User reviews

If you don't enjoy this Bowery Boys flick, forget the others! THE BOWERY BOYS MEET THE MONSTERS is one of their best, and quite possibly THE best. Slip and Sach leave Manhattan for Long Island to ask the owners of a barren lot in their neighborhood if they might help turn it into a baseball field where Bowery kids can play. What the boys discover when they meet the eccentric owners at their eerie manor is that they're a couple of looney bird mad scientists, who quickly plan to use Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall as brain donors for their latest experiments.

This is not exactly ABBOTT & COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN, but it was doubtless influenced by that team's "meet the monsters" series of movies. The Bowery Boys wind up confronting a creepy butler who transforms into a Jekyll/Hyde monster, a quirky robot, a savage gorilla, a sexy vampiress and a creaky old lady with a man-eating plant for a pet. Fans of The Three Stooges may recognize actual sequences "borrowed" from some of their shorts, as this was scripted by Stooge writers Edward Bernds and Elwood Ullman (and Bernds directed). As a result, the pacing is quick and the jokes are quite good. Highly recommended as one of your first Bowery Boys experiences, or if you're a fan of monster movies of the period.

*** out of ****

The title The Bowery Boys Meet The Monsters is somewhat a misnomer since there are no real monsters in the film, just a weird family who'd like to make one. A 'temporary' one does appear, but you'll have to see the film to find out just exactly what I mean.

Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall ran into a few unworldly types in their various films. In this case what brings them to the house of the Gravesend family is they're representing the kids in the neighborhood who would like to use a vacant lot that the family owns for a baseball field.

What an interesting crew the Gravesends are, a kind of Vanderhof family from You Can't Take It With You on steroids. Three siblings, John Dehner, Ellen Corby, and Lloyd Corrigan all pursue their various scientific interests and their butler Grisson aka Gruesome played by Paul Wexler. Dehner and Corrigan have made tests on Huntz Hall and discover he's got the proper cranial capacity for a brain transplant. But they're fighting over whether it will be Dehner's gorilla or Corrigan's robot. Corby has a Venus Man-Trap plant that needs feeding and the black sheep of the family is Laura Mason who is a vampire who also needs feeding. With this family she gets leftovers.

The boys have their hands full with this crew and in one of their better films, the audience will have its laughs full.

After a baseball breaks the window of "Louie's Sweet Shop", problem-solving leader Leo Gorcey (as Terrence "Slip" Mahoney) decides he his fellow "Bowery Boys" - accomplice Huntz Hall (as Horace "Sach" Jones), brother David "Condon" Gorcey (as Chuck), and Benny "Bennie" Bartlett (as Butch) - should get the kids playing in the Bowery off the streets and onto a safe vacant lot. Telephoning the lot-owning "Gravesend Family" at home, Mr. Gorcey wrangles an invitation to their mansion.

Mad scientist John Dehner (as Derek Gravesend) tells brother Lloyd Corrigan (as Anton) that Gorcey must be dim-witted, due to his mangling of the English language. The pair decide "Bowery Boys" would be perfect for head and brain transplanting experiments involving both a robot and a gorilla. Family matriarch Ellen Corby (as Amelia) would rather feed them to her man-eating tree. And, sexy vampire Laura Mason (as Francine) is looking forward to the arrival of new blood at the old house.

As a film series, "The Bowery Boys" looked like it was (generally) in an insurmountable rut, after a string of unsatisfactory films (see especially those from 1952). The quality was never all that dependable, but the movies did successfully entertain a targeted audience. While seeming to be finished, the series became sporadically good again, before the crashing in 1956.

"The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters" was one of the a high points; it was followed by the bad "Jungle Gents" (1954), then the good "Bowery to Bagdad" (1955). The title "The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters" suggests some inspiration from "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein" (1948), but this situation is more clearly swiped from Charles Addams' witty "The Addams Family" (begun as a comic strip in 1938), which spawned the memorable 1960s television series and imitations like this film.

