A trip down memory lane, watching FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN (1943)

Posted by Daniel Metz

Dir. Roy William Neill
Alamo Drafthouse Ritz, 2/2/10, 7:00pm

I didn’t know what to expect on my viewing of this post-classical Universal horror film. I promoted it a lot for the Alamo, including a wonderful huckster-type blog post. I watched the film a lot as a child; I vividly remember having the VHS and watching it on a number of successive Halloweens. That said, fifteen or so years later, I felt that I didn’t recall much of the film.

When the film starting rolling, it all came rushing back. The imagery of Lon Chaney, Jr. on a hospital bed, the amazing medium shots of the Wolf Man, and the all-too brief fighting sequences toward the end. It seems that this film, probably more than any other, is really the archetype that I use to conjure up Universal’s lycanthrope, even more so than the original film.

Say what you will about this film. For a B picture, the mise en scene of this shot is remarkable.

Unfortunately, all memory aside, the film is pretty miserable. The story involves the Wolf Man/Larry Talbot, his slumber disturbed by grave robbers, trying to find a cure by searching for Dr. Frankenstein, who the familiar gypsy woman tells him can solve his problems. He goes to Frankie’s home town (Visaria) only to discover that the Doc is dead. He also unfreezes and befriends the Monster who, as we all know, blew up in The Bride of Frankenstein eight years earlier, was chemically deteriorated in Son of Frankenstein four years after that, and who was burned up in The Ghost of Frankenstein three years after that. The Wolf Man and the Monster become friends, but then they fight. That’s pretty much it.

When people start getting their blood drained in the town, it is wonderful to see how quickly the mob forms. It seems that, in Visaria, the villagers love a good lynch mob.

There is also an interesting addition to the mythos of Frankenstein. Somehow, Dr. Frankenstein has a grown daughter by the name of Elsa, played here but the beautiful “actress” Ilona Massey. I put actress in quotes there because she is a horrible actress. Speaking of, wouldn’t it be great if Elsa was played not by Ilona Massey but Edith Massey?

Oh, you want my father's journals? You're going to need to bring me my EGGIES!

I’m getting distracted. Anyway, Elsa, the improbably aged (grand?)child of the God Doctor (Is that not a good pun? He knows what it feels like to be God. Right? Anybody with me on that one?) is here to help Larry Talbot with recreating her (grand?)father’s experiments. She becomes a Fritz/Igor stand-in, only half as helpful and only an eighth as grotesque.

I just spent a good deal of time researching the Elsa character and the Frankenstein Universe. Allow me to clear some things up for you: In Son of Frankenstein, Elsa von Frankstein is the wife of Baron Wolf von Frankenstein, son of Dr. Henry and brother of Dr. Ludwig. In that film she is played by Josephine Hutchinson. In Ghost of Frankenstein, Elsa Frankenstein is the daughter of Ludwig, and is played by Evelyn Ankers. In this film, Elsa seems to be the daughter of Ludwig, although the characters refer to her “father” in a way that is clearly meant to be Henry, I think.

Enough with that. Final word: The Monster is played by Bela Lugosi in a sad turn of events. Lugosi was famously offered the role in 1931, but he refused and Karloff made history with as the gruesome corpse. Bela said that he wouldn’t take it because the character was voice-less and basically a brute. Due, I am sure, to money problems (if Ed Wood taught us anything, it is that Bela Lugosi was a morphine addict), Lugosi put on all of that make-up and the neck-bolts and delivered a truly soulless, voiceless and brutish performance. He is so much better than what he portrayed in this movie. ‘Tis a shame, indeed.