Phantom, The (1931)
* (out of 4)
1931 gave us horror classics like Dracula, FRANKENSTEIN and DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE so it's understandable why something like THE PHANTOM has long been forgotten. A man is on his way to death in the electric chair when he jumps over a wall onto a train, which then has a plane come down, pick him up and take him away. He threatens to kill the man who sent him away at the strike of midnight and soon, inside that man's house, the mysterious "Phantom" starts to strike. This entry into the "old dark house" genre is the perfect example of a bad sound film. I'm not sure what the budget of this thing was but it's clear they really couldn't afford to do too much as everything here is quite poor. The screenplay is just a rip of THE BAT and THE CAT AND THE CANARY type of film (both were remade in 1930) and the acting is at times rather atrocious. Allene Ray plays the female "love interest" here and it didn't shock me to read that this turned out to be her final picture. A star of serials in the silent era, her voice and acting certainly didn't go over too well in talkies and I must admit that she might give one of the worst performances I've seen here. Other members of the cast are equally bad and that includes Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. Silent fans might find interest in seeing D.W. Griffith regular Wilfred Lucas and Sheldon Lewis from that "other" version of DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE released in 1920. I've seen a rather large share of films from this genre and this here is without question near the bottom of the barrel. Even if the performances had been better there wouldn't have been any way to get around the bland screenplay and the all around cheapness of the film.
* (out of 4)
1931 gave us horror classics like Dracula, FRANKENSTEIN and DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE so it's understandable why something like THE PHANTOM has long been forgotten. A man is on his way to death in the electric chair when he jumps over a wall onto a train, which then has a plane come down, pick him up and take him away. He threatens to kill the man who sent him away at the strike of midnight and soon, inside that man's house, the mysterious "Phantom" starts to strike. This entry into the "old dark house" genre is the perfect example of a bad sound film. I'm not sure what the budget of this thing was but it's clear they really couldn't afford to do too much as everything here is quite poor. The screenplay is just a rip of THE BAT and THE CAT AND THE CANARY type of film (both were remade in 1930) and the acting is at times rather atrocious. Allene Ray plays the female "love interest" here and it didn't shock me to read that this turned out to be her final picture. A star of serials in the silent era, her voice and acting certainly didn't go over too well in talkies and I must admit that she might give one of the worst performances I've seen here. Other members of the cast are equally bad and that includes Guinn "Big Boy" Williams. Silent fans might find interest in seeing D.W. Griffith regular Wilfred Lucas and Sheldon Lewis from that "other" version of DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE released in 1920. I've seen a rather large share of films from this genre and this here is without question near the bottom of the barrel. Even if the performances had been better there wouldn't have been any way to get around the bland screenplay and the all around cheapness of the film.