Again, sorry I’m late putting this one up.
Okay, so, ‘The Corpse Vanishes.’ This is a minor little horror film starring the great Bela Lugosi. It’s the standard plot of the mad scientist who keeps himself (or in this case, his wife) young by taking the life juice (or some such thing; the film is pretty vague on this point). To that end, he knocks out brides with a special orchid at the altar then steals their bodies with the help of his motley group of henchmen. Why he picks the most conspicuous time possible to steal them is never brought up, nor why he only targets brides. You’d think a handy prostitute would work just as well and be easier to steal without alerting the entire city. Anyway, a very insensitive young reporter is now on his trail, and of course he targets her, because she’s the heroine. She randomly falls in love with a doctor and Bela’s ill treatment of his henchmen comes back to bite him. The heroes really don’t do anything constructive at all. It’s a very bad movie, of course; I’d probably rate it the third worst one they’ve done so far, just above ‘Women of the Prehistoric Planet’ and ‘Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy’ (see below for a new feature; the film quality list, which lists the actual relative quality of the movies watched).
Again we open with ‘Commando Cody’ and again, it’s pretty fun, even if it is pretty lame. God, I love serials! Really, if you ever get the chance, go check out ‘the Crimson Ghost,’ or ‘Mysterious Dr. Satan,’ or especially ‘Captain Marvel.’ You won’t be disappointed!
Anyway, host segment wise, again nothing too great here; Crow’s haircut segment is pretty amusing, as is some of their discussions about celebrity robots they’re reading about in the magazines, but nothing that really grabbed me.
Thoughts while watching:
Again open with the Mads. I got to say, Dr. Earhart kind of wears on me; his high voice and slightly over-blown mannerisms tend to annoy me more than amuse me. Josh Weinstein isn’t bad, but he’s definitely no Frank.
Joel’s invention here is pretty funny, and was actually the very first invention in the original pilot, which has long since been lost.
The Mads’ invention is pretty funny.
No bots until the theater again.
Servo’s singing the credits is pretty good.
Another Cody serial! And we get to see the stock footage from ‘Captain Marvel’ again, just to annoy us again.
I like Servo’s assertion that the entire camera crew was annihilated ‘but they got the shot.’
Incidentally, the ending to the cliffhanger is that they go down another passageway. Could that be any more anticlimatic?
Yeah, the evil moon men with vastly superior technology have practically found our ship, do you think we should go back to earth now?
Okay, that’s an awkward place for a radio; the moon-man cranking it up looks…. You’ll see what I mean if you ever see the serial. Modest ladies may wish to avert their eyes here.
Crow and Servo’s ‘fashion show’ lines are pretty funny.
“It looks like the Macy’s parade gone awry,” – Servo
I love how they have gangsters working with aliens. Does it get more awesome than that? (well, if the aliens weren’t just guys in cowls, maybe).
“Just keep turning and switching knobs until we’re down,” – Servo
So, to protect and greet the returning astronauts, they have two cops?
Hah! Servo tries to sneak off! Or something; he comments about how he ‘just wants to get noticed by all the babes.’
“Hey, you almost lost him in that last edit,” – Crow
Lame as this one is, I’ll say it again; I love serials. Even poorer ones like this are usually pretty fun.
First Host Segment. Is it just me or is this a little earlier than usual? Crow and Servo discuss celebrity robots. “Here’s Data’s spread-sheet,” It’s pretty amusing, but goes on a little long for my tastes.
“A corpse is a horse of corpse of corpse,” – Joel
The guy playing the husband is looking directly at the camera; they even comment on it.
The bride suddenly dropping dead is so random that it’s funny.
Bela Lugosi! Of course most famous for Dracula and other classic horror movies. God he was fun to watch; no matter what movie he was in, he gave it his all.
Joel says it well; “What a sensitive pair,” the old guy jokes, the woman reporter (presumably our heroine) is nothing short of gleeful at the story.
Naughty riff; Lady: “We want protection,” Joel: “You should have talk with your daughter about that earlier,” Yikes!
Girl: “You’re making much ado about nothing!”
Crow: “Hey, I thought Shakespeare wrote that?”
Cripes these reporters are cold!
Bride (trying to reassure her mother): “You should forget all that silly nonsense about those brides dropping dead!”