****** The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters (6/6/54) Edward Bernds ~ Leo Gorcey, Huntz Hall, Bernard Gorcey, Paul Wexler

Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters, The (1954)

*** (out of 4)

Fast-paced and fun entry in the series has Slip (Leo Gorcey) and Sach (Huntz Hall) traveling to a creepy mansion so that they can ask the owners if the Bowery kids can use their lot to play ball. Soon the duo are being held captive by the mad scientists who want to use their brains in some crazy experiments. After several so-so entries, it's good to see the series back with a winner as this one perfectly mixes the laughs with the various horror elements. This is clearly influenced by the Abbott and Costello flicks but that's not a bad thing especially when you get such a winning film. I really loved the fact that Bernds was back behind the camera as he kept the action coming very fast and helped keep everything moving. The laughs are plenty as we get countless good jokes including one that must have been seen by Mel Brooks and Gene Wilder as it would later be used in YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN. At one point the creepy butler tells Sach and Slip to "walk this way" which they do by mocking the way he's walking. Other funny jokes include the various horror elements including a sexy vampire, a living tree who eats humans, a killer gorilla and a robot who keeps losing its head. All of these elements are perfectly blended into the story and we also get a kind old lady who wants to feed the fat Slip to her tree. Both Gorcey and Hall are on the top of their game and deliver fine performances. The comedy here is pretty wide ranged as we get a lot of physical stuff but also a lot of one liners and both of them deliver just fine. Bernard Gorcey has a couple funny bits including a very good incident with the gorilla. Some might be disappointed that the "monsters" aren't Dracula, Frankenstein or the Mummy but it really doesn't matter because of how well everything works here. A lot of the jokes fall on their face but that's only because so many are flying around that your bound not to have them all work. Fans of the series will certainly find this to be a winner but I think even those who can't stand them will find this one entertaining.

Growing up in new jersey i remember them showing the Bowery boys movies every Sunday,and being a monster fan this was my favorite Bowery boys movie,huntz hall and Leo gorcey want to turn a vacant lot into a baseball field for the Bowery kids so they will have a safer place to play baseball,actually called stick-ball in new jersey and new york. they find it is owned by some kooky Addams family types.there's a gorilla in a cage,a man eating plant,and a big clunky robot.its all slapstick hijinks when the Bowery boys show up,some people called this the poor mans Abbott and Costello meet Frankenstein.though not as good its funny,especially Leo gorceys vocabulary.as a Bowery boys movie i would say its the best one.made by allied artists(earlier known as monogram pictures)the Bowery boys went through many name changes, the Clancy street boys,dead end kids,eastside kids,and later the Bowery boys.i give this vintage gem 7 out of 10.

The Bowery Boys films simply went on way, way too long. After all, they made 48...not counting the ones made before this by many members of the group in such incarnations as the East Side Kids, the Dead End Kids and the Little Tough Guys! Talk about over-saturation!! And, to make it worse, after Bernard Gorcey died, his son, Leo, quit the series...and yet they still made more films!!! To make things worse, they often tended to reuse plot ideas--and the Boys ended up battling baddies in haunted houses many, many times...too many! This is why I really was not impressed with "The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters".

So despite all this, is this later Bowery Boys film worth your time? Well, for some (those who hate the films), no...and for devoted fans, yes. But for the average person...it's probably NOT a good place to start. Instead, find one of their earlier films--the ones they made just after WWII.

This film finds the gang going to Gravesend Manor--where the weirdos living there are anxiously awaiting the visit. At first, they are excited by how stupid Slip sounds when he phones them but upon meeting Sach they realize he's perfect for a brain transfer to a gorilla...something they actually did in several other previous films!! The lack of originality make this hard to distinguish! It's all essentially a retread...and the earlier haunted house/brain transfer with ape films were better. The only major difference? They've also got a giant silly robot in this one...ugh!

The slapstick is so overdone in this Bowery Boys tribute to fright flicks that there's something happening at slam bang speed in almost every frame of THE BOWERY BOYS MEET THE MONSTERS.

