Main Cast: Bela Lugosi, Tor Johnson, Tony McCoy, Loretta King, Harvey B. Dunn
Release Year: 1955
Country: US
Run Time: 70 minutes
Plot
To most outside observers, Bride of the Monster probably seems like a ridiculously inept horror film, and in many ways it is just that. To connoisseurs of the work of director Edward D. Wood Jr., however, it is the biggest budgeted film in his entire output, made with the resources of a normal B-movie (as opposed to his usual totally emaciated finances) and the most easily accessible of his three horror films. Bela Lugosi, in his final complete performance, portrays Dr. Eric Vornoff, a renegade Eastern European scientist with a plan to create a race of atomic supermen, giants charged with radioactivity. The problem is that the hapless hunters and other passersby at Lake Marsh, where he has set up shop with his hulking, mute assistant Lobo (Tor Johnson), whom the pair waylay, keep dying when he straps them in and switches on his atomic ray machine (which is a not-at-all disguised photographic enlarger). A dozen victims later, reporter Janet Lawson (Loretta King) goes out to investigate the disappearances -- attributed to a monster -- and falls into Vornoff's hands, with her police detective fiance Dick Craig (Tony McCoy) hot on her trail, and a devious spy (George Becwar) from Vornoff's former nation also nosing his way around the swamp and the old house. Vornoff dresses Lawson in a wedding gown and plans to irradiate her but Lobo refuses to allow it, straps Vornoff into the machine, and turns him into a radioactive giant (and into stuntman Eddie Parker, totally unconvincing in his doubling for Lugosi). ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Review
There's a lot that's been said about Bride of the Monster, and most of it is true. It is ineptly made and it has seams -- including mismatched interior and exterior sets and scenery that shakes during the fight scenes -- that show a mile off. And it has a script that's a mix of clichés from mad-scientist movies and hardboiled reporter lingo, interspersed with some of the strangest incidental dialogue that anyone had ever heard in an English-language movie up to that time -- at least, one made in an English-speaking country, but therein lies its charm. Bride of the Monster was the biggest-budgeted movie ever made by director Edward D. Wood Jr., and is, along with the crime-thriller Jail Bait, his most accessible film. Although it has continuity problems (a pencil behind the ear of a newspaper morgue clerk won't stay put from angle-to-angle -- although, to be fair, no less a director than Alfred Hitchcock had those same kind of problems in movies like North By Northwest) and badly matched footage, it is a smoother movie than Wood's magnum opus, Plan 9 From Outer Space. In contrast to Plan 9's ultra-cheap surroundings, which gave it an almost other-worldly look throughout, like a nightmare in slow-motion, Bride of the Monster follows the conventions and expectations of a B-movie crime-thriller and horror story, giving the viewer some familiar points of reference to work from. The typical Wood sexually tinged argot is also muted somewhat in the dialogue, and what is here manages to be entertaining without diverting the viewer's attention from the plot. This movie was as close as Wood ever got to making a successful film, although he had to compromise in many areas of the production to get it shot. Wood's significant other, Dolores Fuller, who ended up with a tiny scene in the film, would have been a better lead, but would-be actress Loretta King played the female lead because Wood had thought she had a significant amount of money to put into the production (she didn't). Tony McCoy, the male lead, isn't bad for a non-actor. Wood got financing from McCoy's father, a meat-packing magnate, who insisted that his son play the lead and also that the movie end with a huge nuclear explosion as a warning about the atomic bomb. There is a lot to laugh at in the movie, most of it unintentional, although one attribute that is a complete myth concerns Bela Lugosi's dialogue . His accent is very thick, as always, but in describing Tor Johnson's Lobo, Lugosi does NOT say "he is as gentle as a kitchen." The movie was the first of what was ultimately a trilogy of horror films from Wood -- the others were Plan 9 From Outer Space and Night of the Ghouls -- all linked by one common character (police officer Kelton, played by Paul Marco) and their plots, which mix elements of police procedural and horror films. ~ Bruce Eder, All Movie Guide
Tony McCoy - Associate Producer, William L. Nolte - First Assistant Director, Edward D. Wood, Jr. - Director, Warren Adams - Editor, Frank Worth - Composer (Music Score), Ted Allan - Cinematographer, William C. Thompson - Cinematographer, Edward D. Wood, Jr. - Producer, Pat Dinga - Special Effects, Alex Gordon - Screenwriter, Edward D. Wood, Jr. - Screenwriter, David D. Martin - Technical Director, Jane Huizenga - Production Director
Lugosi's character, Dr. Eric Vornoff, is experimenting with nuclear power in a primitive laboratory in his mansion with the help of his assistant, Lobo (Tor Johnson) . His goal is to create an army of mutated supermen to do his bidding. Newspaper reporter Janet Lawton (a role originally intended for Dolores Fuller but given to Loretta King Hadler)[2] starts investigating, as do the local police. Meanwhile, an Eastern-bloc agent or spy named Professor Strowksi (George Becwar) appears and tries to persuade Dr. Vornoff to return to their homeland. In the end, Lobo betrays Vornoff and Vornoff becomes a monster and is then blown up in an atomic explosion.
