Official Score = 1 1/2 Devils[/caption]Over the last few years, since I have been really begun delving deeper in to movies then I would have ever gone before, I have started watching these really great black and white movies, and you know what? I have found that I really like them!
Now I mention this for two reasons. The first reason that I mention this is that another interesting fact about movie goers that I am slowly beginning to realize is that a lot of movie fans primarily (but often not exclusively) tend to gravitate toward the movies that and styles of movie that they grew up watching when they were kids!
A great example of this is that I knew a guy who I was talking with about movies, and he was talking about all of these great movies from the new millennium that he just thought were truly fantastic (and I have to admit that more than a few he had mentioned genuinely were quite fun,) but at the time I was deeply involved in the works of Bela Lugosi, and trying to talk to him about it was going right over his head! (Of course there was a few that he was talking about that were going over my head as well.)
Now if you’re a fan of old black and white horror or science fiction movies then the other reason I mention the above is because I recently watched a kick ass classic black and white horror movie called, The Vampire (1957)!
Written by: Pat Fielder (The Monster That Challenged The World) & Directed by: Paul Landres (Daktari). Starring: John Beal (Amityville 3-D), Coleen Gray (The Killing), Kenneth Tobey (The Thing From Another World), Lydia Reed (The Seven Little Foys) and Dabs Greer (Invasion Of The Body Snatchers).
Now, The Vampire, is an interesting tale, you see in a lot of respects, although it does have elements of the, ‘Vampire’, story line, it is really more closely related to the tale of, ‘Dr.Jekyll & Mr. Hyde’.
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Mr. Hyde... The Vampire![/caption]What I mean by this, is that Dr. Paul Beecher (Beal) is a small town Doctor with a quiet little practice where he is liked by his patients and the rest of the community, and is respected with in the scientific community that has set up shop in the small town.
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Dr. Paul Beecher (John Beal) as he is seeing patients... But before he begins to transform in to the man he is going to be... Literally![/caption]One day though Doctor Beecher is called out to the base of operations for the lab that had been set up by Doctor Campbell (Played by: Wood Romoff). You see this solitary Doctor who had developed a drug that was supposed to eventually expand the intellect of mankind… The only problem is that the drug is hideously addictive and every time the person who is addicted to the drug doesn't take it, then the killer that the drug created is awaken (very Jeykll & Hyde, eh?)
Anyway, Doctor Campbell ends up dying, but before he does, he gives Beecher the drugs that he had been taken…. Well Beecher takes them home with him, but when he gets home, Doctor Beecher comes down with a headache and asks his daughter, ‘Betsy’ (Reed) to give him one of his headache pills from his coat pocket, big mistake!
You see the pill that Betsy ends up giving Beecher is the drug that killed Doctor Campbell, and now that Doctor Beecher is addicted, the more he tries not to take the drug, the more his own personal, ‘Mr. Hyde’ will go on his own literally blood thirsty rampage that will end up slowly destroying the Doctor!
Now I have to say that this movie is more of an interesting take on the old, ‘Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde’ premise, I mean there are elements of Vampirism in this movie, (when Beecher changes, he does appear to drink blood through the jugular,) but un like most vampires (who just kind of are vampires,) Beecher’s monster came out because of the drug, and the change was more like changing in to, ‘Mr. Hyde’ then any of the more traditional vampire archetypes that we are used to seeing in Vampire movies even going that far back!
With all of this in mind, this movie is a fun one, and if you like black and white movies, then you should atleast try this movie once!