The non-stop shenanigans gets the usual boost from LEO GORCEY and HUNTZ HALL, busy slapping each other around in the tradition of The Three Stooges as they encounter some spirited spooks in the care of Dr. Gravesend (JOHN DEHNER).

ELLEN CORBY (the grandma from The Daltons) is on hand as a feather-brained Mrs. Gravesend devoted to her man-eating plant with designs on getting its tree-like limbs around Huntz Hall or Leo Gorcey.

It's a broad farce, played for laughs by the entire cast, including JOHN DEHNER and LLOYD CORRIGAN as his fellow scientist, but all of the gags are recycled from either Abbot and Costello movies or The Three Stooges. The only new twist is that the monsters aren't the creatures you might expect them to be--and for that, you have to see the film.

Recommended mainly for those Bowery Boys fans who can't get enough of their silly hijinks.

This is the first Bowery Boys movie I've ever watched, and judging by what I've seen, I won't be in a hurry to check out their other movies, the 'boys' particular brand of slapstick and buffoonery leaving me straight-faced throughout.

Clearly modelled after Abbot and Costello's 'Meet' series of films (which I also find not very funny), '..Meet The Monsters' sees Bowery boys Slip and Sach (Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall) paying a visit to a creepy mansion inhabited by a family of kooks and oddballs, each of whom want the unwary guests for their own nefarious reasons.

With Hall's painfully unfunny dumb routine and Gorcey's excessive use of maladroits (that's fancy speak for using the wrong word), this film is already on shaky ground, but chuck in a moth eaten killer gorilla, a crap robot, and a rubber man eating tree, and what you have is a film that gives new meaning to the term 'lowbrow'.

A baseball smashes the front window at Louie's Sweet Shop. It's the neighborhood kids. The adults decide to call up the Gravesend residence for permission to let the kids play baseball in their lot. Slip and Sach travel up to the mansion but they don't realize that the family is disturbed and the house is full of monsters.

This is trying to be Abbott and Costello. I don't hate it but I prefer to have Abbott and Costello. Costello is a comedic genius. These guys are a step below. This is still good clean fun if not necessarily original.

I felt sorry for myself after sitting through this horrendous pile of garbage, but not as sorry as I do for anyone who watches it more than once.

Gorcey and Hall doing their schtick wears thin after about 30 seconds, and it goes on for well over an hour!

The only interest to me was the obvious nod to the work of Charles Addams, very popular at the time. I've watched a few other Bowery Boys movies, but it won't happen again.

Neighborhood kids playing baseball in the street in front of Louie's sweetshop keep hitting baseballs through his storefront window. Sach suggests they get permission for the kids to use a big, vacant lot nearby. Slip telephones the lot owners, the Gravesend family-- Slip wants permission to use the lot because he is a "bene-fracturer" of humanity. They are invited to drive over, since mad scientists Dr. Derek Gravesend and Anton Gravesend want brains-- to put into their gorilla and robot! Derek needs a tiny brain; Anton notes: "A creature with a brain that small wouldn't have sense enough to come in out of the rain." Quick cut to Sach, standing in the rain. At the spooky house, Slip and Sach meet Grissom, the butler, whom they call "Gruesome" (kind of a prototype Lurch, 10 years before "The Addams Family"). The Boys also meet a sexy female vampire Francine Gravesend (a prototype Morticia); she wants them for their blood. Amelia Gravesend wants to feed the Boys to her Agopanthus Carnivorous, her man-eating tree (sort of like in "The Wizard of Oz"). There are old jokes, such as the butler saying: "Walk this way" (this joke would be 20 years older in "Young Frankenstein"). Some jokes are pure Bowery Boys-- the butler says, "This old manor house goes back to colonial times; take this chair for instance: 1775." To which Slip retorts, "17.75? Anybody that paid over 3 bucks for it got rooked!" Some skits are recycled: Slip and Sach are locked in a closet; they use a saw to cut a hole in the far wall, and crawl through-- it leads to a cage with a gorilla in it. If this scene looks familiar, it's because it had been used before with the Three Stooges short "Dizzy Detectives" (1943). There's lots more fun and scary thrills. Just watch this movie and enjoy!

