The Frozen Ghost

This was the fourth film in Universal's "Inner Sanctum" series and the first one not to be directed by Reginald LeBorg, which could be only one of the reasons that THE FROZEN GHOST, aside from having a terrific title, scores way down low as the least satisfying of these six modest melodramas. This feature's got a competent cast and a few scattered good ideas, but they're only half-baked and just don't rise in the oven.

Lon Chaney plays Alex Gregor, a stage hypnotist who reads people's minds along with the aid of his female assistant and romantic interest, Maura (Evelyn Ankers again). During one of their live clairvoyant acts, "Gregor the Great" (ha!) tries to hypnotize a man from the audience and the subject collapses, stone cold dead. Now Alex thinks he killed the man with his mind and the inner turmoil he feels makes him ripe for a breakdown. There's no better way to relax from your troubles than a nice stay at a friend's wax museum, so Gregor takes up an offer to do just that for awhile. Once he arrives amongst the mannequins, he finds he still retains the power to kill with his eyes, as strange goings-on ensue.

That brief description sounds more interesting than it turns out, because this is a wasted opportunity to utilize a wax museum backdrop for the one and only time in a Universal horror film. Nothing really happens for the hour's running length of this thoroughly average snoozer. Chaney goes through his basic motions once again, and with Harold Young now directing there isn't as much suspense or intrigue as the previous installments managed to cook up under LeBorg. Milburn Stone is pretty good as Gregor's business manager, and pretty Elena Verdugo (the gypsy girl from HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN) is on hand as the darling niece of the museum owner. But once again, it's Martin Kosleck who gets a raw deal as an effectively menacing, knife-wielding stalker. It's just another case where poor Kosleck, perhaps the best thing in the whole picture, gets buried inside yet another of Universal's more mediocre movies. ** out of ****

Another "Inner Sanctum" mystery with Lon Chaney Jr. giving another so-so performance.

Here he plats a mentalist who (he thinks) accidentally kills a man with his mind. It seems the man died of natural causes but he can't shake the feeling. He breaks up with his girlfriend (Evelyn Ankers) and goes to Madame Monet's Wax Museum to relax (!!!). There he thinks he accidentally kills Madame Monet (Tala Birell) with his mind. But the body disappears. What's going on?

It's just OK. It's very well-directed (especially during the opening hypnotic show & the shots of Chaney's feet) and has some pretty good acting by Ankers, Birell and Milburn Stone (as his manager). Also it's nicely atmospheric. But it meanders, there's plenty of padding (even at an hour) and tons of plot holes. Also the final resolution is pretty silly but it DOES fit.

OK undemanding fare.

Lon Chaney, Jr. plays mentalist Gregor the Great, who believes he killed a guy with his psychic powers. Distraught over this, he quits and goes to work at a wax museum (naturally). Things are okay for awhile but then Gregor gets into an argument with a friend and, once again, believes he killed someone with his mind.

The fourth movie in Universal's Inner Sanctum series. Like the other movies, it's a fun B mystery thriller with a good cast. A bit silly at times but that adds to the fun if you're in the right frame of mind. The cast includes Universal regular Evelyn Ankers, Milburn Stone, Martin Kosleck, and Douglas Dumbrille. But the star is Lon Chaney, Jr., whose surly demeanor and sometimes overwrought acting are infinitely entertaining to watch. Not to mention his stylish mustache!

Right in the beginning it seems to be the same old story with spiritualists and fake mediums: 'Gregor the Great' (Lon Chaney Jr.) hypnotizes his beautiful medium Maura (Evelyn Ankers) during his obviously quite successful radio broadcast to read the thoughts of some of the people in the audience. She evades difficult questions, and so a drunkard starts grumbling that it's all a phony - and Gregor accepts the 'challenge', invites him up to the stage and tries to hypnotize him... and the man drops dead!

From now on, although the autopsy proves that the alcoholic died of a perfectly natural heart failure, Gregor is absolutely convinced that he killed the man: he'd wished him dead because he threatened to spoil his radio broadcast, and then he'd hypnotized him and killed him that way - nobody, not even Maura, his fiancée, can get that obsession out of his mind. So his manager George suggests that he should spend some time at Mme. Monet's Wax Museum, a nice, secluded place - with murder scenes made out of wax all around, and a VERY weird young artist, a former plastic surgeon, who talks to the wax figures and is himself obsessed by Mme. Monet's pretty young niece Nina...

This fourth one of the six movies made from the hugely successful radio program "Inner Sanctum" certainly IS scary, a mixture of a murder mystery and a horror movie (Universal Studios were masters at that...); the cast is quite good, Lon Chaney Jr. is once more teamed with Evelyn Ankers (they co-starred in eight movies altogether), and once more seems doomed by a strange kind of fate to do bad, like in "The Wolf Man"... Although "The Frozen Ghost" is nothing too inventive, it's QUITE a treat for fans of the genre!

In spite of its meaningless title, this is one of the better "Inner Sanctums" - though still not exactly a good film. Lon Chaney Jr. is at his most Larry Talbot-like here as a hypnotist constantly bemoaning his fate (thinking he may have killed a drunken and skeptical member of the audience by sheer will-power!). In fact, the opening hypnotism sequence features some unusually odd angles - which is then ruined by the stereotypical (and unfunny) intrusion of Arthur Hoyt as the drunk!!

The plot then contrives to incorporate the well-worn wax museum theme, which results in the establishment of an adequate atmosphere throughout the film (not to mention utilizing its furnace for the effective climax). Besides, it's aided immensely by the presence of Martin Kosleck as the unhinged museum 'curator' (with a secret medical past) and Douglass Dumbrille as the wily investigating detective with a fondness for quoting Shakespeare (there's a section of wax figures devoted to characters from the Bard's work). Once again, the star finds himself in a tug-of-war between three females - Evelyn Ankers (playing the good girl this time, as Chaney's assistant/fiancée), Tala Birell (as the jealous and ageing museum owner) and Elena Verdugo (as Birell's ingénue niece, also desired by Kosleck).