FILM REVIEW OF ''THE GHOUL" (1933-British)

The contribution of “The Ghoul” to cinematic history is that this supernatural saga represents the earliest example of a British sound horror movie. According to the British Film Institute, the British Board of Censors added to the historical status of the film, too, when it gave director T. Hayes Hunter’s film an ‘H’ certificate for being horrific. Although it may have been horrific when it was initially shown, this long-lost hair raiser doesn’t do much to make your scalp crawl even with the presence of iconic horror star Boris Karloff. Director Pat Jackson remade "The Ghoul" in 1961 as a comedy "What A Carve Up" with Donald Pleasence, Shirley Eaton, Kenneth Connor, Dennis Price, and Michael Gough.

“The Ghoul” boasts a decent enough budget, but the story is confined presumably to London and the action takes place largely at night in and around a residence, a tomb, and a street. Clocking in at a modest 77 minutes in length, “The Ghoul” never wears out its welcome, but then it doesn’t have that much to make it welcome. Karloff spends too much time off-screen and his second death comes about far too easily. The film is not without a surprise or two here and there, but you won’t suffer from nightmares after watching this melodrama unless you are extremely squeamish. Indeed, apart from the eponymous character, nobody dies, though a couple of people are left the worst for wear. A woman is nearly strangled and another fellow is knocked down.

This atmospheric black & white British horror chiller concerns an Egyptologist Professor Morlant (Boris Karloff of “Frankenstein”) who is seeking immortality by means of an Egyptian artifact known as the ‘Eternal Light.’ Morlant believes that this amulet will throw open the gates of paradise for him and he will live forever. He wallows restlessly on his death bed while his servant informs a kindly minister, Parson Nigel Hartley (Ralph Richardson in his cinematic debut), that the good professor won’t see the light of dawn. Moreover, he adds that Morlant has pagan beliefs and has no use for a man of the cloth. “He will die in his own fashion as he has lived,” the servant states, “He is stubborn and unbending and will be so at the throne itself.”

Meantime, a stranger from Egypt, Mahmoud (D.A. Clarke-Smith”), lurks about in the shadows of London and awaits the arrival of Egyptian Sheikh Aga Ben Dragore (Harold Huth) at his apartment house. Dragore dresses like a well-heeled Englishman and loves to drink Absinthe. Mahmoud confronts Dragore and explains that he has come to fetch the ‘Eternal Light’ and return it to his native country. He is an expert knife thrower and warns Dragore to not attempt any funny business. Dragore warns him that the British authorities will catch him if he kills him. Dragore explains that he has sold the amulet to Morlant, but Mahmoud and he can get it back once Morlant is dead. Clearly, Dragore doesn’t share Morlant’s belief in the immortality that the ring possesses for its wearer.

The scene shifts to a mansion where the dying Professor Morlant warns his Scottish man servant, Laing (Ernst Thesiger of “The Old Dark House), about the consequences of being buried without the jewel! If the full moon strikes the door of his tomb and he isn’t wearing the jewel, he will rise and kill him. Before Morlant croaks, Laing carries out Morlant’s wishes but bandaging the professor’s hand with the jeweled ring on his finger. The attending physician pronounces Morlant dead from heart failure and plans go forth for Morlant’s burial. Morlant’s estate account Broughton (Cedric Hardwicke of “King Solomon’s Mines”) checks Morlant’s corpse after they have put him in an elaborate crypt and discovers that the jewel has been removed. As it turns out, Laing has stolen the jewel and concealed it in his shoe. Afterward, he hides it in a coffee jar. Morlant’s relatives show up to demand an account of his finances and things begin to happen.

Viennese cinematographer Gunther Kramph deserves the bulk of the credit with his evocative black & white photography that endows “The Ghoul” with a sinister atmosphere. Art director Alfred Junge shares some of the kudos for creating the film’s sinister, somewhat spooky atmosphere with his selection of sets. Indeed, Morlant dies—in movie time—about a quarter hour into the action, but he doesn’t make his spectacular return from the dead until some 48 minutes later. By then “The Ghoul” has lost much of its momentum, primarily because the evil professor is the most important character.

When you let your protagonist languish off-screen that length of time and dwell on supporting characters running about in a tizzy arguing about the existence of the afterlife and the significance of an amulet, you wind up undercutting the zest of the movie. Director T. Hayes Hunter shoulders the blame for this obvious flaw and his scenarists are just as guilty. However, Hunter stages with funeral scene with some aplomb and his use of Richard Wagner’s music from Siegfried's Funeral March gets it no small amount of gravity.

The logic is the usual flawed logic of any horror movie. Morlant threatens to rise from the dead if he doesn’t have the vaunted ‘Eternal Light’ on his finger, but how on earth can an ordinary human resurrect himself without the ring. Indeed, in this instance, why does he need the ring if he can walk after death? Of course, Morlant has got to walk after he dies, but the logic is pretty creaky. Interestingly, for a movie made in an English speaking country, “The Ghoul” gives some status to a pagan religion by allowing the death to walk.

Unfortunately, the details about the ‘Eternal Light’s’ power are too sketchy. We don’t know enough and the scribes are short on exposition. In the end, Scotland Yard lives up to its reputation because it captures the foreigners and gets the ring. Presumably, the film’s poor showing ruled out any chance of a sequel because Scotland Yard retains the ring.

Boris Karloff wears some sloppy looking make-up and later carves a symbol into his chest that presumably has something to do with the Egyptian afterlife. Unfortunately, Karloff is squandered as he is either floundering around in his death bed or shambling about in the mansion searching for the ring. Mercifully, Hunter keeps a tight rein on the comic relief, principally a girlfriend of one of Morlant’s cousins. Altogether, the creepy atmosphere and first-rate performances help, but “The Ghoul” wouldn’t scare a cat.

