the left side of his face badly burned (a pretty grisly bit of makeup) and the other having nasty cuts on it, is a pawn for Dr. Acula in the same way that he was for Dr. Vornoff. However, while he proved to be surprisingly multi-faceted in Bride, given his affection for Janet Lawton, here he really is little more than a mindless brute who lumbers around and does Acula's bidding. As tough as he is, able to take three shots from Kelton's revolver and still keep going, Lobo is clearly in pain, as he's often moaning and breathing in a labored manner. Even Acula figures he may be on his last legs and thus, plans to leave him behind when they take off for another hideout. Sure enough, when Lobo attacks Bradford and Kelton in the draped room near the end, the police come in and fire on him, killing him for good.

Paul Marco also returns as the wise-cracking, jittery Officer Kelton for the third and final time, having played the role before in both Bride of the Monster and Plan 9 from Outer Space. In fact, Kelton's dialogue confirms that Plan 9 is apparently in continuity with this and Bride (I guess you could call this the "Woodverse"); when he's first tasked with accompanying Lt. Bradford out to Willows Lake, he initially freaks out and grumbles, "Monsters. Space people. Mad doctors. They didn't teach me about such things in the police academy, and yet, that's all I've been assigned to since I became on active duty! Why do I always get picked for these screwy details all the time?!" He then attempts to resign, ranting, "You're all against me. The whole police force is against me! The whole city's against me! I resign!", and running out of Captain Robbins' office. Bradford then goes to the house at the lake by himself, and Kelton later returns to Robbins' office, making the excuse that he can't get a patrol car because they're all out for repairs. However, Robbins sees to it that Kelton gets a car and he reluctantly drives out to the house. Upon arriving, he gets spooked at the sight of both Sheila as the White Ghost and the Black Ghost and desperately tries to contact Robbins, who's gone home for the night. Naturally, his claims aren't taken seriously, but he keeps sending reports as he stays inside his car, scared out of his wits. Eventually, he does man up enough to go into the house, continuing to get spooked and is stalked by Lobo. He breaks in on Dr. Acula's seance, demanding to know where Bradford is, only to be knocked out and dragged away by Lobo, despite shooting him three times. Bradford later finds Kelton unconscious in a coffin and helps out of it, giving him a cigarette to calm his nerves. After he complains about how he always gets beaten up during these cases, moaning, "You know, sometimes I feel that I'm the whipping boy of the whole police force," Bradford helps the whoozy Kelton get to his feet when they opt to escape. They get attacked by Lobo again, but fortunately for them, the cops show up and save them. Kelton tags along as they go on investigating the house, unaware that other forces have taken care of Acula.

While the character of Captain Robbins is here again, this time he's played by a man named Johnny Carpenter (listed as John Carpenter, but I don't want to make any false connections between this and actual quality). Depicted as much more short-tempered and exasperated (not to mention inexplicably twenty years younger), Robbins calls Lt. Bradford in to investigate the house on Willows Lake following the Edwards' encounter with the White Ghost. Despite Bradford's protests, given that he was on the way to the opera, Robbins won't back down from insisting he go out there, given his experience with the place. After telling Bradford what the Edwards claimed to have seen, as well as reports of other incidents out there, Robbins orders Kelton to accompany him, only for Kelton to start whining about once again being assigned to a spooky case. Robbins is especially annoyed by his cowardice, telling him to get the hell out of his office when he's talking about resigning and angrily demands he be given a patrol car when he later says there are none available. With that, Robbins, who's tired, hungry, and frustrated, decides to go home for the night, wanting to hear from nobody except Bradford. When he's called back to the office following Kelton's reports, claiming that he's seen ghosts, Robbins says that he's about ready to kill Kelton himself, and also plans to promote him just so he can take his stripes away from him. Still, with nothing else to do, he accompanies Sgt. Crandall out to the house, arriving just in time to save Bradford and Kelton from Lobo, and also to break up Dr. Acula's ring.

Oddly, Robbins being recast doesn't seem to have been an issue of original actor Harvey B. Dunn not being available, as he is in the film, along with Margaret Mason, Tom Mason's wife, as Henry and Martha Edwards. As the two of them are driving out to visit Henry's ailing sister, they argue about the shortcut he's taken to get there faster, with Martha worrying that they're going to get caught up in a storm soon. Eventually, their drive takes them by the old house, which already spooks Martha, given its history, and then, when their car gets stuck, she and Henry see Sheila as the White Ghost, which sends them driving to the police station in a panic. Their scene is one of the more classic Ed Wood moments here, given how Dunn really struggles to make it seem like he's actually driving the car and having trouble with it, sayings stuff like "gol darn it" and "dang," and Margaret Mason's idea of looking scared is to make a face that almost seems like a grin (Dunn's isn't much better at it).

I'll admit that it's been a long time now since I last watched Plan 9 from Outer Space, so I'd forgotten that Criswell not only introduces that film but also continually narrates throughout it, as he does here. However. I don't remember his narration in Plan 9 being this egregious. Starting with the opening, where he sits up in a coffin and melodramatically says, "Now, I tell you a tale of the threshold, people. So astounding that some of you may think this is a story of those in the twilight time. Once human, now monsters, in a world between the living and the dead. Monsters to be pitied, monsters to be despised...", he tends to cut back in constantly, with the most asinine, nonsensical narration, especially during the first act. When the movie opens on the police station, Criswell says, "For our talk, I must take you to your town, any town. A police station. Activity of the day and night... Activity, some of which the police are quite willing to admit... This is how it began: an incident the police were fearful to admit," and he continues droning on during stock footage of juvenile delinquency, urban violence, and drunk driving, asking if this is really the most horrific stuff that happens in this day and age. Following the scene where we see the Black Ghost kill two teenagers, Criswell pipes down for a little while, much to my relief. But when Lt. Bradford arrives at the house, he has to chime back in, telling us that Bradford, off the record, is a ghost chaser. Also, when we first see Lobo, Criswell pointlessly tells us, "The house was not all that remained of the old scientist's horrors," and when Kelton arrives, "Patrolman Paul Kelton, 29 years of age, four years with the department. Eager for the glory of the uniform, but wide-eyed with fear at the thought of actually being on special duty. Unfortunately, though eager, not what the department usually looks for in their officers." Between that and his having to tell us what Bradford is thinking and planning while in the house, I was thinking to myself, "Criswell, stop talking!"

