Before diving into this next review, there are a few points to be aware of, first this movie is over 4-hours in length, I know it’s crazy but allow me to explain, as one needs to understand that it was released in 1939; the greatest year in Hollywood’s history. Therefore, a trip to way back to yesteryear is needed, in 1939 the average movie ticket cost .20 cents, and Hollywood released over 370 films in this one year, there was no internet, less than .5% of US households had televisions (valued at $9,200 for 12-inch B&W in 2023), in other words nonexistent, an average person would go to the movies on Saturdays to see a serial chapter, two features, animated short, and newsreel; most of the nation had ‘blue laws’ which meant businesses would be closed on Sundays. In this one year on average 80–million tickets would sell each week and if adjusted for inflation Hollywood – the large, small, and minuscule studios would never again see this much profit in a year as it would total at $19.8 billion. Hence, it brings us back to what is a serial, it’s essentially a great marketing tool to lock in audiences, a film could have as many parts as it wants in various lengths and finish each week with a cliffhanger, making you want to come back next week to see the continuation of the story and become lost in fantasy or swept away in a romance, and fearful from the horror, all in all an escapism from the harsh realities of life. The playing of serials had to conduct themselves with certain set of rules such as play each chapter in order, and have play all week long, and not showing more than one part of a movie, i.e. couldn’t play part 3 and 4 back-to-back.

Therefore, The Phantom Creeps is a twelve-chapter science-fiction horror serial; that spliced together now as one feature, though while watching you might think you were drunk as scenes and lines often repeat themselves, that exactly does happen and to better understand it recall Friday the 13th Part 2 [1981] shows a scene from Friday the 13th [1980] in beginning as to remind the audience. This serial was Universal’s 112th film made and would go on to become 44th adapted to DC’s Movie Comics #6, which lent itself to embrace early forms of cross-over merchandising. One needs to point out that two versions of the film exists, the first is 265-minutes long and features all 12-parts, the other version was thoroughly edited to a mere 78-minutes in 1949 to prepare for both a feature movie and viewing-options on television. Bela Lugosi (Dracula [1931]) was the star of this film, and it was also his fifth and final serial that was produced for Universal. Lugosi was at a desperate stage in his career where he would accept any role offered to him, however this was a double-edged sword while he got work since Hollywood casting agents knew he give them the villain they needed, with full conviction and emphasis on powerful line delivery, but the productions were extremely low and hence contributed to lower pay which affected his personal life. Although, not was all grim as this serial was released on January 7, 1939 his “comeback film” Son of Frankenstein [1939] was released six-days later. The film was director by Ford Beebe and Saul A. Goodkind, who both would later go on to direct The Invisible Man Returns in 1944, who used a story from Wyllis Cooper, a radio writer/producer of horror-mystery tales, and developed into a script by George H. Plympton, Basil Dickey, and Mildred Barish.

In addition, for the curious, here are the 12 serial or film chapter titles: 1. The Menacing Power, 2. Death Stalks the Highways, 3. Crashing Towers, 4. Invisible Terror, 5. Thundering Rails, 6. The Iron Monster, 7. The Menacing Mist, 8. Trapped in the Flames, 9. Speeding Doom, 10. Phantom Footprints, 11. The Blast, 12. To Destroy the World.

Dora Clement, Robert Kent, and Edwin Stanley

The story starts convincing, remembering as this needs to capture the attention of the viewers, hence a powerful origin foundation is required of Dr. Alex Zorka (Bela Lugosi) a scientist with vast ideas and grandiose ambition, so much that ultimately desires rule not only the planet but the entire universe. He doesn’t think or do anything on the small scale, his inventions have granted incredible strengths from an iron robot to exploding mechanical spiders, even invisibility belt, almost sounds like something that arise in late 1960s from The Wild Wild West series. Zorka powers come from well-guarded meteorite, his amass of diabolical weapons shall be used to attempt to thwart those bent on stopping him and his corrupt thirst for total domination. He has an escaped convict, Monk (Jack C. Smith) though appears wry of his boss’ intentions and easier terrorized. By Chapter Three, multiple struggles erupt, Zorka’s wife Ann (Dora Clement) and his former colleague Dr. Mallory (Edwin Stanley) want him to turn the of control the devices and the meteorite to United States government and away from foreign spies. Mallory alerts Captain Bob West (Robert Kent) of the Department of Military Intelligence as everyone seems to be keenly away of the mad doctor’s mindset, the storyline is very skim in the conveyance of information. One of weapons that is memorable for all the wrong reason is the Huge Robot,  which was a cumbersome costume for actor Ed Wolff (Return of The Fly [1959]), who was professional freak show performer that successfully transferred to Hollywood and dotted his career by portraying monsters in the landscape of horror and sci-fi flicks.

