Thiel-a-Vision Review: The Raven (1935)

1/2

Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff star in the 1935 version of The Raven. As was the case with the 1963 film starring Vincent Price, Peter Lorre and Karloff (again), it has virtually nothing to do with Poe's poem.

Instead, Lugosi is a skilled surgeon with a Poe fixation and a secret dungeon full of working torture devices. Urged to come out of retirement to save the life of a beautiful dancer, he falls in love with his patient, much to the disgust of her father. Lugosi plots revenge with the aid of a fleeing criminal played by Karloff who, coming to the doctor in hopes of receiving a new, kinder-looking visage, is instead transformed into the spitting image of Batman's foe Two-Face.

Lugosi's a lot of fun in this one, cackling with ghoulish glee as he metes out punishments on the rest of the cast. He's certainly credible as a batshit crazy dilettante whose great joy is crushing people to death. I only wish that his accent wasn't so damned hard to understand; it's one of the main reasons he never became the matinee idol he believed he should have been.

The best thing about The Raven is that it's only an hour long. I don't mean that in a cynical manner; it's refreshing to see a film that gets to business right away and shuffles off the stage before it has a chance to wear out its welcome.

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Ratings Guide
Zero What the hell were they thinking? Even Ed Wood was more entertaining.
1/2 Dear God in Heaven. Probable involvement of Jerry Bruckheimer and Michael Bay.
Seriously shit. Based upon a Saturday Night Live skit.
1/2 Mildly crap. Eddie Murphy made another family comedy.
It's not good. It's not bad. It's just there.
1/2 Has its moments. A bonus half star for a particularly cool robot or perky breast.
Solid entertainment. Exploding robots and/or multiple bare breasts.
1/2 As good as most movies can hope to achieve. May include full-frontal nudity.
Like Mary Poppins herself, practically perfect in every way.

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