Criswell also has an actual role in the film. Near the end, when Dr. Acula and Sheila are trying to escape through the mortuary room, they're faced by a group of undead men, one of whom is played by him. Speaking an echoing, otherworldly voice, he tells Acula that he actually does have the power to raise the dead, elaborating, "Once every thirteen years, when called by a strong medium such as you, we are given a brief twelve hours of freedom from our deep pit of darkness. Those few hours are almost gone. We

must return to the grave." He then adds, "You will accompany us there." They proceed to overwhelm Acula and force him into an open coffin, which Criswell lines the inside of and then closes, as Acula screams helplessly. At the end of the movie, Criswell closes it out, saying that Kelton's speculation about what became of the disappeared Sheila, that she had become a real ghost, was the closest to the truth. It cuts back to him in his coffin, saying, "And now, we return to our graves, the old and the new. And you, may join us soon." As much as he may have gotten on my nerves, I'll admit that I do kind of like the idea of this story having told to us by an actual ghost and that, sooner or last, we'll be with him in the afterlife.

Among Acula's clients are Mrs. Wingate Yates Foster (Marcelle Hamphill), a wealthy old woman who wishes to contact the spirit of her deceased husband to ask permission to marry a much younger man (James La Maida). However, Acula reveals that the man is in on the scam and plans to split what he gets from Mrs. Foster with him. In the end, though, Acula opts to run out without collecting and set up shop elsewhere when things start getting a little thick. Also, there's Mr. Darmoor (Bud Osborne), who's desperate to see

his deceased wife, Lucille. Acula has him convinced that he'll be able to raise her in two days, but when the seance is interrupted by Kelton barging in, shooting at Lobo, and getting taken away, Darmoor worries that it may impede Acula's ability to do so. Acula assures him that it hasn't, and Darmoor gives him a check for $10,000 to prove that he still has faith in his "abilities," which is more than enough incentive for Acula to get out.

As I said, Tom Mason appears briefly here, during one the seances, as he rises out of a coffin and pretends to be Mrs. Foster's dead husband. (I assume he's in on Acula's racket, but he's one of several figures who disappear completely following the seance, so he may have been a real ghost, for all I know.) And we can assume that the Black Ghost (Jeannie Stevens), who's reminiscent of Vampira's role in Plan 9, is one of the spirits whom Acula unknowingly resurrected. She mainly just lurks

around the house, frightening those who see her, but as seen as the beginning, she is willing and able to kill, murdering the teenage couple who parked near the house. (In scenes like that, where the Black Ghost's face is hidden behind a veil, that's actually Ed Wood himself in the costume, as Jeannie Stevens is said to have absolutely refused to perform the actions he wanted her to.) And at the end of the movie, she takes control of Sheila when she runs outside and compels her to join her in the grave, speaking in the same echoing voice as Criswell's character.

Again, it could come down to Wood not getting the chance to recut the film the way he'd intended, but regardless, Night of the Ghouls is shot and edited in a very static manner, with a number of shots of two or more people standing around and talking that are held on for much longer than necessary. For instance, the first shot of the police station interiors is maintained for almost two full minutes, as you watch a woman come in and report a stolen car, another guy get brought in for booking, and the Edwards walk out of Captain Robbins' office, still reeling from having seen

the White Ghost. An almost identical shot is used in the same room after the Black Ghost is shown killing the teenagers, as we watch a drunk walk in and then leave just as suddenly, Robbins come out of his office and ask Kelton where Lt. Bradford is, and Bradford arrive and go into Robbins' office. This shot goes on for over 90 seconds, with no editing, and when Bradford goes into the office and is ordered to go to the house, there is some camera movement and a little more cutting, but not much. And the cutting back and

forth between them as they talk is done with some awkward close-ups of both actors. This may not sound like that big of a deal, but this very static visual style continues throughout the film, such as in a late scene where Bradford is trying to avoid Lobo, and makes it come off as lifeless and not that fun to watch. Also, there are moments in the house, like when Dr. Acula leads Bradford through this dark corridor, where the camerawork and editing make it hard to decipher where everyone is or, in the case of the seance scenes, if the clients are seeing the bizarre stuff that we are.

Sometimes, the editing is really choppy and sudden. You'll notice that, when I quoted Criswell's opening monologue, I ended it with an abrupt ellipses and that's because it suddenly cuts from him talking to a stock shot of thunder and lightning, before going into the credits. Speaking of stock footage, as per usual with Wood, there's plenty of it here, and the editing is sometimes really clumsy here, too. During the montage of juvenile delinquency, fighting, and drunk driving at the beginning (and by the way, when Criswell says, "The latest in juvenile delinquency,"

the footage it cuts to is some teenagers doing absolutely nothing wrong; just having some fun at an outdoor diner, with two dancing very innocently), it repeatedly cuts from the footage of said acts to a police car coming down the road with its sirens blaring, but you never see the police resolve anything. It's interesting to note that some of this stock footage was from other projects that Wood was involved in. For instance, the footage of the two guys fighting in the dirt is actually Wood and Conrad Brooks, from Wood's unfinished film, Hellborn. Most notably,

when Bradford explores the house while Dr. Acula is called away, much of that is taken from Final Curtain, a TV pilot that Wood directed. They added in Criswell's narration, as well as voiceover by Duke Moore, to try to make it fit, but they weren't entirely successful, as that set looks nothing like the rest of the house. And Moore's voiceover is just as dumb and nonsensical as Criswell's (before he starts, Criswell narrates, "One could almost read his thoughts,"). As he walks up some stairs to an attic area and

investigates, he has this tosay: "It's only a metal railing. Huh. Guess probably this Dr. Acula character has that railing rigged up too... Well, that's strange, the ringing of the staircase is so much louder at night than during the day... Well, one of Dr. Acula's storerooms. Lighting equipment, props, scenery, sets, and an old organ. Now, what a theater group could do with these!" There are some very obvious moments of ADR work elsewhere, like when Bradford, while his back is conveniently to the camera, tells Acula, "These dark passageways and weird sounds are disturbing. I'm not used to it."

While a lot of the nighttime scenes were actually shot at night, there are still moments where it cuts back and forth between them and obvious day-for-night shots. Also, like I alluded to before, the shots of Henry and Martha in the car is one of the most pathetic examples of "poor man's process" I've ever seen, as it's clear the car isn't moving at all, even though Henry is constantly whipping the steering wheel left and right, like he's driving on a tough stretch of road. And when the Black Ghost attacks and kills the teenage couple, any effectiveness it may have had is done away with thanks to the footage of the teenagers being inexplicably sped up, the guy letting out a half-hearted, high-pitched squeal when he's killed, and the cartoonish music choices.

