Session: Pre-Code 1932 Horror on Tap, Week 3
Movie: Doctor X (1932)
Directed by Michael Curtiz
As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL
Plot:
A cannibalistic serial killer is stalking New York, and the evidence points to Dr. Xavier's medical academy. The police and the press want answers, but the good doctor wants to conduct his own investigation. Hilarity ensues.
Reaction:
I kind of had false expectations going into this. My only familiarity with Dcotor X was from the line in the Rocky Horror sountrack, "Doctor X will build a creature." So I was expecting some kind of Frankenstein-type story, and this wasn't it. So perhaps my rating was unfairly biased by that bit of letdown. Having said that, the fact is there was nothing in the plot to stick with me. So I went home afterwards and hardly thought about the movie again. That's a bad sign.
The visuals were great -- especially the use of shadow in the scene wher Xavier performs his experiments to identify the killer. And I did enjoy the technobabble that the scriptwriters used there. It reminded me of Star Trek. But the visuals and technobabble weren't enough to make this movie memorable for me.
Ratings:
Me: 6
Christina: 8.2
Ethan: 7
Sean: 2 out of 4
No fair! You can’t fault the makers of “Doctor X”, if the makers of “Rocky Horror” didn’t know their pre-code horror films! Or maybe “Baron Frankenstein” was simply two syllables longer than “Doctor X”, when it came to writing the lyrics! That said, I just don’t think this era of filmmaking is your cup of tea, just like the ‘80s and beyond is not mine.
ReplyDeleteVery likely Stan Lee recalled this film when he later created Professor Xavier and “The X-Men” in the early days of Marvel Comics. Because a lot of Gold, Atom, and Silver Age comics writing was based on movies those guys saw. …So, I guess Stan the Man remembered the film a lot longer than you did! ��
Yes, it's unfair. And I even noted as much. See the first paragraph under "Reaction." As an aside, I've been thinking of renaming that section for future posts as "My Thoughts." And, yes, you're right -- this era is not generally my thing. In my writeup for "Frogs" last month I noted that my wheelhouse -- if I can be said to have one -- is probably the 1970s.
DeleteAs for Stan Lee, I did note during the class that this was apparently a prequel to the X-Men movies. So, great minds and all that...