Return Of The Ape Man!

When is an "ape man" not an "ape man"? When that "ape man" appears in the 1944 flicker Return of the Ape Man. This is one of those delightfully awful movies from the poverty row side of Hollywood and it stars Bela Lugosi, John Carrdine and George Zucco (almost). The final name appears only momentarily in the movie, but was taken ill and replaced by a bloke named Frank Moran.

Moran plays the title role, but alas is only an ancient caveman and not anything really much like an ape. From some of the dialogue and even the movie's title card one gets the sense a different creature was intended. Moran is mildly menacing at times, but hardly an "ape man".

He was defrosted from some Arctic ice by scientists Lugosi and Carradine who went looking specifically for a cave man in ice. Now it's worth pointing out that this movie has no apparent connection to the earlier Lugosi effort titled The Ape Man.

Lugosi's scientist is properly mad and murderous and ends up dissolving his partnership with the much more easygoing Carradine in the most macabre manner. There are some younger folks to fill in as hero and heroine, but the story is hapless from the get-go with plot holes easily fixed which were not. The scenes are all on stages aside from some images of glaciers falling apart and the scenes are just dumb. Almost as dumb as the police, who will shoot at nearly anything at anytime. You'd almost think Ed Wood had something to do with this mess.

But that said, I found a few things here and there to hang some fun on. If you can see this one for free, it's worth a fan's time, but don't pay much for it unless you're obsessive like I am.

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