Even for an Ed Wood flick, the sets here are exceptionally threadbare, with the immediate interiors of the police department consisting of little more than a small room with a front door with Venetian blinds on the window, a file cabinet in the corner, a desk that you always see from the same angle, and a WANTED poster on the wall that, if you look closely, you'll realize has Wood's face on it (it's actually a publicity photo of him that they taped the word "WANTED" over the top of). Captain Robbins' office fares better, being much more fully decorated, although I've

noticed that the door almost completely blends in with the wall, and there doesn't appear to be a knob, as the actors have to open it on its side. And when Kelton radios in about seeing ghosts, the call comes through in a room at the station that has so little to it that they hung up a bunch of curtains behind the officer at the desk. 

The only other major sets are the interiors of the house on Willows Lake, which are also fairly bare, as well as confusing in regards to the place's structure. Once Lt. Bradford enters through the front door and meets Dr. Acula, he's led through some extremely dark corridors that seem to go on for a quite while, until they reach something of a main hub. In one spot is a room with what appears to be a body covered by a sheet, surrounded by four candles, and also around here is the "draped room" where Acula puts on his phony seances. The look of this room is the most

memorable by far, as the table has a crystal ball with a skull inside it, with a candle on either side of it, while the three chairs on the right side are each occupied by a skeleton, one of which has a black wig atop it and another a Mohawk, and Acula's unique chair also has two skulls atop it. Acula also has a small dressing room, as well as a room called the "mortuary," where he and Sheila run into the undead at the end. When Bradford is exploring the house in the middle of the movie, the use of the Final Curtain footage makes the

place look even bigger than it actually should be, as Bradford is going up metal staircases, looking through big storerooms full of equipment, walking through a large backstage area, and finds a room with a mannequin that appears to be alive (more on that later). There are other parts of the place that come off like an old-fashioned spook-house, like this one spot where Kelton opens a door to find a skeleton hanging up inside, and finds another spot that looks like it has sections of a wooden fence up against the wall, with skulls lining its top, while eerie moans freak him out. And there's one hallway with a bunch of doors on either side of it where Lobo stalks both Kelton and Bradford (the latter moment feels like a routine you'd see on Scooby-Doo).

The house exteriors do manage to come off as rather spooky, like a classic old, rundown building that looks like it should be haunted (although, it looks awfully decrepit for a place that was supposedly rebuilt only recently; also, the front door area that's used by both Bradford and Sheila don't match the other shots of the house, suggesting that they were probably shot separately or may even be from a completely different source). Its immediate surroundings also come off as atmospheric in a number of shots with the ghosts wandering around, as there's often plenty of low-hanging mist, and I like the look of the main yard, with that low tree branch stretching out across it.

The seance scenes are not only the most ridiculous and illogical in the film, but they also rank up there with the weird hallucinations in Glen or Glenda as the weirdest stuff that Ed Wood ever put together. As Dr. Acula begins to "invoke" the spirit of Mrs. Foster's deceased husband, you hear sounds like sudden loud drums, plucking strings, slide whistles, and a low humming, while the film continually cuts from those at the table to bizarre sights like a floating trumpet that sounds badly D tuned; a bed-sheet ghost cross-stepping from one side of the frame to the other; and

what I think is meant to be a big, floating eyeball, but the thing turns around in midair, revealing it's a plastic prop. During the second part of the seance, we not only get more floating trumpet and bed-sheet ghost, but it suddenly cuts to some guy in the dark, with what looks like a kind of metal strainer on his head, making exaggerated facial expressions as he speaks in a horribly distorted voice. I only know that this is what he says thanks to the Quotes section on the film's IMDB page: "Mongo, mongo! I am your spirit guide. Mongo! Mongo, mongo! From the

everlasting pit of darkness. Dr. Acula calls and I obey! Mongo, mongo, mongo! I will lead you into the dark world beyond! Mongo, mongo, mongo! Mongo, mongo!" While the people at the table can obviously hear it, I'm not sure if they can actually see any of this goofy stuff. Sometimes, it looks as if they can, like when the man pretending to be Mrs. Foster's husband rises up in a coffin and speaks to her, and when Sheila walks through the room as the White Ghost, acting as though she's calling to another spirit, but the latter is

the only time where they appear to be in the same room with the "spirits." You do see that coffin off to the side of the table in the one shot, but that's the thing: I didn't notice it until I looked at the film more carefully, as the coverage is so bad that I wasn't sure before. And like I said, I don't know who it was that pretended to be Mrs. Foster's husband, or, for that matter, the spirit guide or the person under the sheet, as they don't figure into the climax.

Like James Rolfe, one thing I can't deny is that there are moments of true atmosphere and spookiness here  Like the exteriors of the house itself, those shots of both the White and Black Ghost roaming the misty woods and grounds are nicely photographed, and have an eerie quality to them. The same also goes for the moment when, as Lt. Bradford and Dr. Acula are walking through the house's dark corridors, they hear the cemetery clock-tower strike midnight, which Acula says portends some very strange things. It then cuts to a shot of the cemetery, some shots of lightning

in the sky, and one of clouds passing by the moon, and while the latter two may not line up from a continuity standpoint, all three of these images are so classically Gothic that I can't help but love them. They're complimented by shots of both of the ghosts in the woods near the cemetery, even if this is where it's revealed that the White Ghost is a fake when she screams at the sight of the Black Ghost. And while it is hurt by the stock music and narration, the footage taken from Final Curtain is legitimately creepy, as Bradford wanders this dark area in the back of the

house. At one point, he opens the door which, according to him, once led to Dr. Vornoff's control room (it seems a tad small for that), and inside finds a "mannequin" dressed completely in white (Jeannie Stevens, who also plays the Black Ghost), with a long wig. You can tell this mannequin is really a person because Stevens is unable to keep completely still, and Bradford's inner monologue about how "lifelike" it seems doesn't help, but either way, the moment where Bradford walks back to the door, turns around,

and she smiles at and beckons to him, is pretty creepy. This is something else that's never explained within the context of the film, as Bradford thinks to himself, "That Acula guy's a genius!", suggesting she was another spirit whom Acula unknowingly conjured. I haven't seen the entire film of Final Curtain, which wasn't discovered and made available until the 2010's, but judging from how eerie this footage is, it seems as though it may be the most genuinely creepy stuff that Ed Wood ever had a hand in.