Paul Wexler would appear in other horror movies, like "The Four Skulls of Jonathan Drake." Laura Mason would appear in other films, as a Harem Girl, and then a Venus Girl in "Queen of Outer Space." Lloyd Corrigan had been in a previous Bowery Boys movie "Ghost Chasers" (1951). John Dehner would play occult characters in "The Twilight Zone" in the episodes: "Mr. Garrity and the Graves" & "The Jungle." Steve Calvert (Cosmos the gorilla) had played an ape in "Bela Lugosi Meets a Brooklyn Gorilla"; his last movie was playing a gorilla in the Ed Wood 'classic': "The Bride and the Beast." Trivia: this is the only Bowery Boys movie with "Bowery Boys" in the title.

I gave it a 7 because I like the Bowery Boys. This is good, clean fun for the whole family. Just like Bugs Bunny, there are plenty of jokes for kids and adults.

The "Hall Tree" is moving. The robot is a drag. The skulls and skeletons are grave. The dialogue is classic "Sach." The Boys are the Keystone Cops as always.

The "bad guys" in this seem to have been the inspiration for the later TV series, The Adamms Family. If you like campy misdirection and "The Boys", you'll like this. If you've never seen The Bowery Boys in action, this is a great movie to start.

In order to appreciate the slapstick comedy of the Bowery Boys, one must first be able to wholeheartedly laugh at the Three Stooges. Many of the comedy team films of the 40s and 50s centered around the same theme - haunted house, mad scientist, gorilla, brain transplant, etc. This one is like the rest. The most hilarious part of this film is how the Chief (Leo Gorcey) manages to mangle the English language, many times stumping Dr. Gravesend into trying to figure out what he's actually saying. Unlike The Three Stooges, the Bowery Boys are not really physical comedians. Huntz Hall's facial expressions are really not as funny as Curly's, Larry's or Moe's. Leo Gorcey tries to play it for laughs as best as he can by being bug-eyed, but it just doesn't come off. Perhaps his age was showing by this time and he just couldn't quite cut it anymore like in his earlier films. Still, the premise of the film is familiar, there are some good laughs from the entire cast, and it is worth a look, even if just for nostalgia's sake. Although I think the group's earlier films were much funnier, this is about the best one out of the series that were made in the 50s. Worth a peek.

Slip and Sach become mixed up with a family of weirdos in an old dark house in this thirty-fourth entry in the series. The family is the highlight of this one, with John Dehner, Ellen Corby, Laura Mason, Paul Wexler, and Lloyd Corrigan all turning in enjoyable performances. Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall are fine as usual. Leo has some especially funny malapropisms in this one. David Gorcey and Bennie Bartlett get little to do. Bernard Gorcey is fun as Louie. It's a good B comedy with a lot of things for old horror and sci-fi fans, like a robot, a gorilla, a vampire, a man-eating plant, and a formula that turns a guy into a Mr. Hyde-type monster. Definitely one of the better later Bowery Boys films.

"The Bowery Boys Meet The Monsters", according to IMDb the Boys' biggest box-office hit, as well as the longest title, is mostly typical low-brow slapstick, full of old-hat gags, but it is also a bit more imaginative than usual: it must be one of their most horror and sci-fi oriented entries. In addition to the standard escaped gorilla, we get a crude robot, a carnivorous plant, a creepy butler, a potion that briefly turns its recipient into a werewolf-like monster, and a family that makes the Addams clan look normal. Paul Wexler is a standout as the butler aptly named Grissom; Laura Mason shows potential as a female vampire but is underused. **1/2 out of 4.

