Boris Karloff Triple DVD Box Set

C. O. DeRiemer

at 11:49 am

The problem with the Boris Karloff Collection is the false promotion Universal gives it. This “Franchise Collection” says on the box, “The Master of Horror In His Most Frightening Roles!” Far from it. Of the five movies only The Strange Door has a bit of horror and the movie belongs to Charles Laughton, not Karloff. For the others, Karloff mostly plays secondary roles which aren’t scary, although Mord in Tower of London is a man to avoid. None of the movies would win any awards. Still, Karloff was an interesting actor and it’s hard not to like him even in these secondary films.

–Night Key. This B-movie crime programmer has as much connection to horror as a thin pork chop has to a freshly ripped-out human tongue. Karloff as the well-intentioned, kindly and ingenious inventor does a fine job, but the movie is forgettable. Of interest to some is that the director is Lloyd Corrigan, a writer and director in the late Twenties and throughout the Thirties. He became one of Hollywood’s most recognizable character actors when the Forties started. He usually played roly-poly parts, chortling and happy-spirited.

–Tower of London. Here we have a cauldron of a movie bubbling merrily away that spatters as much rancid stew on Richard III almost as vividly as Shakespeare did. Basil Rathbone plays Richard with enthusiastic malice. As a henchman, he has Boris Karloff as Mord, a big, club-footed, bald-headed, muscular torturer, eager to use the executioner’s axe or the torturer’s rack and whip. “You’re more than a duke,” Mord tells Richard, “more than a king. You’re a god to me!” Mord eagerly and admiringly acts on Richard’s plans, from thrusting a dagger into the back of the mad old Henry VI to tipping Clarence, Richard’s troublesome brother, into a huge vat of malmsey, then sitting on the lid while waiting for the sound of the bubbles to stop. This is Basil Rathbone’s movie, however, and he makes the most of it with icy diction and some good lines. He hands his own dagger to Mord, then sends him to where Henry VI is praying. “A fitting occasion for a blade in the shape of a cross,” Richard says. “It will insure the thrust and bless the wound.”

– The Climax would be more aptly named The Anti-Climax. It marked Boris Karloff’s return to movies after three years on Broadway and touring in Arsenic and Old Lace. His name alone led many to believe The Climax would be a grand, shivering horror fest, especially as it would be Karloff’s first color film. Instead, The Climax is a sad tale of an elderly doctor who has a thing about a singer he strangled ten years previously. For some, it might have promised a delightful Technicolor movie of Viennese operetta and Hollywood soubrettes. Instead, it’s a weak re-make of The Phantom of the Opera, without the Phantom, which was released the year before. More than anything else, we get a story of aged obsession, hypnotism and throat spray that is as flavorless and stale as a slice of month-old Sachertorte. Inexplicably, Karloff is under-utilized. When Karloff says in that deep, sincere voice of his, “I’ve come to help you, my dear,” we hope things will pick up. They don’t.

–The Strange Door. “They’ve begun by disliking each other,” says Alain de Maletroit (Charles Laughton), smacking his lips, eyes gleaming at the prospect of the forced marriage between his 20-year-old niece and a drunken wastrel he chose for her in a rough French tavern. “Hatred will come later. I’m in the mood for relaxation! Let’s visit the dungeons!” As de Maletroit, Laughton sports an amazing comb-over, almost as grotesque as the one he wore in Jamaica Inn. de Maletroit can be charmingly gracious one moment, squinty-eyed suspicious the next, and absolutely jolly as he enjoys his crazed and nefarious plans. The movie is hardly more than an amusing throw-away, but Laughton turns it into a comedy of melodramatic excess. Karloff has a much smaller, but important role, and does a sympathetic job of it. On balance, the movie is fun and worth watching because of Laughton, but it’s basically filler.