While it's similar to The Screaming Skull in that we have a scam or a plot involving spirits while, at the same time, there are real ghosts wandering around, this plot is hardly unique to the two of them; in fact, as has been noted by others, Night of the Ghouls is very similar to a movie shot and released around the same time called The Unearthly (Tor Johnson even plays a character there called Lobo). Still, I like the idea of a fake medium and necromancer who, unbeknownst to him, actually does have such powers (one of the last episodes of the original Twilight Zone

had this twist), and even though you know long before the movie's over that the undead are really roaming about, it is something of a surprise to learn that Acula unknowingly conjured them. What's more, his ultimate fate, where those he resurrected overpower and place him in a coffin, which Criswell shuts on him, is quite dark (though, during the montage near the beginning, a drunk driver is shown dying in a violent crash, with a disturbing shot of the

aftermath and his dead face, so the movie had already proven to have something of an edge to it). And the way it wraps up, with the police finding Acula's body and a bunch of skeletons on the floor next to the coffin, while Sheila is compelled to follow the Black Ghost to the grave, is something else that's legitimately creepy, in my opinion.

But, at the end of the day, Night of the Ghouls just isn't as entertaining to watch as Wood's other movies. It's not entertaining in the expected so bad, it's good way, since the direction, while still flawed, is more competent and the acting is, for the most part, up to the standards of a typical 50's B-movie rather than what you normally expect from Wood. But it's not entertaining in an unironic way, either, since, you know, it's still Ed Wood, and thus, you still have nonsensical scenes and images, bad dialogue, awful continuity between this and Bride of the Monster, and

a hodgepodge of various ideas that don't gel together. And, again, you don't have Bela Lugosi to give it that little touch of class. Also, when the movie is not annoying you with Criswell's inane narration or confusing you with its editing and scene coverage, it's just dull due to the flat direction and how much of the action during the latter half consists of either Bradford or Kelton wandering around the house, occasionally having to contend with Lobo. And even though I do like the final resolution, it doesn't save the movie.

Like Plan 9 from Outer Space, and also because of how much Wood was scraping by this point, the music in Night of the Ghouls is stock music compiled from various sources by Gordon Zahler. But, as per usual with this flick, said music isn't nearly as memorable as Plan 9; in fact, sometimes it makes scenes that are meant to be suspenseful or atmospheric come off as silly, like when the Black Ghost kills the teenagers at the beginning or some of Bradford's exploration of the house. However, there are other parts of the score that do nicely accentuate the scenes they're played to, like when Dr. Acula mentions the church bell-tower and how strange things happen when it strikes midnight, when he and Sheila are confronted by the undead, and during the final moments. But, that said, I couldn't tell you what any of the music sounded like. It's all sheer blandness.

While it's nice that it was saved from the twenty-plus years of limbo it ended up in, there's a reason why Night of the Ghouls isn't as well-known or liked as Ed Wood's other films. The direction is fair but uninspired and bland; the cinematography and editing sometimes makes it confusing to figure out where the characters in relation to each other; the stock footage often doesn't fit with the original stuff; none of the actors and performances are of Bela Lugosi's caliber but, for the most part, they aren't as awful as in Wood's other films, meaning they're not enjoyably bad; the dialogue and writing is still pretty bad, especially when connecting the film to Bride of the Monster, and Criswell's narration gets old really fast; the sets are especially bare and ho-hum; the music is nothing to write home about; and the film is mostly just boring. There are moments of the expected schlocky silliness from Wood, especially the seance scenes, and there are genuine moments of creepiness and atmosphere, but on the whole, there are much more entertaining ways to spend 69 minutes.

Frankenstein's Daughter (1958)

Like with Monster from Green Hell, I don't have much to say in this introduction, as I first learned of this flick in The History of Sci-Fi and Horror, hosted by Butch Patrick, where it was briefly touched on in the documentary's first section, The Frankenstein Influence (I think that's what it was called). And when I say it was "briefly touched on," I mean that they only mentioned it in passing, with Patrick saying it was a sign that, at this point in the 50's, Hollywood was hardly interested in breaking new cinematic ground with the Frankenstein story. They also showed one clip from it, showing a silly-looking female monster raising her head up while lying on a bed (little did I know at the time that that wasn't even the title monster). But that was all I ever saw of it until the summer of 2024, when the Blu-Ray (which, like Monster from Green Hell, was released by Film Detective) was one of a number of things I picked up at G-Fest. And yes, also like Monster from Green Hell, it was from that same vendor I first mentioned in my introduction to Voodoo Man. So, anyway, how did Frankenstein's Daughter turn out? Well, while I don't hate it, as I've definitely seen much worse flicks from around this time period (you've already seen me talk about some of them, like The Screaming Skull), it's not one I find to be particularly enjoyable, either. It's just another dime-a-dozen low budget, independently-made monster flick from the drive-in era, with a cast of characters who are mostly just bland, not so great makeup designs for the monsters, a number of plodding scenes, and a third act and climax that aren't that exciting and go on much longer than they should.

After being dropped off by her boyfriend following a date, teenager Suzie Lawler screams in terror at the sudden appearance of a hideous, female creature on the nearby sidewalk. The next morning, her friend Trudy Morton awakens later than usual in her bed at the home of her uncle, Carter. While she heads off to play tennis with her boyfriend, Johnny Bruder, Suzie, and her own boyfriend, Don, her uncle, a scientist, prepares to continue the work he's been embarking on with his assistant, the mysterious and extremely critical Oliver Frank. Morton intends to create a drug that will allow people to live forever without being plagued by disease, but Frank insists that, at present, it causes certain areas of the body's exterior to become horribly disfigured. Meanwhile, at the tennis match, Suzie tells Don and Johnny what she saw, but they don't take her seriously. When Trudy arrives and hears about it, however, it makes her remember a horrible dream she had the night before, one that involved the same monstrous woman Suzie says she saw. It turns out that it was more than just a dream. Unbeknownst to Trudy and her uncle, Frank's real surname is Frankenstein, and he's the grandson of the original Dr. Frankenstein. With the help of Morgan's gardener, Elsu, who was as an assistant to Frank's father in his own experiments, he's planning to succeed where those before him failed and assemble together a "perfect being" from various body parts. As part of this experiment, he's been spiking glasses of fruit punch that he gives to Trudy with her uncle's formula, which he plans to use to preserve his creation's cells but wishes to see the effects it will have first. When he gives Trudy a stronger dose this time, she becomes all the more monstrous and runs rampant in town, getting the attention of the police. Frank, however, is able to capture her before she's shot and killed and takes her home. At the same time, Morton breaks into Rockwell Labs, where he once worked, and steals some Digenerol, which he feels will ensure his serum's success. In doing so, he unknowingly leads the police to suspect a connection between the theft and the monster. And soon, Frank manages to both complete his creation and bring it to life by murdering Suzie and grafting her head and brain onto its body.

