Phantom of the Rue Morgue (1954)

everything you have heard about this movie is true.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

.Like the great film, it's made with a great deal of visible affection both in front of and behind the camera.

Surprisingly Bloody, this was made after House of Wax (1953), also in 3-D, was Such a Hit. This one Holds Up pretty Well with the Vincent Price Movie, although Karl Malden seems Out of Place.The Attraction of this Film is the Gruesomeness of the Violence. There are some Attractive Indoor Scenes. But when the Movie Ventures Outdoors it is Stilted and Stage Bound. There is some Tension as the Brutal Murders continue and when the Evil Doctor Locks the Heroine in the Barred Room (cage) it is quite Terrifying.Overall, a Man in an Ape Suit is Rarely Effective, although done somewhat Believable Here. The Movie is just about as Good as one would expect Considering the Limitations of the 3-D Format and 1950's Sensibilities, in Fact, maybe a Bit Better. The Downside is the Aggravating Police Department and there are a lot of Scenes where Folks just Stand around and Jabber.

If you've read the Edgar Allen Poe story THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE, be prepared to be wildly disappointed in this unexciting, awkwardly produced film version. Roy Del Ruth directs with such inertia it's impossible to recommend anything here. Poe's story of some sort of beast roaming the streets of Paris killing young women is transferred to the screen with all the excitement of a soggy croissant. In casting that is silly rather than intriguing, Karl Malden has the lead role and Steve Forrest is a professor who cracks the case. B-movie goddess Patricia Medina (later Mrs. Joseph Cotten in real life) and French acting legend Claude Dauphin add very little. Merv Griffin is in cast list but good luck spotting him. Creepy Anthony Caruso plays creepy Jacques, Malden's cycloptic assistant. The obvious music score is by David Buttolph and the cinematography is by J. Peverell Marley, who shot the much better HOUSE OF WAX a year earlier. Director Del Ruth followed this with the equally unscary horror film THE ALLIGATOR PEOPLE.

As a series of strange murders plague a small area of Paris, the lack of clues force the police to team up with the prime suspect in the case to find the maniac responsible when he claims a friend's trained killer gorilla is responsible and targeting his fiancée.This was a fairly impressive and fun effort that has a lot going for it. One of the better elements here is the fact that there's a large amount of attack scenes on the victims, which really drives this one nicely as these continuous sequences provide plenty of action, shocks as well as generating some sultry teases with the women being targeted being quite attractive overall. As the attacks are framed so the audience doesn't see the culprit, and the only times they are is when they're obscured or casting a shadow on the wall, it leaves a distinct impression, and the fun continues due to the investigation done to recreate the crime at the scene, and the evidence either way makes for some fun times overall. The fact that these investigations point to the main purpose of this one is a little troubling since they can drag on at times especially when they keep trying to pin it on the hero through flimsy circumstances that won't work in any real courtroom. The other real flaw is the romance angle that appears late in the film, which stops the film cold and comes out-of-nowhere to create a really confusing mess, though it does solve the film's murders quite nicely. Overall, this one was pretty enjoyable.Today's Rating-PG: Violence.

A murderous fiend is destroying Parisian lovelies and law enforcement seems powerless to stop him. But who is it and what drives him to savagely attack beautiful women at night? Is it even a man? Zoologist Dr. Marais (Karl Malden) could hold the answer to the killer in Paris. A mean-spirited remake of Robert Florey's atmospheric 30s chiller starring Bela Lugosi, with Malden in the Dr. Mirakle role of devious scientist who can control ape to heinously kill women, implicating friend Professor Paul Dupin (Steve Forrest), a teacher of psychology, by placing items he had given to his fiancé, Jeanette (Patricia Medina; who Malden is in love with) at crime scenes.With glossy sets and nice production value, "Phantom of the Rue Morgue" shows the destructive aftermath of the killer ape's rampage, with rooms laid to waste, female (and a male) bodies discovered bloodied, and the familiar "wrong man" scenario utilized (imprisoned innocent man trying to get police to believe that he didn't and couldn't commit the murders he is set up by Malden for). Malden implements "psychotic eyes" to convey his madness, simmering to the surface when Jeanette, who Marais is infatuated with, he feels betrayed because she denies his advances. Predictable and lacking real chills, "Phantom of the Rue Morgue", to me, is an interesting failure, probably of interest to horror fans for Malden's involvement and its status as a remake of an underrated classic. Not that well known, "Phantom of the Rue Morgue" has a dark streak, to be sure, and was perhaps pretty potently violent in its time. The melodramatic score adds to the Hollywood gloss of the picture; I felt this was an affectionate homage to Universal studios 30s/40s horror. The ending, where Malden's antics come back to haunt him, closing at his zoo, goes through the motions and lacks atmospheric thrills which came easily even with the lesser Universal studios' B-movie efforts, like the inferior Mummy series. Claude Dauphin is Paris Inspector, Bonnard, persistently assured that he has caught the right man for the crimes...even when it is obvious no human could commit the crimes where a great deal of strength would be needed and superior agility to escape from such heights. Anthony Caruso has a fun part as a surly one-eyed assistant to Marais, killing an acquaintance who knows too much about the ape in a memorable scene. There's a great knife throwing scene and an acrobatics demonstration, both providing some decent suspense. Good cast helps, even if the film never quite becomes altogether involving.