–The Black Castle. The best thing — and that’s pretty good — about The Black Castle is that it’s a black-and-white Forties’ gothic grabber featuring a murderous mad count which was somehow made in 1952. Skulking around in the shadows of the count’s castle is a long-gowned Boris Karloff in a decidedly secondary role of an aged doctor who may or may not be the salvation of the hero. Surprisingly, for all the cliches, The Black Castle keeps moving merrily along. The movie takes itself seriously, but it’s competently enough made to keep our interest, even if we wind up sitting back with a smile while we watch. It’s even reassuring in a way to realize there are strong echoes of The Most Dangerous Game. Hollywood’s second creative rule has always been, “If you’re going to steal, steal from the best.” It’s first creative rule, of course, is “If you’re going to steal, steal from the best and then turn it into liverwurst.” The Black Castle is a nice bite of Austrian braunschweiger.
Rating: 4 / 5

bernie

at 3:15 pm

If Peter Lorre (Rosenberg, Austria-Hungary [now Ruzomberok, Slovakia]) can be Mr. Moto “Mr. Moto’s Last Warning (1939),” then Boris Karloff (Camberwell, London, England, UK) can be Mr. Wong. Boris appears in more than 160 films and videos.

Actually these films are quite entertaining. They are also some of his more obscure films but it is worth purchasing as a set.

Night Key (1937) David Mallory

Tower of London (1939) Mord

The Climax (1944) Dr. Friedrich Hohner

The Strange Door (1951) Voltan

The Black Castle (1952) Dr. Meissen

See my individual reviews.

There are larger Karloff collections

The Val Lewton Horror Collection (Cat People / The Curse of the Cat People / I Walked with a Zombie / The Body Snatcher / Isle of the Dead / Bedlam / The Leopard Man / The Ghost Ship / The Seventh Victim / Shadows in the Dark)
Rating: 4 / 5

Lazydrake

at 6:35 pm

Universal should be prosecuted for breaking trades descriptions legislation. This is by no means the definitive Karloff collection (‘The master of horror in his most frightening roles’ goes the blurb). Well, don’t be misled. I mistakenly purchased this, meaning to buy ‘The Boris Karloff Horror Flicks collection,’ an authentic horror collection. In all but two of the films (‘Night Key’ and ‘The Climax’) Karloff plays very minor parts and none of the films are strictly speaking horror. Night Key is a crime B movie where Karloff plays the genial inventor of a security system kidnapped by crooks and forced to perpetrate robberies. It’s a very sympathetic role but hardly menacing. ‘The Climax’ is Karloff’s first colour flick where he plays a doctor who’s murdered his opera singing wife and becomes obsessed with another (young) opera singer. It has resonances with ‘The Phantom of the Opera’ but is manifestly inferior. The film won plaudits for the cinematography but it is overlong and stuffed with singing sequences which detract from the more menacing scenes(which are few). In short,rather boring. In ‘The Strange Door’ he’s the servant of an sadistic nobleman played by Charles Laughton who amuses himself by keeping a people captive, and Karloff contrives to help the prisoners escape. His role here is so minor he’s virtually invisible and the acting plaudits clearly go to the excellent Laughton.The film’s still enjoyable but hardly a great Karloff horror vehicle. ‘The Black Castle’ is quite similar in plot, centred on an evil count who perpetrates cruelty in the eponymous castle, with Karloff playing a doctor who tries to rescue the count’s victims. It’s also quite enjoyable but by no means a classic and is no fit medium for Karloff’s talents to shine, in another very minor role. The best film of the bunch is ‘The Tower of London’, which details Richard 111’s rise to power and swift demise ( well played by Basil Rathbone) and Karloff is highly effective as Mord the executioner and Richard’s conspirator. The film is quite atmospheric and is also notable for the presence of the young Vincent Price, but once again Karloff plays a minor supporting role and the film is best described as an historical drama, not a horror film. Universal should be ashamed of themselves for effectively lying to customers about the content of this DVD. An authentic horror collection of Boris’s ‘most frightening roles’ would go something like: Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Ghoul, The Black Room, The Black Cat, The Bodysnatcher, and many others, but none of the offerings on this DVD made by those capitalist con merchants at Universal. Avoid and try the ‘BK horror flicks collection’ instead for a true taste of the man’s talent.
Rating: 2 / 5