Frankenstein's Daughter was one of only a small handful of feature films directed by Hawaiian-born Richard Cunha, who started out making industrial films and commercials, and also worked on some very early TV shows. Then, in the late 50's, he tried his hand at directing features, making four low budget sci-fi and horror flicks distributed by Astor Pictures, of which this film was the third; the others were Giant from the Unknown, She Demons, and Missile to the Moon. All of these movies were budgeted at under $80,000, shot in just six days, and released throughout 1958. According to Cunha, he and his producer Marc Frederick, with whom he'd established a production company for making these films, were given the title of Frankenstein's Daughter by the distributor and told to make a movie around it; he latter commented, "We were lucky, I guess, that they didn't say Frankenstein's Mother-in-Law." He would later call it his "biggest disappointment." Although Astor had intended for Cunha and company to produce ten more films after they'd distributed his first two as director, with Frankenstein's Daughter being the first of these, only two more were made: the aforementioned Missile to the Moon and the 1960 crime film, Girl in Room 13. After directing the English version of a German film called Dog Eat Dog, Cunha left his directing career behind. He did work a little more as a cinematographer, on TV shows like Death Valley Days and Branded, and most notably, did some uncredited additional photography work on Close Encounters of the Third Kind, but by the end of the 70's, he was completely retired. He actually opened up a video rental store in Oceanside, California afterward, and died in 2005, at the age of 83.

The most memorable character in the film, as well as the real star, is our resident Dr. Frankenstein, Oliver Frank (Donald Murphy), mostly because the guy is a complete and utter lunatic. At first, he seems to be little more than Carter Morton's cynical, snobbish assistant, always dumping on whatever procedure Morton intends to take in developing the drug that he hopes will wipe out all disease, and commenting that his formula causes disfigurement to certain areas of the outer skin. Morton wonders how Frank could know that, seeing as how they've never tested it on any actual specimens, and why he gets so uptight when asked about his background or when Morton intends to take drastic measures to get the Digenerol he needs for the experiment. As it turns out, when no one's around and he has the laboratory to himself, Frank, with the assistance of the gardener, Elsu, is assembling together a living creature from body parts, the same way as his father and grandfather. Determined to create a "perfect being," he also intends to use Morton's formula to preserve his creation's cells and, in order to test it, has been slipping it to Trudy Morton when he offers her some fruit punch. Twice, this causes her to turn into a monstrous creature that runs out into the streets and causes trouble for him, and the second time, he's forced to quickly whip up an antidote, find her, and subdue and inject her before she brings the police on him. In addition to his insane devotion to his work, Frank is also a complete and utter lech. At one point early on, he makes a move on Trudy, which she angrily rebuffs, and he later meets and makes a date with her friend, Suzie. But during said date, he proves to be really rough while making out with her, and when she refuses and even slaps him, he accuses her of taunting him and even says, "I oughta kill you," before grabbing her and forcing another kiss onto her. After she fights him off again and demands that he take her home, he proceeds to get in the car and run her down, later using her head and brain to complete his creation. When he succeeds in bringing her to life, he gets her to obey his every whim, claiming it's because, "The female brain is conditioned to a man's world."

As you can see, there's nothing at all redeeming about Frank. When he's not being a madman who's willing to commit murder to further his experiments (look how crazy he looks in the scene where he's threatening to kill Suzie), or a misogynist who's violent towards women while getting his rocks off, he's just a condescending jerk to Carter Morton, whom he thinks is an old fool who could get him in trouble with his stealing Digenerol and eventually plots to get rid of him so he can have free reign of his

lab. He's also a moron in many respects, like with how heated and defensive he gets when Morton badmouths the Frankensteins, calling them geniuses, and how he tends to lose his patience and shout at Morton, when he could easily throw him out of the house. The dumbest thing he does is when he, twice, gives Trudy the formula that temporarily turns her into a monster, which then escapes and roams about the town, scaring those who see her and risking getting the police involved, which does eventually happen. Even though he did it to see what effects the

formula would have, you'd think the first time would let him know that this was a really bad idea. And during the third act, when Trudy, once more, rebuffs his advances and makes it clear that she's going to marry her boyfriend, he's intent on doing something similar to her again, telling her, "You've always treated me as a monster, Trudy. Now you're going to be one." Finally, when he succeeds in assembling and bringing his creation to life, he sees her as nothing more than a slave who will obey his every command, including killing others, which he does to get rid of his enemies, as well as proof that he's not the lunatic that others describe him as. In the end, he dies a death that's fairly gruesome for the time.

Frank is aided in his experiments by Elsu (Wolfe Barzell), the Mortons' old gardener who, in actuality, aided Frank's father in his own experiments. Though he's willing to kill in order to get Frank the "parts" that he needs, arranging for a car crash early on, there's a limit to how far Elsu is willing to go. He has affection for Trudy (though he comes off as a creepy old man when he tries to show it) and doesn't like the idea of Frank inoculating her with the formula that makes her become a monster, and is also shocked when he murders Suzie to make use of her head and brain. Unlike Frank, he sees the creature as a living, breathing being, not just some tool, and doesn't like it when he keeps her shut away for a long time. Moreover, when Frank makes it clear that he intends to use her to kill if necessary, Elsu begins to rebel, saying, "That is evil... That wasn't the plan in the beginning. You said you wanted to accomplish the building of a human being. This is no good." He refuses to help, saying that Frank has completed the experiment and he's had enough of all this macabre stuff (a contradiction, given how sinister Elsu acted about causing the accident at the beginning, but he admits that even he doesn't know where this sudden bout of morals is coming from). He really draws the line when Frank, after Trudy rebuffs his advances for the last time, prepares to make her into a monster as well. With that, he threatens to go to the police and tell them everything, despite what it'll mean for him. Thus, Frank has his creation kill Elsu, which she does, despite Elsu trying to talk her down by saying he's her friend and took care of her.

