– Director: James Hogan
– Writers: Brenda Weisberg, Paul Gangling
– Stars: Turhan Bey, Evelyn Ankers, David Bruce, George Zucco, Robert Armstrong
– Run time: 1 Hour, 6 Minutes
– Amazon Link: https://amzn.to/36sz2I9
Synopsis
The professor explains that the ancient Mayans used to know a lot about poison gas, and they had some very specific uses for theirs. They didn’t use it to kill people, but instead, it turned them into mindless slaves. He’s going to spend the summer break investigating this gas. It seems the Mayans cut out the hearts of sacrifices to bring people back from the death caused by this gas. Dr. Morris asks his student, Ted, to be his assistant during the summer months. Ted is all in for that, but he and the professor must stop and listen to Ted’s fiancée, Isabel, sing on the radio.
The two of them go into the lab and look at a dead monkey. It’s not really dead, it’s just under the effect of the Mayan gas that the professor has reproduced. The gas *will* eventually kill the monkey, but the professor intends to reverse the poison using a chemical derived from the hearts of the dead. They do it; they revive the monkey.
That evening, Ted and Isabel come by Dr. Morris’s house for a visit. Dr. Morris realizes that Isabel has fallen out of love with Ted, and the old doctor quickly tries to move in on her. He asks if he can help her dump him.
The next morning, Ted says he’s going to ask Isabel to marry him later in the afternoon. The doctor, on the other hand, boils up some of the poison gas and tricks Ted into walking into a room full of it. Ted doesn’t die, but he becomes completely suggestible, and he looks like a zombie. Morris tells Ted to forget Isabel.
Morris and Ted head over to the cemetery, and they dig up a body to cut out the heart. The doctor does something with the heart, and sure enough, the next morning, Ted is normal again.
Everything is looking good for the doctor until the test monkey suddenly keels over dead. The antidote is only temporary. Ted doesn’t realize his time is counting down, as he doesn’t really know what happened.
Isobel gets word that Ted is coming to town for a visit, and her new boyfriend, Eric, doesn’t like the idea. Apparently, Morris’s commands to the zombie didn’t quite take, since Ted is still infatuated with her. Just as Ted asks Isabel to marry him, he relapses into his zombie state. He and Morris make a quick trip to this town’s cemetery and knock out the caretaker. They steal his heart instead of digging up a fresh corpse.
Isabel and Morris have dinner, and she explains that she’s involved with Eric. That night, Ted becomes the mad ghoul again. Morris turns Ted against Eric and orders Ted to kill him. Isobel interrupts things, and Morris and Ted drive away and find another cemetery-raised heart.
Meanwhile, the reporter who has been working on the case figures out that for every murder, Isabel has been singing in the same town. There must be some connection. He works it out with the local undertaker to pretend to be a fresh corpse in the next town where Isabel is expected to play. Sure enough, Ted and Morris come in to claim his heart and the reporter sees them. It doesn’t go so well for the reporter.
Now the police get involved, and they’re on to the Isabel connection to the ghoul as well. They question her, and they think Eric is the murderer. She suspects Ted. Ted realizes that his nightmares are real; he remembers everything. Ted mixes up some of the poison gas and wrecks the lab before changing again. Morris comes in and orders Ted to kill Eric, then himself. Ted walks off with a gun and then Morris inhales the gas, freaks out, and runs off.
Isabel and Eric are on stage performing when Ted walks up on stage with a gun. The police, who are in the audience, shoot him dead.
Morris heads to the cemetery and starts digging but dies before he can get a heart.
Commentary
Of all the old Universal films, this is the only one that even remotely comes close to a zombie film. It’s not bad, but it was very predictable. Ted was part zombie, part Jekyll-and-Hyde as he turned back and forth. Overall, this one is mediocre. It’s not really a bad film, just sort of bland.