I'm one of the few people around who can still recall seeing first release Bowery Boy movies. I was eleven years old when this one hit the silver screen. I can recall laughing until I cried when the monsters began appearing. Any hard core Bowery boy enthusiast recalls the wonderful job done by Leo Gorcy, who played "Slip" Mahoney and Huntz Hall who played "Satch". They played off each other perfectly and their on screen characterization of a pair of gang members from the mid century Bowery made the comedy that much sweeter. I can't recall seeing a Bowery Boys movie that I didn't like. Some were better than others, but my buddies and I would have walked to the next town to see any of their movies. Oddly enough, Leo Gorcy died quite young without much money. He passed away in 1969 at about 52 years of age. Huntz Hall on the other hand lived to be about 80 years old and passed away in 1999. He apparently was quite well off, having owned a 10% interest in the Bowery Boys and having made some very profitable oil and gas investments. I owe a lot of happy hours to these two fine actors from the early years of movie comedy.

I don't know if I was laughing with "The Bowery Boys Meet the Monsters" or if I was laughing at it. A little of bit of both I guess. Either way I did laugh quite a bit during this movie. Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall are in pretty good form, as is the rest of the cast. There is also a strangely attractive Laura Mason around to help things out. "...Meet the Monsters" isn't the best Bowery Boys movies but it's not the worst either. Overall, I enjoyed the hour I spent with the Boys.

One of the last bowery boys films with all three gorceys; the next year, dad gorcey (bernard) would die in a car accident. And leo would take a break from acting. Brother david did make a couple more bowery films, with huntz hall taking the lead. Keep an eye out for ellen corby, probably best known for waltons, or sabrina. In the story, when the local kids need a place to play ball, slip and sach visit a creepy house to ask permission for using their empty lot. Robots, monsters, suspense. The usual clever word play as slip mixes his metaphors and tries to appear extra smart. Paul wexler is the tall, creepy, butler grissom; laura mason is francine. It's fun and silly and campy. The guest stars get more air time than usual in this one. Directed by ed bernds, who directed a bunch of the bowery films. Leo gorcey and paul wexler both died quite young.

This movie is a riot. I think that Sach is a very funny man, and that Leo Gorcey/Huntz Hall were as funny a team as any of them. Personally, I think the Bowery Boys are funnier than The Three Stooges, Though I enjoy them to. in this movie, there is a commotion in almost every scene. and I think that the Bowery Boys add their own flavor to things. Actually, I favor the Bowery Boys over Abbott and Costello as well. My two favorite teams are the Bowery Boys and Martin and Lewis. Too bad they never made a movie together. That would have been fun. Aside from this movie, I also loved the 'Navy' movie the Bowery Boys made. Just hilarious. A commotion in every scene. My kind of movie.

THE BOWERY BOYS MEET THE MONSTERS was the highest grossing film of the entire series, widely screened to this very day, inspired by Abbott and Costello. Since A & C were doing some wild things with monsters, why not? In all fairness, the gag was all about an eccentric family, much like tv's the Addams Family, although there was a robot and a gorilla on the loose.

In fact, tall and dark Paul Wexler, who plays Grissom, the butler, may have been an inspiration for the Addams Family's Lurch character. Veteran actress Ellen Corby has some funny scenes, playing a batty grandma-type who tends to her "plants." There's also a man-eating tree that wraps its lips around Sach while Slip is shouting out one hilarious malaprop after another. The kooky family's name is Gravesend, who own property that Slip and Sach would like to use for a ballpark for kids. John Dehner and Lloyd Corrigan play mad doctors who have plans for Sach, eventually turned into a wolfman. Last but not least, actress Laura Mason, a dead ringer for Vampira, makes a fine female vampire lurking about the house.

Director Edward Bernds attributed the huge success of this film to the supporting cast. He said the cast was filled with seasoned actors which prompted Leo Gorcey and Huntz Hall to go the extra mile, adding more material and ad libs to the script.

Originally released in the summer (1954), but has been a Halloween fave forever. Best line department: Ellen Corby holds Louie at gunpoint. "It would be a pity to shoot you, Mr. Dumbrowski. You're under the LEGAL SIZE."

Remastered by Warner Brothers in several dvd box sets, generally containing six to eight episodes. The color covers are beautifully remastered from original movie posters. Thanks to TCM for running these oldies on Saturdays.