The Corpse Vanishes

Bela made 9 pics for Monogram, but it was only at THIS one, the 4TH, that things started to come together. All the rest in the series would use this one as the essential template for production, writing and character development. From here on, better or worse, the series would also deal with one essential theme: a scientist (usually Bela) makes experiments in the basement or the old house (sometimes IN the basement in the old house) that causes things to go blooey. This was also the first time that Art Director Dave Milton got a chance to spread his wings. He came on board for BLACK DRAGONS, the flick before, but THIS one is where he gets to make his craft start to click. Lewis made great atmosphere for next to nothing, and was around for all the rest of the Monograms. Casting is key in these, and it's a pretty good one B movie wise, here. You get Barclay and Harlen (also from BLACK DRAGONS),along with Russell, who would star in Lewtons' CAT PEOPLE movies..and Rosetto, from SPOOKS RUN WILD...a nice slice of Poverty Row talent. If you have limited time and budget, start with this one...it sums up everything they had learned up to this point, and gives you something to compare the rest to. The plot? Bela steals gland juice to keep his nasty wife young. They both like to sleep in coffins. If you can read that and smile, the rest will be easy.

Modest, insignificant but nevertheless amusing black & white horror that stars Bela Lugosi as a (surprise surprise!) sinister doctor who kidnaps young girls on their wedding day. Not for the cause of science this time, but to donate eternal youth and beauty to his wife, the countess. He breeds a special type of orchids (that's right, he's also a horticulturist) that paralyzes the girls and he picks up the bodies with a fake hearse. The screenplay doesn't really bother to explain what exactly happens to these girls afterwards and neither are we informed about Bela's relation with the family of misfits that lives in his mansion and works for him. In fact, "The Corpse Vanishes" is one giant incoherent mess yet I can't bring myself to bash it entirely. The basic plot idea is good, there are some moments of creepiness (when the female journalist discovers the dungeon, for example) and the acting performances are overall decent. Lugosi is on automatic pilot here but I especially liked the countess character! She's a hostile and egocentric shrew and I loved how she got so hysterical all the time. What can I say…I have a thing for evil women.

I had watched THE CORPSE VANISHES (1942) a couple of years ago but I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised as to how watchable and engaging it was the second time around. Who'd have thought that such fare was worth a second look? If anything, I found CORPSE to be even livelier than GHOST (which did get to be repetitious and feel constrained by its one setting): although it is never explained why Lugosi is married to an 80-year old woman (except maybe to get into high society given that she's a "Countess") or why she needs to be youthful (it's not like she's parading her "look" anywhere except at the Lorenz household), the film offers an amusing throwback to those 30s hard-boiled reporter movies and predates such rejuvenation-themed horror movies as I VAMPIRI (1956).

I found the film to be quite atmospheric and enjoyable: it was nice to watch Lugosi surrounded by such familiar faces as Elizabeth Russell (from several Val Lewton films), Angelo Rossitto (one of Tod Browning's FREAKS [1932]) and Vince Barnett (who had a memorable supporting role in Hawks' SCARFACE [1932]) among others. That said, the campier elements of the film were sometimes too silly for words: Lugosi whipping his moronic assistant, the proverbial funereal organ-playing, the even more hilarious sight of Lugosi and Russell sleeping in coffins and the final shoot-out with the police in which, of all people, it's Lugosi's dwarfish henchman who gets it!

In the end, I guess I wouldn't mind watching Lugosi's other stuff from this period but I doubt if it will make me enough of a fan to go out and purchase them in their best available prints on DVD.

After the death of many brides in their weddings and disappearance of their corpses, the snoopy journalist Patricia Hunter (Luana Walters) notes that all of them were wearing an orchid in their breasts. She finds that the hybridization of the orchid was made by Dr. Lorenz (Bela Lugosi), and she decides to interview him about the flowers. She hitchhikes on the road with Dr. Foster (Tristam Coffin) and they are hosted by Dr. Lorenz in his isolated house. Dr. Lorenz is indeed a mad scientist that sleeps with his wife in coffins, and with the assistance of a dwarf and his strong retarded brother, extract gland fluids from the neck of the abducted virgins to keep his elder wife young.

"The Corpse Vanishes" is a weird story with very bizarre characters. The lighting and shadows are excellent, slightly recalling the German expressionism. The odd face of Bela Lugosi seems to be tailored to the role of the evil scientist. The DVD released in Brazil by Fantasy distributor has the image full of interferences, as if it were a low quality broadcast image. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "O Cadáver Desaparecido" ("The Vanished Corpse")

*The Corpse Vanishes* doesn't waste any time getting down to business. Just about the first thing we see is a bride at her wedding dropping dead during the ceremony. The next thing we know, her body has been stolen away in the wrong hearse. (Important safety tip: When having cadavers taken away by hearses, ask to see the driver's identification.)

Amazingly, it turns out that this is only the latest in a series of such macabre incidents. I don't know about you, but if I were about to be married in a city where this was going on, I would probably delay my wedding (or at least hold it in another city.)

We soon learn that the dead brides are being used by Bela Lugosi as a source of something-or-other that he draws out of them with a nasty-looking syringe. This stuff then gets injected into his wife to restore her beauty; she's apparently suffering from some rapid aging disease or something.

A Spunky Girl Reporter (boy, they had a lot of them back then) finds out that all the dead brides had been given a rare orchid just before the ceremony. She then discovers that the local expert on this plant is (you guessed it) Lugosi. She winds up as an not-very-welcome guest of Bela and his wife. Their servants are an older woman and her two sons, one a dwarf and one a mute hunchback who likes to fondle the hair of the dead brides. (There's some speculation at one point that the brides are only in suspended animation, but this question is never resolved.)

*The Corpse Vanishes* is a wild bit of Grand Guignol, with all kinds of spooky stuff thrown in. We find out that Bela and his wife like to sleep in coffins. There is no explanation for this, except for the fact that they find them more comfortable. (This whole household makes the Addams Family look like the Brady Bunch.)

A couple of familiar faces other than Bela show up in this thing. The dwarf is played by Angelo Rossitto, who played various little people in everything from *Freaks* to *Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome*. Bela's wife is played by Elizabeth Russell. Fans of classic horror may best remember her as the woman who calls Simone Simon "Moia sestra" ("My sister") in *Cat People*. She's a striking and exotic woman, who manages the remarkable task of being more sinister than Bela.

This film is short on plot logic (surely there must be an easier way to obtain the bodies of young women than at their weddings) but it delivers more than enough in the way of creepy thrills. And of course there is the insinuation that Bela needs the glandular fluid of a virgin and a really big assumption - even in 1942 - that brides are virgins. How do you know they are virgins? Because, in the words of Fonzie of Happy Days fame - "Virgins never lie about these things."

I give it a five out of ten just because of the old world charm and mystery Bela brings to any role, no matter how low budget the film.