Return of the Ape Man

RETURN OF THE APE MAN was one of nine films Bela Lugosi appeared for the Poverty Row studio Monogram between 1941 and 1944. In this film, he plays mad scientist Professor Dexter who with the help of his colleague Professor John Gilmore (John Carradine) revives a prehistoric man (Frank Moran) from an ice block. Dexter schemes to kill a modern person to use part of his brain in the newly thawed brute. Thus, the savage ape man will not only become manageable, but he'll have the speech and intelligence to describe his prehistoric life. Why not a WHOLE brain? Because Dexter believes that if he removes all of his subject's old brain, the ape man won't have any knowledge of his former life.

This synopsis suggests the film's silliness. The plot is more coherent than in most of Lugosi's other Monogram films, but it still has its share of inexplicabilities and inconsistencies. Monogram's typically poor production values further enhance the film's cheesiness. The sets are sparse and threadbare. An Arctic sequence where the scientists find the ape man is especially phony looking; one expects the curtain to come down when it ends. The music, consisting of randomly selected stock scores, is dull and often inappropriate, such as a marching band tune during action sequences.

Still, one can derive legitimate pleasure from Bela Lugosi's performance. Ever the trouper, he acts as if he's in one of his Shakespeare productions in his native Hungary and the film is all the better because of it. Lugosi emotes his standard mad scientist part with passion and conviction. He delivers such lines as "Some people's brains would never be missed" in his sonorous Hungarian accented voice with an air of sinister elegance. Such a unique delivery elevates his dialogue from stale cliches to arcane parlance. Lugosi fans should savor RETURN OF THE APE MAN.

It's a letdown for John Carradine's fans, however. As Dexter's sane and ethical partner, he just goes through the motions. His performance is so listless that one perversely roots for Lugosi's far more vibrant character when the scientists argue.

Overall, RETURN OF THE APE MAN exemplifies the situation of an outstanding performer (in this case, Lugosi) rising above his unpromising material.

Standard low, low budget Monogram programmer stars the legends Bela Lugosi and John Carradine as a pair of scientists. Professor Dexter (Lugosi) is determined that they find a perfectly preserved prehistoric man so they can continue with their cold storage experiments. Naturally, they do find an ape man (prizefighter Frank Moran), who comes back to life and wreaks predictable havoc. Dexter thinks that the solution to controlling the ape man will be donating a portion of a rational mans' brain to the confused cave dude.

Although this is routine stuff, clocking in at barely over an hour, Bela and Carradine are once again great value. Carradine, who played his own fair share of mad scientists over the course of his career, here gets to play the moral centre / voice of reason - and also gets to play that oh so familiar composition "Moonlight Sonata" on the piano. Bela, meanwhile, clearly has fun as the irrational, totally self serving cretin who doesn't care what he has to do to realize his ambitions. The supporting cast is sufficient: gorgeous Teala Loring as Carradines' niece, Michael Ames (a.k.a. Tod Andrews) as her fiancée, Mary Currier as Carradines' wife, Eddy Chandler as a police sergeant, and Ernie Adams as a hobo. George Zucco was originally cast as the title character, and had done the required hair and makeup tests, but fell ill, and had to leave the picture. As a result, he's barely in it, spending a few seconds on the slab until the ape man wakes up and is then played by Moran. Still, Zucco clearly had a good agent; his contract allowed him to get third billing no matter what.

Overall, this is a mildly enjoyable lark, with nothing special or memorable about it, but it's got a decent forward pace and enough chuckles to make it palatable. The director is Phil Rosen, an extremely prolific B filmmaker whose credits include some of the Charlie Chan features.

Five out of 10.

The story revolves around an Artic expedition headed by Bela Lugosi and his associate, scientist John Carradine, as they search for what might be the missing link. They find a frozen cave man...why this is called an ape man is totally lost on me. It must be based on the huge lack of success from an earlier Lugosi film called The Ape Man, of which this film has no relation too in plot whatsoever. Anyway, Lugosi brings this man back but finds that it needs at least a part of someone else's brain. He begins to search for possible subjects and settles on Carradine's soon-to-be fiancee. Carradine is not enthusiastic in the venture any further and severs ties, and the real mayhem begins as Bela gets to really ham it up trying to find and finally succeeding with a substitute. The Return of the Ape Man is undeniably cheap, poorly scripted, and laughably acted by most; it does, however, remain thoroughly entertaining due in large part to Lugosi in a charged-up role and Carradine in a rather subdued one. The cast credits list George Zucco but alas he is nowhere to be found. Quite a shame considering his ability to add class to almost anything.

Lugosi, Carradine and Zucco all in the same film, but which one plays the mad scientist this time around? The answer to that question is Lugosi, the Dracula star appearing as Prof. Dexter, who performs groundbreaking suspended animation experiments with the aid of his colleague John Gilmore (Carradine).

After successfully freezing a vagrant and reviving him four months later, the pair go in search of a frozen prehistoric man for their next experiment. They find what they are looking for trapped in a glacier; transporting their discovery back to the lab, the pair wake up the 'ape-man' (Zucco, soon to be replaced by Frank Moran due to illness). Dexter reveals that his next move will be to transplant brain tissue from a present-day human into the prehistoric man, an idea that Gilmore finds abhorrent -- little does he realise that it will be his brain tissue that Dexter uses!

Featuring three icons of horror, and a suitably loopy premise, this film should have been a lot of barmy fun, but the whole thing is strictly routine, playing out like so many other cheap B-movies of the day. The script is weak and the direction uninspired, but the biggest let down is the prehistoric creature: a policeman describes it as looking 'more like an ape than a man', but it doesn't... it looks like a regular man in need of a bath, a haircut, a shave and a change of outfit. I guess 'Return of the Dirty Hobo' doesn't have the same ring about it.

In true movie monster fashion, the 'ape man' ultimately escapes and makes off with damsel in distress Anne Gilmore (Teala Loring), her beau Steve Rogers (Tod Andrews) and the police in hot pursuit. Predictably, Dexter dies at the hands of his creation, and the 'ape-man' goes up in flames in the laboratory.

3/10. Does nothing to distinguish itself from countless other poverty-row potboilers. If it wasn't for the participation of three horror legends, the film would have been completely forgotten by now.

Professor Dexter and his assistant Professor Gilmore (Bela Lugosi and John Carradine) are busy experimenting on homeless winos, freezing them solid for months at a time in order to defrost them later.

Next, they're off to the arctic to find a frozen caveman. Once one is located and chipped out of the ice, they haul him back to their laboratory and bring the troglodyte back to life.

Naturally, Dexter and Gilmore plan to transplant a normal human brain into the caveman's noggin. A subject is found, drugged, frozen, and prepped for the implantation process.

What could possibly go wrong?

RETURN OF THE APE MAN is every bit as ridiculous as the original film, perhaps more so. Lugosi and Carradine are in rare form, as is George Zucco. Everyone takes turns devouring the scenery, making this a wonderment to behold!...