Myths about the film
In the biopic Ed Wood, Wood is accused of stealing the mechanical octopus (originally used for the John Wayne film Wake of the Red Witch) from the Republic Studios' backlot. Other stories circulated insist Wood legitimately rented the octopus, along with some cars. Regardless, its inner mechanism was missing.[citation needed] To remedy this, whenever someone was caught by the octupus, they simply flailed around a lot (something that was painfully obvious). The filming of these scenes, as well as the production of the film in general, were played to comic effect in Ed Wood, directed by Tim Burton. Lugosi's monologue to Professor Strowksi is featured twice in the movie.
The book The Golden Turkey Awards claims that Lugosi's character declares his manservant Lobo (Tor Johnson) "as harmless as kitchen" (sic). This allegedly misspoken line is cited as evidence of either Lugosi's failing health/mental faculties, or as further evidence of Wood's incompetence as a director.[3] However, a viewing of the film itself reveals that Lugosi said this line correctly, the exact words being, "Don't be afraid of Lobo; he's as gentle as a kitten."
Rudolph Grey's book Nightmare of Ecstasy: The Life and Art of Edward D. Wood Jr. contains anecdotes regarding the making of this film.[2] Grey notes that participants in the original events sometimes contradict one another, but he relates each person's information for posterity. He also includes Ed Wood's claim that one of his films made a profit and surmises that it was most likely Bride of the Monster, but, in a situation similar to the play in Mel Brooks' The Producers, he oversold the film and couldn't reimburse the backers.
Production
The first incarnation of the film was a 1953 script by Alex Gordon titled The Atomic Monster, but a lack of financing prevented any production. [4] Later Ed Wood revived the project as The Monster of the Marshes. Actual shooting began in October 1954 at the Ted Allan Studios, but further money problems quickly moved the production into a halt.[4] The required funds were supplied by a rancher named Donald McCoy, who became the film's producer. He also provided his son to star as the film's hero.[4] Production resumed in 1955 at Centaur Studios and the film finally premiered at Hollywood's Paramount theater in May 1955, under the title Bride of the Atom. [4]
This film is part of what Wood aficionados refer to as "The Kelton Trilogy", a trio of films featuring Paul Marco as "Officer Kelton", a whining, reluctant policeman.[citation needed] The other two films are Plan 9 from Outer Space and Night of the Ghouls. The character of Lobo also appeared again in Bride's sequel, Night of the Ghouls.[5]
As mentioned in an episode of the 1986 syndicated series, the Canned Film Festival, Bride of the Monster was Bela Lugosi's last speaking role in a feature film. His last appearance in a film was Wood's Plan 9 from Outer Space.
Trick Shooting with Kenne Duncan (1953) • Final Curtain (1957) •The Night the Banshee Cried (1957) •
Television films directed
The Sun Was Setting (1951) • Crossroad Avenger: The Adventures of the Tucson Kid' (1953) •Boots (1953)
Films written, not directed
The Violent Years (1956) • The Bride and the Beast (1958) •Anatomy of a Psycho (1961) •Shotgun Wedding (1963) •Orgy of the Dead (1965) •One Million AC/DC (1969) •The Love Feast (1969) •The Venus Flytrap (1971) •The Undergraduate (1972) •Drop-Out Wife (1972) •Class Reunion (1972) •The Snow Bunnies (1972) •The Cocktail Hostesses (1973) •Five Loose Women (1974) •The Beach Bunnies (1976) •Hot Ice (1978)
