Calling Dr. Death (LeBorg 1943)

For the record, I never had any intention of turning reviews of Lon Chaney Jr./Universal Studio films into an ongoing series, much like I have never really had any specific plans for this site overall. But here I am again, this time looking at the film Calling Dr. Death (LeBorg 1943), and much like Man Made Monster (1941), Calling Dr. Death is not a particularly great film.

That said, the film is a significant departure from the Chaney Jr./Universal films previously reviewed on the site, with Calling Dr. Death being a mystery rather than a horror film. The film is based on the radio series Inner Sanctum Mysteries which ran from 1941-1952, featuring stories of murder, horror and suspense. Coincidentally enough, I listened to an episode of the series a month or two ago, and the program certainly has its charms, with a spooky-but-campy atmosphere, and some fun host banter to bookend the episode. Unfortunately, none of those charms are on display in Calling Dr. Death. The film is a straightforward mystery, directed by Reginald LeBorg in a perfunctory manner from a screenplay by Edward Dein.

The film concerns psychologist Dr. Mark Steel (Chaney Jr.), a man trapped in a loveless marriage to a woman who is openly having affairs with other men while refusing Steel a divorce. Steel’s frustrations are only exacerbated by the romantic feelings shared between him and his nurse Stella (Patricia Morison), who is seemingly his only confidant. One weekend, Mark discovers his wife has taken off, and he heads out to find her. When he wakes up in his office Monday morning, he discovers that he has no memory of the weekend, and that his wife has been brutally murdered. While his wife’s lover is the prime suspect, Mark is convinced of the man’s innocence, because Steel is convinced that he himself is the murderer. With no evidence however, Steel sets about trying to solve the crime and save the man, even if it means revealing himself as the killer in the process.

There is nothing about Calling Dr. Death that is particularly interesting, including its failings, which are little more than the typical problems with most murder mysteries, from an easily deduced killer, to giant plot holes and lapses in logic. If the film has a problem that is particular to itself, it is the use of voice over to convey the “voices” in Mark’s head. Along with being overused, the voice over never successfully conveys the idea that Mark is suffering from any form of psychosis, as the bulk of it is little more than Mark moaning on about how pathetic he is. He may be slightly depressed, but there is never any indication from the voice over that Mark is truly suffering from any serious mental issues.


If there is anything fascinating in the film at all, it is mainly the work of star Lon Chaney Jr., who continues to astound me as I work my way through his films for having a star image that is completely defined by weakness. In every film I have watched Chaney Jr. in thus far, the characters he has played have been essentially powerless men, unable to take action and constantly at the mercy of others. As Mark Steel, we see Chaney Jr. playing the weakest character I have seen him take on yet, accomplishing little and being attacked from all sides. Unfortunately, this does not make for a particularly fascinating character, and since there is no doubt from the beginning as to whether or not Mark is or is not guilty, it is impossible to care about anything that happens over the course of the film.

Calling Dr. Death is only available as part of the “Inner Sanctum Mysteries” DVD collection from Universal, the remaining films of which I have yet to review. On its own, I cannot recommend the film as a worthwhile dip into the Universal catalogue, and as a start to the series, Calling Dr. Death does not hold out much promise for the rest of the films to come. Still, with five more films to go, we shall see if the “Inner Sanctum Mysteries” film series improves, and has any cinematic value as a whole.

Man Made Monster (Waggner 1941)

Earlier this year, I finally watched The Wolf Man, the 1941 horror classic from director George Waggner which featured Lon Chaney Jr. in the title role. While I had some reservations about the film as a whole, it was an ambitious and striking work, thematically complex and an interesting critique of the pressures of patriarchy and traditional conceptions of masculinity.

So when I heard that there was another film from the same year directed by George Waggner with Chaney Jr. in the lead, I was excited to say the least. Unfortunately, Man Made Monster is far from the heights set by The Wolf Man. Instead of a bold an ambitious film, Man Made Monster is a poorly conceived riff on the Frankenstein story, borrowing the broad strokes of the tale and “updating” it for the pre-atomic era. The end result is a film whose sole value is as a camp classic when viewed ironically.

Man Made Monster opens with a bus crash into an electricity tower, which kills five of the six passengers. The lone survivor is Dan McCormick (Chaney Jr.), a carnival showman who comes out completely unscathed despite the high amounts of electricity. This bit of luck attracts the attention of a leading scientist named Dr. Lawrence (Samuel S. Hinds), who working on a bio-electrical theory. Dr. Lawrence invites Dan into his home with the idea of studying Dan’s “immunity” to electricity, an offer Dan is more than happy to accept given that he is temporarily out of work. Dr. Lawrence’s colleague, Dr. Rigas (Lionel Atwill) however sees Dan as the perfect subject to test out his more extreme ideas about creating powerful electrically run beings, and sets about a clandestine set of experiments to transform Dan into one of his new electrical men

With a running time of only an hour, Man Made Monster moves at a rapid pace, and the film suffers as a result. The characterisation is rudimentary at best, with characters fitting into only the most basic of archetypes, if that. Only Chaney Jr. is given anything of real value to play in the film as Dan, the dim but loveable victim of Dr. Rigas. A scene late in the film where Dan is under psychological evaluation is given more effort from Chaney Jr. than the scene deserves, managing to bring out some legitimate pathos out of the proceedings. Atwill unfortunately does not fare near as well, with his mad scientist character existing as little more than a plot device designed to deliver poorly written exposition and even worse villainous monologues.

Blame for the shoddy writing falls on the shoulders of George Waggner himself, who wrote the film under the alias of Joseph West. While Waggner does manage to fare better in his direction of the film, Waggner the writer manages to undermine Waggner the director at numerous points thanks to the endless exposition. All too often, particularly in the final third of the film, characters stand about and deliver said exposition while watching events that we the audience are never made privy to, or even in scenes that audience is allowed to see. During the film’s climax, various characters stand around and describe what the monstrous Dan is doing rather than actually doing anything to help the situation, even though they are the characters who are supposed to be intervening.

Man Made Monster does have its charms however, a few of them legitimate. From time to time, Waggner does manage to creating some striking imagery, particularly during a montage scene showing the passage of time leading to a character’s execution date. The effects utilized to realize Dan in his monstrous state are effective, and the film does manage to have a bit of fun mocking psychoanalysis in a manner Alfred Hitchcock would have loved. However, the film is more memorable for its unintended humour, from the laughably bad science (electrical immunity? Really?) to what is perhaps one of the worst “man was not meant to play God” speeches I have heard in quite some time.

As a film likely made to fulfill a production quota, Man Made Monster is hardly the worst film to come out of the Classic Hollywood era. It is however a below average genre piece that would have been a welcome target for mockery on Mystery Science Theater 3000. While hard core genre fans will likely want to see the film, anyone else interested in seeing a science gone wrong film would be best to look elsewhere.