Initially, it seems as though Trudy Morton (Sandra Knight) is going to be the protagonist or, at the very least, a significant character, as it's clear from the beginning, when she talks about not sleeping well the night before and having a nightmare, that she's the monster who comes down the sidewalk during the film's opening and scares the bejesus out of Suzie. And then, early on, when Oliver Frank hits on her early on, only to get rebuffed, he later inoculates her with the serum, causing her to become even more hideous and run rampant throughout town. That, coupled with my recognizing her monster form from that clip in The History of Sci-Fi and Horror, made me sure that she was the title monster. But, once Frank recaptures her during her second night our and cures her, her significance in the plot drops dramatically. In fact, while Trudy does recall another "nightmare" where she saw herself as the monster that Suzie encountered, and she notes that, both times, it was wearing the same clothes she last remembers wearing before she lost consciousness, neither she nor anyone else pieces together that it was actually her. For the rest of the movie, she just notices strange things going on around her house and, at one point, comes face-to-face with Frank's creation, only for him and everyone else to convince her that she really didn't see it after she awakens from passing out in terror. During the third act, Frank, again, makes a move on her, and then tries to turn her into a monster once more, but she manages to escape while Frank has his monster kill Elsu. In the end, the monster nearly kills both her and her boyfriend/fiance, Johnny, with Trudy making no attempt at all to help when Johnny fights the creature by himself, even when Frank isn't restraining her (her reactions to everything that happens during that climax are very stunted and poorly acted). In the end, they both make it out and plan to marry soon.

As laughable as Trudy's initial monster form is, coming off as more like a bad version of Mr. Hyde than anything Frankenstein-related, with those big, bushy eyebrows, darkened eyes, ugly teeth, and messy hair (also, according to Suzie, her skin turns a blue color), it's actually better than the look of Frank's ultimate creation, which we'll get into. Also, when Frank gives her the serum for the second time, you can see a subtle, cost-effective progression in the transformation when she staggers into her bedroom,

with a lot of black appearing around her eyes, before she collapses onto the bed, then raises her head up to show she's now in monster form. And here, this turns out to only be the preliminary stage, for when she walks over to a mirror and looks up at it, she's now even more hideous, i.e. silly-looking, with big, googly eyes, nastier-looking skin, and crazier hair. According to Richard Cunha when he answered a number of questions sent to him by Tom Weaver in the early 80's, while Sandra Knight did wear that initial makeup (and was apparently so hysterical at how she looked that she about had a nervous breakdown), someone else wore the more advanced stage, which you can tell is just a mask.

John Ashley, who plays Trudy's boyfriend, Johnny Bruder, is top-billed, mainly because he'd recently starred in a good number of movies for AIP (he acknowledged in an interview with Tom Weaver that, as low budget as they were, this was, "Really rock bottom,"). However, his role is even less significant than Trudy's, as he does little more than play the part of the best-looking guy in the movie, as well as mostly act dismissive about her claims of seeing and possibly even being a monster, although that doesn't stop her from agreeing to marry him. While there was really no question of it before, during the third act, he does start to come off as more of a decent guy when, upon learning that Trudy's uncle has been arrested, he goes down there to see if he can help and also gets his father, who's a lawyer, involved. And during the climax, while staving off Frank's creation, Johnny ends up mortally wounding Frank in a horrific manner: he throws a bottle of acid at the monster, only to miss and hit Frank in the face with it.

Suzie Lawler (Sally Todd), the young woman who, at the beginning of the movie, sees Trudy's initial monster form after her boyfriend, Don (Harold Lloyd Jr.), drops her off after a date (she has to push him away when he gets a bit too frisky and he leaves rather angrily), finds that, like Trudy, no one believes her story. She gets really frustrated about it and when the monster is seen again and this time is talked about in the newspaper, she's even more irked when Trudy tells her that she "dreamed" about being said monster,

accusing her of trying to steal her thunder. It turns out that Suzie is a bit of an attention whore, and holds a grudge against Trudy for supposedly stealing Johnny away from her. Thus, she decides to ask Oliver Frank on a date purely out of spite, thinking Trudy is interested in him as well. This proves to be a grave mistake, as Frank is first forceful and aggressive with her, and when Suzie pulls away from him and asks to be taken home, he runs her over (she doesn't do much to save herself in that instance, though, and really didn't take the hint that this guy was a psycho beforehand) and uses her head and brain as the finishing touches for his creation. Don, meanwhile, is little more than just a goofball, not taking Suzie's claims seriously until it hits the papers. According to her, he called her numerous times to apologize but she never gave him the chance. At the pool party that Trudy and Johnny put on, Don is clearly pretty miserable without Suzie and tries to make up for it by pulling a prank on Trudy, jumping out of a bush in the backyard with a monster mask on. Though Trudy isn't angry about it, she gets back at him by forcing him to sing at the party (not that he's terrible at it, mind you). At the end of the movie, when everything about Frank has been uncovered, Don comes by with a newspaper about it, but Trudy and Johnny aren't interested, with the latter pushing him into the pool when he doesn't take the hint.

Carter Morton (Felix Maurice Locher) is the typical well-meaning old scientist who, on the one hand, acts as a very nice parental figure to his niece, always looking out and concerned for her, and even encourages her to have some friends over for a pool party. He's also working to create a drug that will benefit mankind, specifically one that will wipe out all disease and destructive cells. But, on the other hand, he's willing to go as far as to break into Rockwell Labs, where he once worked, in order to get a hold of a drug that he feels will make all the difference. He also has to put up with Oliver Frank as his assistant, who's either being condescending and judgmental towards his methods or is constantly overstepping his boundaries and yelling at him, particularly whenever he does something that might get the police involved, much to Morton's growing frustration. In fact, not only do his thefts indeed lead the police to suspect there's a link between them and the monster sightings, but when Morton has to steal some more Digenerol after losing his initial batch, he upsets his heart condition. Not long afterward, Frank grows tired of having to share the laboratory and attempts to kill him right then and there. Morton is only saved when Lieutenant Boyle comes by to question him, since he used to work at Rockwell Labs. Frank, however, spills the beans about his thefts and convinces Boyle to take Morton down to the station, which is the last time he's seen onscreen. When Johnny goes down to try to help Morton, Boyle tells him that he's ended up in the hospital, likely due to more strain on his heart condition, and shortly after Trudy arrives upon escaping Frank, they learn that Morton passed away, never learning what exactly Frank was up to.

