These are the TALONS of The Vampire Bat
At first glance The Vampire Bat has all the trappings of a lost horror gem. Great cast, wondrous sets, thrilling plot of a bat serially draining the blood from neighboring townspeople. But. Yes, there’s usually a but thrown in, isn’t there?
The sets will look overly familiar as they are rented out from Universal. You see, The Vampire Bat is a Majestic picture, and again it’s likely you haven’t heard of them. But know they are a Poverty Row studio, so frills are not part of their style.
The plot starts out great and for the first twenty or so minutes the aura of a lost gem sustains itself, even growing a bit. But sadly the momentum can’t be maintained. It’s pretty clear early on who didn’t do it. As hard as The Vampire Bat tries, we all know that Herman (played wonderfully by Dwight Frye) isn’t the culprit. It’s only slightly less challenging to figure out who is the murderer, though why is a bit….amusing.
The cast is the one main component which does hold up. Melvyn Douglas is “Inspector” Karl in one of his earliest roles. He’s surely worth more than running down cases in this backwater of a town however. Lionell Atwill (who, along with Fay Wray, were quickly contracted to do this picture during a short gap between two other pictures) is admirable as always as Dr. Otto, with a great mix of brooding menace and fatherly wisdom. Fay Wray is, well, Fay Wray. She doesn’t have much to do but look good here and she’s strong in that area.
The real but unheralded star of the film is Dwight Frye as Herman, the man initially thought to be the murderer. He’s played delightfully as a bit of a ‘special adult,’ as there is clearly something off mentally about the chap. Toss in his love of bats and blood and you’ve got a real frame-up. It’s only when a torch toting mob (nicely hand tinted in the restored version on Filmstruck now) chases him to his death that we officially know he’s not the one. Look for Frye’s portrayal of pure terror as he’s chased and cornered at a cliff where he finally jumps to his death, only shortly later on to have a stake driven through his heart for good measure.
Maude Eburn plays Otto’s housemate Aunt Gussie. Her character is mostly fluff and was perhaps meant to lighten the mood of the picture as she’s always on the verge of being humorous, mostly with her hypochondria. Sadly after a few minutes she becomes very wearying and probably should have been cut from the picture but that would have reduced an already very short running time.
Given that Majestic apparently spent most of their budget on sets and cast, there clearly wasn’t anything left to be “the monster.” Dr. Otto is apparently stealing (yes, I’ve spoiled it, I know) blood to feed his monster. The monster, if one could call him that, looks like a sponge in an aquarium. It actually looks more like a piece of pumice, but it ‘breathes’ so that’d make perhaps even less sense.
The Vampire Bat starts off well but unfortunately can’t shrug off its Poverty Row birth, though it’s short enough to be palatable if your a completist of one of the stars.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYv8vW5xuwo[/embedyt]