And now a return to form.\u00a0 Whereas Charles Laughton can make a \u201chorror\u201d movie into a semi-legitimate film, putting Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi into a movie ensures that the full Universal horror treatment will ensue.<\/p>\n
The Black Cat was such a pairing.\u00a0 Bela Lugosi is a German medical doctor who was taken prisoner by the Russians during the First World War and eighteen years later he is looking to take revenge on Karloff who was the German commander who sold his troops out before the battle.\u00a0 Also, while Lugosi was in prison Karloff stole away his wife telling her that Lugosi was dead.\u00a0 Lugosi comes back to the scene of the battle where strangely Karloff has built an art deco palace on the site of the fort that he had commanded.\u00a0 Later on, we learn that the whole hill is still booby-trapped with dynamite.\u00a0 Well, you never know when that might come in handy.<\/p>\n
There is a young American couple honeymooning in this Hungarian locale (sure why not) and Lugosi befriends them and then because of a motor vehicle accident during a rain storm, Lugosi is forced to bring them both to Karloff\u2019s house where the doctor performs minor medical procedures that require putting her under a powerful sedative that makes her somewhat prescient upon meeting Karloff.<\/p>\n
While the Americans sleep that night Lugosi and Karloff have a conference and we find out that Lugosi\u2019s wife died of \u201cpneumonia\u201d years before.\u00a0 Unsurprisingly Karloff decided to have her embalmed and put on display in his basement.\u00a0 Well, sure, who wouldn\u2019t!\u00a0 And if all that isn\u2019t bad enough Karloff tells Lugosi that his young daughter also died.\u00a0 Next, we find out that Karloff is a satanic priest and the next night is the new moon and he will be celebrating a black mass at which he wants to sacrifice the American girl to Satan or something.\u00a0 Lugosi objects and Karloff offers to play a game of chess to see whether she will die.\u00a0 And Lugosi loses.\u00a0 Darn.\u00a0 Meanwhile we discover that Lugosi\u2019s daughter is not dead but is married to Karloff and living in the house they are in.\u00a0 The American girl meets her but somehow Lugosi still hasn\u2019t heard about her.<\/p>\n
A lot of goofy stuff happens with Lugosi\u2019s servant pretending to obey Karloff and the American man being trapped in a room that eventually he escapes by just opening the door.\u00a0 And even though the satanic mass is quite crowded Lugosi somehow easily manages to rescue the American girl.\u00a0 And then everyone heads down into the basement for the climax.<\/p>\n
So, let\u2019s see.\u00a0 Lugosi stumbles on the dead body of his daughter.\u00a0 Karloff and Lugosi get into a fight that ends when Lugosi\u2019s fatally wounded servant helps him over power and chain up Karloff to a dungeon wall (yes dungeon).\u00a0 Then Lugosi decides to finally revenge the deaths of his wife and daughter on Karloff by skinning him alive.\u00a0 But when the American girl sees this going on she screams and her husband finds their location and mistaking Lugosi\u2019s intention he shoots the doctor.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Lugosi calls him a fool but tells the American couple to rush out of the building and get away from the hill because he is about to set off the timer that will trigger the dynamite to blow up the satanists, Karloff and Lugosi.\u00a0 And in the last scene the happy honeymooners continue their railway journey to Budapest.<\/p>\n
This movie has so many hokey things going on.\u00a0 Why would Karloff believe that Lugosi\u2019s loyal servant would do his bidding instead of his master?\u00a0 Why would Karloff still have the timer and detonator for the dynamite not only intact but on prominent display in his basement?\u00a0 Why wouldn\u2019t Lugosi have killed Karloff as soon as he saw his wife stuffed and mounted in Karloff\u2019s basement?\u00a0 Are all art deco architects, satanists?\u00a0 Or are all satanists art deco devotees?\u00a0 What did Lugosi\u2019s morbid fear of black cats have to do with anything else in the movie except the title?\u00a0 So many questions.<\/p>\n
The strange thing is I enjoyed the movie.\u00a0 Sure, it made no sense.\u00a0 But there was a style and an energy to it that was fun.\u00a0 You sort of knew the American couple would emerge unscathed so really, we were watching the duel between Lugosi and Karloff and we knew that some kind of justice would prevail.\u00a0 And those lousy satanists would get blown up.<\/p>\n
In a way, with its modernist architecture juxtaposed against the medieval stonework of the underground fort it was a perfect way for the modern (1930s) world to intrude on the gothic horror that is the stock in trade of the Universal horror movies.\u00a0 Art deco horror.\u00a0 Well done Bela and Boris.<\/p>\n