At first, Lieutenant Boyle (John Zaremba) and his partner, Detective Bill Dillon (Robert Dix), don't take the monster sightings in town seriously, but when enough people see Trudy's monstrous form, they decide to investigate, in case it's a prank that might get out of hand. The two of them see the Trudy monster and even fire on her, but Frank manages to subdue and take her back to the house before they can capture or kill her. They then talk with Mr. Rockwell, president of Rockwell Labs, and learn about the

recent theft of Digenerol and the negative effects it has, leading them to draw a link between it and the monster sightings. Later, they get a report of another theft of the drug at Rockwell Labs and the murder of a man at the warehouse district at the hands of Frank's ultimate creation after she escapes from the house. Things come to a head when Boyle comes by Carter Morton's home to speak with him, since he used to work at Rockwell Labs. Learning from Morton and Frank that the former did indeed steal the Digenerol, as well as Morton's accusation that Frank tried to murder him, Boyle takes Morton down to the station, where he later has a relapse of his heart condition and dies. When Trudy arrives at the station after escaping Frank and his monster, saying that Frank admitted his name is really Frankenstein and the monster is his creation, Boyle now feels there may be something to her story. He and Dillon go over to interrogate Frank, who, naturally, denies what Trudy said, although they do have their suspicions that he's not being honest about what's been going on. Boyle then leaves to go to the hospital to retrieve Morton's keys, leaving Dillon behind at the house. It doesn't take him long to find the monster and uncover the truth about Frank, but Frank has her kill him. During the climax, Boyle arrives back at the house in time to fire some bullets at the monster, but he has no part in saving Trudy and Johnny.

As for the title character (Harry Wilson), "she" has little-to-no character of her own, although there is some pathos to be had in how her creator sees her as nothing more than both his ultimate creation and a blindly obedient servant who will carry out his every command, treating her like an animal even when she's being docile. As I said, Elsu is much more gentle towards her, and also sees her as a living breathing creature that shouldn't be kept locked away all the time. That's not quite enough to keep her from killing him when Frank commands her to, but she is clearly conflicted about it. Speaking of killing, when the monster escapes from the house after first being brought to life, she heads down to the warehouse district and kills a man working there, though only truly attacks when he smacks her with a crowbar out of fear. And at the end of the movie, when Frank himself dies after accidentally getting acid thrown in his face, the monster is distraught over her creator's death, and is distracted enough to where she catches her left sleeve on fire, ultimately burning alive as a result.

Then, there's the makeup design and outfit, which are ridiculous, to say the least. While the makeup job for the monster's face is certainly not the absolute worst Frankenstein monster design there's ever been, with a hideously deformed right side and a more human-like but still brutish left side, and big, bushy eyebrows, you may notice that it's hardly the most feminine-looking creature, especially since she's supposed to have Suzie's head and brain. In fact, when Detective Dillon comes across the monster near the end of the

movie, Frank says, "Don't you recognize her? Suzie Lawler. Though she's not quite as pretty as she was," to which you're likely to thank, "No kidding." According to makeup man Harry Thomas, the reason for this fiasco is because he wasn't told the monster was meant to be female until he'd already created the mask, and thus, could then only put lipstick on the side one of the mouth. I find this a bit hard to believe, though, since, even though it was a very low budget and they likely didn't have a spare copy of the script

to give to him, as he said, didn't he at least know that the movie's title was Frankenstein's Daughter? Like I mentioned earlier, Richard Cunha said it all started with that title, chosen by the distributor, so Thomas should've at least had some inkling of what was expected. Of course, it's also possible that their memories weren't lining up when they were interviewed. In any case, not only is the monster's design disastrous for a female (Cunha said he literally cried upon seeing it), but so is her outfit, which

consists of what looks like a jacket with a white stripe down the center, some dark pants, the classic big heavy boots and bolts in the neck, rubber gloves on the hands, small coils running from her shoulders down the length of her arms, and bandages wrapped around the bottom, sides, and top of her head. And Harry Wilson does more than his fair share of snarling and growling in the role, and the pained screams when the monster burns alive at the end are actually kind of disturbing.

As it was a very low budget movie shot in just a week, you can forgive Frankenstein's Daughter for not exactly being the pinnacle of filmmaking, as Cunha didn't have the time or the money, nor probably not even the inclination, to get really fancy with his cinematography and editing. When looked at in high-definition, you can see that the movie is competently made, with some good use of shadows and lighting during the many nighttime scenes, and there are some notable shots, like the one on Frank during his doomed date with Suzie, where he looks

completely insane, with a close-up on his crazed eyes highlighted by a shaft of light across them, as he mentally considers using Suzie's brain for his monster; one with Boyle and Dillon reflected in a mirror in the living room when Frank first begins speaking with them; one with Elsu's face in the foreground while Frank stands in the background; and a glimpse at the monster's shadow as she comes down the stairs at Trudy and Johnny near the end. Also, they came up with a simple, economic way to depict

Trudy's transformation by having her looking more and more monstrous between cuts. However, there are some scenes where the direction and editing are just awkward, an example being when Frank kills Suzie, which has these awkward close-ups on her face as he begins to approach her menacingly and a very quick push-in towards her as she stands in the middle of the road, screaming, as he comes at her and runs her down.

Carter Morton's up-scale house, and the setting for maybe 85% of the film, was actually the home of producer Marc Frederic, including both the interiors and the swimming pool. It definitely has the air of the home of someone with a good amount of money to their name, with many scenes taking place in the study/living room, which not only has some fancy furniture in the couch and chair, but also a globe, shelves on the wall filled with tons of books, and a fireplace. The exterior pool area is also quite nice, with a large patio and barbecue section, and the pool

itself a fairly big size. However, when the movie isn't taking place there, it's in Morton's laboratory, full of the expected chemistry equipment, test tubes, and bottles, and is also where Frank secretly assembles his creation, keeping it in a storage area within Morton's old wine cellar, accessed behind some shelves filled with bottles and books. After he brings the monster to life, he keeps her in another storeroom at the top of some winding stairs in the wine cellar. These settings, as well as possibly Lt. Boyle's office

and the scene at the warehouse district where the worker is attacked, were likely shot at Screencraft Studios in Hollywood, although John Ashley said he remembered shooting the "ending" at Harold Lloyd's estate, as his son is in the movie. However, Ashley didn't specify whether he meant the climactic fight with Frank and the monster, or the true last scene with Trudy, Johnny, and Don at the pool (the latter of which, again, was at Frederic's home).

As much as the monster makeup designs leave a lot to be desired, what may surprise you the most about Frankenstein's Daughter is that it's quite bloody for its time. Before Frank inoculates Trudy with the serum a second time, Elsu brings him a severed, bloody hand (it took pausing the image and looking at it closely for me to make out what it is exactly), akin to the severed pair of hands that Victor Frankenstein purchased for his creation in Hammer's The Curse of Frankenstein the previous year. When Trudy runs around town in her monster form, Boyle and Dillon

find a woman whose face she apparently clawed, and when the actual monster attacks the man at the warehouse, she crushes him between a pair of large doors and you see a bit of blood come out of his mouth. And at the end, when Frank gets the bottle of acid in his face, the brief shot of him before he collapses to the floor, which, according to Harry Thomas, was actually created using nothing more than a combination of hair gel, lens paper, and chocolate syrup, comes off as quite gruesome.