FILM REVIEW OF ''MR. WONG, DETECTIVE" (1938)

The first of crime author Hugh Wiley’s James Lee Wong detective murder-mysteries that Collier’s Magazine published in the 1930s starred horror sensation Boris Karloff as the famous Asian sleuth. “Mysterious Mr. Wong” director William Nigh and “Tiger Shark” author Houston Branch establish San Francisco as the setting immediately with a long shot of the Golden Gate Bridge. This tightly knitted thriller about a thinly disguised group of Hitler’s Third Reich agents trying to sabotage the shipment of poison gas to Stalin’s Soviet Union qualifies as crack jack entertainment with strong performances and a minimum of buffoonery as well as anti-Chinese ideology that Nigh employed in his earlier “Mr. Wong” epic. Indeed, many complain “Mr. Wong, Detective” (*** out of ****) dawdles, but at 69 minutes, this splendid little melodrama maintains a snappy pace, and the dialogue isn’t half bad. Monogram Studios lavished better production values for this B-picture. Consider the detail that the studio went to dress Mr. Wong’s residence. Of course, this studio bound yarn confines its action in rooms where either the police question the suspects or Mr. Wong meets with them a social basis. Occasionally, as in the beginning when a thug surveys a dockyard or when a character pulls up to Wong’s house in a chauffeur driven car, “Mr. Wong, Detective” ventures outside, but not often.

One of the few exteriors (more like a sound stage) occurs in the opening minutes as Lescardi, (Frank Bruno) Mohl's Henchman, hides in a warehouse at the dock and spots a crate stamped with Dayton’s Chemicals. Later, he warns Anton Mohl (Lucien Prival) at his apartment after climbing down from the higher apartment to avoid detection. “If those chemicals fall into the hands of our enemies, we’re though,” Mohl snaps. “That ship has got to be stopped.” Meanwhile, a flustered Simon Dayton (John Hamilton) visits Mr. Wong at his residence late one foggy night. A friend recommended Wong to Dayton. Dayton explains his life is in danger. “I’m just convinced that somebody’s out to get me. I tell you it’s driving me crazy. I haven’t any case,” he tells Wong. Dayton, it seems, has arranged to ship a load of chemicals abroad, but he has experienced setbacks. Factory delivers have been held up; railroad shipments damaged, and ships withdrawn that he’d chartered. He explains his office has been entered, its contents rifled several times. “I can’t give you a single clue,” he says in frustration. “I must have help or I’ll lose my mind,” he pleads. Wong agrees to meet him the next morning. No sooner does Dayton leave than he is almost kidnapped when Lescardi pulls up, posing as his chauffer driver, but Dayton refuses to get into the car. Wong and he find his chauffer in the bushes nearby with blood on his head.

The following day, Dayton summons San Francisco Police Captain Sam Street (Grant Withers) after the disgruntled chemical inventor, Carl Roemer (John St. Polis) storms into his company office and demands to be paid for his formula. Street and his men arrive at Dayton Chemicals and spot Dayton standing at the wind. After they question Roemer, they find Dayton’s office door locked and discover Dayton dead on the floor. Roemer was carrying a gun, but it was empty. Moments later Mr. Wong (Boris Karloff) shows up and finds glasses shards in Dayton’s office. Wong visits a friend with a lab and they construct a replica of the glass globe that contained the poison gas that killed Dayton. Street’s initial suspects are Roemer and Dayton’s partners, Theodore Meisel, (William Gould) and Christian Wilk (Hooper Atchley), but they are all cleared.

Not only is Anton Mohl, aka Baron Von Krantz desperate to stop the ship from leaving San Francisco with the chemical weapons, but he also wants to obtain the formula. Wong learns that only a high pitched noise can destroy the tiny glass globes that contain the poison. He tries a variety of musical instruments, but it is his parrot that cracks it with its sound. Not long afterward, Wilk dies under similar circumstances as Dayton. He was alone in his room, with the door locked, and a group of people were outside. Street is really frustrated and believes that the surviving partner Meisel is the guilty party. Just before Wilk is poisoned, Wong meets the undercover German agents (of course, the studio could not acknowledge their heritage because the Production Code Administration forbade Hollywood filmmakers from portraying foreign nationals in a derogatory light), and Wong spots Olga Petroff’s special blend of cigarette that he found in Dayton’s stolen car.

Mohl plans to kill Wong, but not before Meisel appears to have committed suicide with a glass globe. The police release Roemer and his wife, but Wong wants Street to bring the chemist to his home. No sooner does Wong arrive at his own place than Lescardi, Anton, and Olga corner him and demand the formula. He produces one of the replicas and crushes it and fools the villains into believing that they are dying for poison gas. Street arrives with Roemer and arrests the German agents.

Director Nigh and his writer Branch have constructed a clever scenario here and you will probably figure out how the victims die even when people are standing around outside their doors. Reportedly, the same device was used in “Charlie Chan in Egypt.” The police are treated like incompetent buffoons, with Street constantly losing his temper at the twists and turns that the case takes, albeit he looks like a precursor to the 1980s TV police superior who constantly shouts at the hero. Red herrings fly like confetti. The last person you expect as the murder is actually the last man you’d expect. Naturally, Karloff is a British citizen miscast as an Asian and Asian are used for comic relief. All in all, “Mr. Wong, Detective,” with its industrial espionage plot clearly involving Germans and Soviets, is a lot of fun for a low-budget B-movie.

Altogether, Boris Karloff made five “Mr. Wong” features: “Mr. Wong, Detective” (1938), “The Mystery of Mr. Wong” (1939), “Mr. Wong in Chinatown” (1939), “The Fatal Hour” (1940), and “Doomed to Die.”