Ah, Halloween. They're breaking out the Universal 30's-40's classics tonight on TCM, and I watched several minutes of Dracula, The Mummy and The Wolf Man in between watching Cincinnati behave like wolf men themselves at the expense of the Denver Broncos. Watched the thoroughly ludicrous The Raven last night. I mean, that's one seriously nutball flick that makes no sense on almost any level, but it's cool because it's got Bela AND Boris!
Anyway, one thing stood out as I scanned The Wolf Man: I can understand, or at least go along with, how when Lon gets his foot stuck in a bear trap, or his dad puts a beat-down on him with that silver cane, we don't see any sign of blood or trauma. It was the Forties, after all. Hell, when we see the recently beaten-to-death-with-a-blunt-object Chaney post-transformation, he looks clean-shaven and fresh-faced, like he just got out of the barber chair! But here's the thing that really stood out to me: diminutive, hawk-nosed Talbot Sr., played by Claude Rains. Hulking, pug-face son Larry, played by Lon Chaney. Father and son?!? Who was the mom? Margaret Dumont? And people BOUGHT this! Robert Osborne came out after it was over and stated for the record that The Wolf Man was Universal's #1 grossing film in 1941.
Alright, that's all I got for tonight. This time last year I did a lot of horror movie posting, if I recall correctly- or maybe that was Sean Collins. I know I did some, anyway. Maybe I'll do more! Then again, maybe not. The most grisly and frightening thing I've seen lately was that Falcons-Chiefs game yesterday...
No comments:
Post a Comment