The biggest issue I have with Frankenstein's Daughter is that it's just rather dull. As entertaining as Donald Murphy can be as Oliver Frank, and as hilariously bad as the monster makeups are, a good deal of the movie is spent with these bland characters standing around and talking. In fact, there are moments where it feels like you're watching a scene play out in a very similar manner to one you saw not too long ago, specifically the two times that Frank gets irked with Carter Morton's stealing Digenerol for fear that it'll lead the police to him, and during the

third act, when Frank twice becomes shocked at Elsu refusing to help him anymore within the span of just three or so minutes, both times sneering, "You refuse?", and with Elsu then confirming and explaining why. There are also a number of scenes where Frank manipulates someone into thinking they didn't see or hear what they actually did: telling Trudy that she really didn't see the monster at the front door, convincing Morton that he left the door to the lab unlocked when he comes in to find Frank there, even though Morton just unlocked it to get in, and so on.

While it shows how Frank is just as cunning as he is a sociopath, it starts to get tiresome after a while. As for the scenes with the monsters, they're not that exciting. Trudy's monster does little more than run around town and get shot at by the police who chase her on foot, until Frank captures her and takes her back to the house. As for the main monster, we do get to see her get to her feet, stumble out of the lab and break her way through the front door (which is completely undamaged later on), and head to the warehouse

district, where she attacks and kills the one worker, but once she returns to the house, she's mostly kept restrained in that storeroom, save for when Frank has her kill Elsu (which is pathetic, as it comes off like she barely touches him) and Dillon, and the climax. And while this isn't uncommon at all for movies from this time, low budget or otherwise, there are numerous events that happen offscreen which we only hear about, like the Trudy monster peeking through windows and clawing that one woman, both of

Morton's thefts (all we ever actually see of Rockwell Labs is the one scene where the police talk with Mr. Rockwell himself at their office), the second of which causes him to collapse from heart problems after stumbling through the door, and his having an attack that eventually proves fatal after he's taken into custody.

Like a lot of these 50's teen horror flicks, there's a section, just a little past the halfway point, where the movie virtually stops to focus on the pool party the teens are putting on, specifically two songs sung by Page Cavanaugh and His Trio: Special Date and Daddy-Bird, both of which involve Don providing backup vocals. As you can probably guess, the songs are cheesy and dated, especially the first, and they serve little purpose other than to pad out the run time, as well as hope to appeal to teens from that era, but the singers and everyone else look like they're enjoying themselves, so you can't help but kind of smile during them. And the sad thing is that, as corny as they are, they're the most memorable bits of music the movie has to offer.

As for the third act and climax, which really starts after Morton is taken down to police headquarters, it's little more than a series of people leaving and going back to the house, invariably being killed by the monster. Frank tries to make a move on Trudy again, revealing who he is, and when she rebuffs him, this time mostly out of fear, he drags her into the lab, where she faints at the sight of the monster, and places her onto a gurney to make her into a monster. This is when Elsu refuses to help Frank anymore, and Frank, in turn, orders the monster to kill him. But

during the chaos, when she corners Elsu in the wine cellar, Trudy uses the distraction to escape. She goes to the police station, tells Boyle and Johnny what happened, and Boyle and Dillon go to the house to interrogate Frank. There, he acts evasive and suspicious, especially about some rustling sounds upstairs, which he claims is Elsu up in his quarters. Boyle goes to the hospital to retrieve Morton's key from his body, leaving Dillon behind to wait for Elsu to "return" after Frank says he's gone out. After Boyle leaves, Dillon hears more rustling and tries to go

speak with the gardener, only for Frank to send him on the wrong track and head up to the storeroom where the monster is kept. Dillon, however, follows him and comes across the monster, only for Frank to sic her on him. After she's killed him, Trudy and Johnny arrive back at the house, only to find it dark and seemingly empty. Upon learning from Boyle over the phone that Dillon, at least, should be there, they search the place and find their way through the lab and into the wine cellar, where the monster comes

down the stairs at them. They're cornered by both her and Frank in the lab, with Frank telling the monster to kill the teenagers (he, no joke, refers to them as "meddling kids" shortly beforehand). What follows is mostly Frank and Trudy watching while Johnny puts the gurney between himself and the monster, then tries to fend her off by throwing random bottles of chemicals at her; at the same time, Boyle arrives and quickly learns something is wrong, even breaking through the exterior window to shoot at the monster.

That's when Johnny accidentally hits Frank in the face with acid and he collapses to the floor. Seeing this, the monster bends down to look at him, when she accidentally catches her left sleeve on fire from a burner on the table. The fire quickly spreads all over her, as she frantically tries to put it out by slapping at it, while Trudy and Johnny escape. They tell Boyle what happened, and he sees the monster collapse to the floor in a burning heap.

Another thing that Frankenstein's Daughter has in common with many of Richard Cunha's other films is that it was scored by Nicholas Carras who, right up to the early 90's, did the music for a number of rather low-rent movies. And as I alluded to earlier, there's not much to be said about his music here, as it's not nearly as memorable as the songs played at the pool party. It's just a bunch of generic, 50's horror/monster movie music, with no pieces or themes that really stand out, save for maybe the music that plays over the opening credits and when Trudy becomes a monster onscreen, but that's me really being generous and desperate for anything to talk about here.

While it is, for the most part, thought poorly of nowadays (not that it got the best reviews back when it was originally released), Frankenstein's Daughter does have some fans, mostly from people who grew up watching it on television and video. I, however, can't call myself one. It's not one of the worst movies I've ever seen, nor is it even among the worst things we'll be checking out this month, but it's also not one I would describe as entertainingly bad. While it is shot well enough, with some nice instances of lighting and camerawork here and there, has some surprisingly bloody and grisly images for the time, as well as some cheesy but charming songs from the time, and Donald Murphy is entertainingly demented as Oliver Frank, it's a mostly dull affair, with a bunch of bland characters you can't really get into, repetitive scenes, a forgettable score, and a third act climax that's quite flat when it should be a major setpiece. And while there is some fun to be had with how goofy the monster makeups are, that can only amuse you for so long. In my opinion, there are many other drive-in flicks from this era that are so much better.