In short, Amicus’ The House that Dripped Blood is an anthology movie. It uses the vehicle of a house where various horrific things have happened to string together four short stories. All stories were written by the famous Robert Bloch (Psycho among many others).
The House That Dripped Blood
The 2001 film, Thirteen Ghosts, is a remake of the 1960 William Castle film, 13 Ghosts. The two films have the following in common:
That’s pretty much it.
Thir13en Ghosts
The Manitou is, quite frankly, one of the cheesiest monster movies of all time — one of those that’s so bad, you watch it with friends to make fun of it.
The Manitou
The movie begins on a full moon in a graveyard, with two grave robbers robbing Larry Talbot’s tomb. Too bad werewolves don’t die. Larry wakes up in a hospital 40 miles away, with a severe head injury. He later escapes the hospital to find the infamous Dr. Ludwig Frankenstein, only to find out that the doctor had died, but his monster hasn’t.
Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man
Celeste, a Romany princess visits a paranormal museum where the curator Dr. Morris is writing the history of her werewolf mother, Marie LaTour. Shortly after her visit to the museum Dr. Morris is murdered. The police automatically suspect Elsa, his personal assistant. So the deceased Dr. Morris’s son Robert aka Bob, with Elsa’s help investigate what really happened to Dr. Morris.
Cry of the Werewolf
Hammer Films, having made One Million B.C., had all of these leftover sets — what to do with them? Make a very campy, rather silly, “Cavegirls in trouble” film, of course. It’s campy in the style of the 1960’s Batman TV series, only with lots of girls in skimpy fur bikinis. Seriously.
Prehistoric Women
Penniless, Baron Frankenstein returns to his hometown to retrieve whatever items he can to sell … Only to find that they’ve already been taken by the corrupt mayor. The baron and his assistant seek refuge in a cave. With the help of a deaf girl, the Baron and his assistant find the original monster frozen in ice. They revive the creature but need the services of a hypnotist to control it … a hypnotist with ulterior motives.
White Zombie begins with Madeleine Short (Madge Bellamy) arriving in Haiti. She’s there to reunite with her fiancee Neil Parker (John Harron). They are to be married at Charles Beaumont’s plantation. But Charles (Robert Frazer) also loves Madeleine. He goes to ‘Murder’ Legendre (Bela Lugosi). He’s an infamous Haitian voodoo master for a potion. To make her choose Neil over him.
White Zombie
In short, The Gorilla is a “haunted house” mystery. Lionel Atwill’s character is threatened to become the next victim of “The Gorilla” — a serial killer. His niece drops in to visit with her fiance. And she announces that they’ll be married in two days. Adding to the creepiness of the house is the butler, Peters, and Patsy Keller as the easily-frightened maid round out the household staff. Peters is played by Bela Lugosi. He is half the reason to watch the film. As I watched The Gorilla with my children, they were all convinced that he must be doing something villainous … Lionel Atwill has hired detectives–the Ritz Brothers–to safeguard him … despite their comical ineptness.
The Gorilla
The original The Invisible Man was a horror movie, mostly faithful to the original novel by H.G. Wells. The sequel, The Invisible Man Returns starring Vincent Price was equal parts horror movie, romance, and crime story. In contrast, The Invisible Woman is a comedy — a very enjoyable comedy.
The Invisible Woman