Jack C. Smith and Bela Lugosi

There’s a great line reference to Dracula [1931] where one character states he despises going to Zorka’s house at night, that subtle humor works wonders in a fairly dry delivery of dialogue with intermixed scene of action. The serial contains quite a lot of car and aerial crashes which often stock footage, and very few shootouts and fistfights, though a very good cliffhanger occurs at the end of Chapter Six involving The Robot crushing an individual under its heavily-weighted foot. It is by Chapter Seven that repetition has started setting into the storyline, with fragments of various pursuit sequences that some attempt to become creative yet are often stock footage. Chapter Eleven ends with a cataclysmic destruction fills the screen just one issue it’s from The Vanishing Shadow (1934). Finally, by the final chapter, one witnesses an exciting conclusion, especially if you can recall the full story and characters of the previous 3-and-half hours, noting all the excessive padding.

Let’s attempt to peel back several layers and examine the guts of this production, first there’s plenty of stock footage usage, which keeps the cost to bare necessity, the editors were on raiding party grabbing all sorts of images from both films and newsreels mixing both fantasy and real life combined it to a disjointed story. Aside from that, this purely a film for Bela to excel at, his actions of the screen are classic in form, swinging glee to passionate anger is fun to watch, accompanied by a wide-ranging spectrum of facial looks, that reminds one of Dwight Frye (Frankenstein [1931]). There were several secondary actors to Bela’s lead that carried their roles well, a refreshing role came from Dorothy Arnold (The House of Fear [1939]) as Jean, who didn’t act as a wisecracking news reporter, that was the stereotypical performance for women in the portraying that job in the 1930s; see Mystery of the Wax Museum [1933].

Dorothy Arnold, Anthony Averill, Jerry Frank, Edwin Stanley, Forrest Taylor, and-Regis Toomey

As for the sets obvious cheapness is shown, as the laboratory scene have various bubbling test-tubes and scientific equipment laying haphazardly about all to present an illusion of importance. This leads one to the limited special effects aren’t too convincing epically when Zorka dons the invisibility belt and his shadow is casted on the screen, this definitely isn’t The Invisible Man [1933], we can clearly see him opening doors hence ruins those scenes. Also, commonly serials used stock music cues for the production, since it was Universal the music chosen was primarily from Fraz Waxman’s Bride of Frankenstein [1935].

The Phantom Creeps definitely isn’t scary, no jump scares, it is very tame for nowadays audiences, and those likely to watch all four hours will be Lugosi fans, as there’s plenty to laugh about the absolute silliness but yet the opportunity to revisit the past is always important. As for a mad scientist movie it is thoroughly unconvincing and lacks in many areas, yet still has an old b-movie charm, and was briefly noted in Candy Corn [2019] proving the relevance for it exists in new filmmakers.  Honestly how many readers have ever seen or in fact ever heard about a serial, very few I estimate, and hence when I saw this on the Visions of Horror I was curious as I thought at first it was the 1949 version but a quick look at the runtime and was clear what I was embarking on for an afternoon of entertainment, therefore simply ask yourselves are you curious enough to venture down this odd path in the horror genre’s past…

TAGLINES:

• ..SMASHING…DASHING DYNAMITE! 12 spine-shivering chapters of thunderbolt action and amazing adventure!
• A BLAZE OF DYNAMITE ACTION! Crashing…smashing…dashing through 12 spine-shivering chapters!
• 12 SPINE-SHIVERING ACTION THUNDERBOLTS! Sinister scientists…foreign spies…federal agents…and a pretty girl…crashing through amazing adventures!

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0031796/

IMDb Rating: 4.7/10

Baron’s Rating: 4.0/10

You can see the full movie here: