Doctor X (1932)
Doctor X (1932), directed by Michael Curtiz.
The Full Moon Murderer has been terrorizing the city for months, not just violating (?) and killing his victims but gnawing on their bodies. The police suspect the scientists of a medical institute, inmates all a bit loony and menacing. The director of the institute uses his lovely daughter as bait to smoke out the lunatic; what could go wrong?
On the down side: it is a ludicrous plot and the wise-cracking reporter is just an irritant this time. It is the 80% laughs / 20% chills formula you might see at a community theater where you can't get too heavy. Some of the fake scare setups remind me of what William Castle would do in the House On Haunted Hill (1959).
On the other hand it has much of interest:
Along with Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) this is one of the last of the two-color Technicolor process films. I love the antique color effect, somehow evocative of printed comic pages of the era. Most of the color versions of these films were discarded; this and others were discovered in Jack Warner's private collection after his death.
In common with Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933) we have director Michael Curtiz, plus Fay Wray, Lionel Atwill and others. Wray tinted her hair red to have a little extra for the camera.
This is still the pre-Code era and we have two scenes in the scary bits that couldn't have been done later:
(1) In this sort of film we usually see the murderer/creature unmasked at the climax, but here we see the monster assembled as the killer goops on masses of synthetic flesh. This is truly horrific and was censored in some countries.
(2) The father has chained himself to a chair when his daughter is attacked by the killer, a nightmarish situation.
More pre-Code: the reporter ducks into a bordello to use the phone.
Audiences raved about the color at the time.
Available on DVD with the unrelated The Return of Doctor X (1939) on the same disc. A fact-filled commentary track gives loads of interesting background.