Hey, is this the first ‘he seemed like a nice enough guy…at first!’ gag?
Okay, brides are dropping like flies, so let’s put on the strange orchid given anonymously?
And the bride is dead.
And all the reporters can think of is what a great picture they got. And she’s supposed to be our heroine? I think we’ve spent enough time with her to make it official.
Ah, the old ‘flaming car to distract/divert cops’ trick. Works every time.
“Yeah, but don’t bother putting it out,” – Crow on the flaming car.
By the way, the silhouettes look kind of highlighted here; a few episodes later they would be colored green, maybe it began here.
Are there really that many huge, creepy mansions in the country? Because I want one if there are.
“Evil henchman Mike,” – Joel.
Is it just me or is that the exact same laboratory from ‘Mad Monster’?
“Now you might feel a little sting…” *Shriek!!* “Okay, a big sting,” – Crow
One of Lugosi’s specialties was as evil, but nevertheless sympathetic mad scientists. That’s basically what he’s playing here; he gets some genuine sympathy from his devotion to his wife, even though he kills people for it.
Second Host Segment; a game of tag. Not particularly funny, but we get to see Joel running down the hallway to the theater.
I agree with Servo; I like those skirts too. Don’t like the girl too much, but the skirt is nice.
I think we just met out hero. I like Joel and the Bots joining in the introductions.
Lugosi has a lot of different henchmen; hunchback, midget, creepy witch-lady, the works.
Lugosi plays it up on the organ! Doesn’t get much cooler!
God, I love Lugosi; why did he have to lose his career and die?
I don’t care how bad the weather is; if a creepy mad scientist with an odd accent invites you to stay the night in an old mansion, DON’T ACCEPT!!
“She’s got legs and she knows how to use them!” – Joel as Lugosi.
“This is much better than my old passage through the sock drawer,” – Servo as Lugosi
“I’ve got to go back here and talk to the lion and the witch,” – Servo as Lugosi enters a wardrobe
How many variants of the ‘You must have been dreaming’ line has there been over the years? Probably thousands by the time this movie was made.
“Maybe they could douse him with something flammable and then hold a candle to him,” – Crow
Very long and tedious basement sequence where we can’t tell who’s following who.
Another Host segment already! Maybe it’s just the movie isn’t holding my interest very much. Crow cuts Joel’s hair. Tom is still reading the magazine from segment 2. Crow randomly goes into a description of a clown massacre “Gasoline and Clown white all over the road,” It’s not the funniest segment, but it is mildly amusing.
I love Joel dusting our hero’s shirt off!
So, she knows he might have been hypnotized but nevertheless tells him her secret information?
Joel keeps cleaning our hero’s shirt! And the editor! Now he’s got a big push-broom!
Pseudo science; did you know that glands determine all appearance and development.
Our heroine is so stiff she fails utterly to get any humor out of her Freudian slip.
Reporter: “Business before pleasure,”
Joel: “You think it’d be a pleasure to dance with him?”
Ah, Lugosi…
Ah, the old ‘we trap him by surrounding the area with guards.’ When has that ever worked at any time in film history?
God, they are acting so obviously like police! You’re supposed to be tricking the villain, you idiots!
Hero proposes to heroine in the middle of the phony wedding. He’s known her for about a week at the most. I really over think this romance stuff, don’t I?
Heroine easily tricked and captured, villain outsmarts police. Anyone surprised?
So, the policeman misses and hits the midget? What was he aiming for, Bela’s knees? Either way, he’s a pretty poor shot.
Heroine about to be drained by villain. Tension? Zero.
VERY oblique depiction of a stabbing. Witch-lady turns on Bela for not caring about her two henchmen sons.
Wife: “Your hand is unsteady!”
Servo: “Of course it’s unsteady I’ve just been stabbed by a second rate character actress,”
This doesn’t make our heroes look much better; basically they win because the villains turned on each-other and were generally incompetent.
Final Host Segment; good-thing, bad thing about the movie. Servo’s head explodes trying to think of a good thing about the movie. First time!
Film quality list so far (Best film to worst film)
1. The Crawling Eye
2. Mad Monster
3. The Corpse Vanishes
4. Women of the Prehistoric Planet
5. Robot vs. the Aztec Mummy (although personally I enjoyed it a lot more than ‘Prehistoric Planet’)
Final Rating: 5/10
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