After the trials and tribulations of trying to get this serial, when I finally got a copy from Trev at Downunder DVD, I felt I should highlight it immediately, and since it fits well for Halloween, the timing couldn’t be better.
The serial starts with Professor Arnold (Ralph Morgan) of the Bainbridge Institute, demonstrating his newest invention, a robot called The Metalogen Man, which is powered by a disc of a rare metal called metalogen, hence the name. After the demonstration, which involved the robot lifting big weights and pulling a safe door out of a wall, Arnold announces he is preparing to have the robot mass produced and be a boon to mankind. That night after the demonstration, three of the scientist who worked on the robot received a mysterious message from an unknown voice (Jack Ingram), warning they will die. Soon after the message the three scientists are murdered by a gorilla (Ray “Crash” Corrigan).
Despite these strange goings on, Arnold plans to go ahead with selling the robot to a manufacturer and receives news that a representative of the company, Ken Morgan (Robert Lowery), will be coming to discuss a deal and take the robot back with him. Ken is sent a fake telegram having him get off at an earlier station stop where he is met by Nordick (Ingram) and Flint (Anthony Warde), who say they are from the Bainbridge Institute. As they head for town, Nordick stops the truck, claiming engine trouble. The two men jump Ken and after a terrific fight, throw off a cliff into a gully. Nordick and Flint then go through Ken’s luggage and take his credentials.
Arnold, his daughter Babs (Carole Matthews) and their chauffer Flash (Willie Best) show up at the correct station to meet Ken. When he doesn’t arrive on the scheduled train, Arnold surmises he might have gotten off at an earlier stop by mistake and they head out for the previous stop on the line. There they come upon Ken, who had climbed out of the gully, walking toward town. After he explains who he is, they all head to the institute and find that the the robot has been collected by the men who attacked Ken. Ken decides to stay on and help Arnold get the robot back.
Arnold tells all of this to Professor Ernst (George Macready), the only other scientist who worked on the robot that is still alive. Ernst is immediately suspicious of Ken, saying that without credentials, he could be anyone. Ernst convinces Arnold to bring the metalogen disc (the only part of the robot not stolen), which is locked in the institute vault, to his house for safe keeping just in case Ken isn’t on the up and up.
Arnold sneaks the disc out of the vault and goes over to Ernst’s house, where Nordick and Flint attack him outside and steal the disc. Ernst is appologetic to the distraught Arnold and goes to get him something to calm his frazzled nerves. While left alone in the library, Arnold accidentally discovers a secret panel with the robot control panel behind it. Ernst returns and finds his cover is blown. Dropping all pretense, Ernst admits he wants to keep the robot for his own purposes (making a bunch and taking over the world of course, failing that he will sell it to a foreign power for a bunch a money) and has his men take Arnold through another secret panel to his underground lab where they will dispose of him.
Just then Ken and Babs show up looking for Arnold. Ernst says he was there but left. Ken spots Arnold’s hat and knows he’s lying. Ernst pulls a gun but Ken takes it away from him. Forcing Ernst to open the secret panel, Ken gives the gun to Babs and goes after Arnold. Ken finds Nordick and Flint about to throw Arnold into a large, spark throwing generator where he will be electrocuted, and jumps the two men, getting into another terrific fight.
Upstairs Ernst tricks Babs and locks her in a closet. Turning on the robot control panel, he sees Ken kayo his two henchmen. Activating the robot, he has it come up behind the stalwart hero, cold cock him and then toss him into the generator, where he lays unmoving amid the sparking machinery………………………
Maybe my expectations were a little too high from all of the praise that has been heaped on this serial as one of the rare good ones from Columbia, having been made in that span between James Horne’s farcical serials and Sam Katzman’s over the top but meagarly budgeted product, where fans got The Secret Code, Batman, The Phantom, and The Desert Hawk, but I have to admit I was disappointed with it.
The plotting is absurd, even by serial standards, a mad scientist uses a gorilla to help him steal a robot that he could build himself (as he states several times during the serial), and the gorilla is from the public zoo, his cage being accessed via a secret tunnel in the villain’s basement. Since their villainy is uncovered in the first chapter, all of the subsequent episodes have them use elaborate ruses to avoid the police guard on his house to access his hidden lab and the gorilla cage tunnel. There is also a bizarre plot twist in which everyone is searching for more of the metalogen, and the villain hides some of his limited supply in a warehouse to trick the hero into a trap when he uses a newly invented detector. Later after the metalogen has been recovered, the detector shows that there actually is metaogen ore under the factory. An amazing coincidence!
The Monster (the robot) and the Ape (the gorilla) of the title really aren’t that involved in the plot. Both get trotted out every few chapters to be involved in a cliffhanger, where either the gorilla gets returned to the zoo or the robot is recovered by the heroes and has to be stolen again by the villains (this happens about four times over fifteen chapters). Most of the plot concerns everyone trying to get more of the mysterious metalogen which come from long buried prehistoric meteors. The whole thing plays like a script that was left over from Horne’s era, only without the exagarated over acting that usually accompanied his absurd plots Here everyone plays it straight and oddly enough it makes me kind of appreciate what Horne had been attempting (it doesn’t make me a fan, I just have a better understanding of it).
Things aren’t all bad, there are several fist fights in the serial and all are exceptionally well done by Eddie Parker and Ted Mapes with lots of punches, kicks and destroyed furniture. The title characters are used to good effect in several cliffhangers, most notably in Chapter Four with the hero and a henchman fighting on a cat walk over a vat of chemicals that have been set on fire and the robot starts pulling the catwalk supports away. The murders in the first chapter are kind of scary with the gorilla appearing out of the dark and visciously pummelling the victim into the ground until the body goes limp.
There is also some good performances. Ralph Morgan does an excellent job as the harried inventor. He is nice and kind, very fatherly. But as the serial contiunes he gets more and more worried about the destruction his invention could be used for if they don’t succeed. Morgan’s most likeable performance in a serial.
Carole Matthews gives an interesting performance, probably due to her husky voice, she is less the helpless damsel in distress and sounds more like a gun moll when delivering her lines. Left hanging around the lab after the first few chapters, Mathews does get to demonstrate she could give any Universal horror movie heroine a run for the money with the scream she gives when attacked by the gorilla in Chapter Seven.
Hero Robert Lowery gives his expected strong performance, tough, in charge and delivered with the rat a tat rhythm of a Warner’s gangster, he occasionally gives the heroine a warm smile of affection, but is mostly all business. It’s no wonder he was cast as Batman four years later, he seems perfect for the role from watching him here.
The villains gave me some disappointment. While it was great seeing Jack Ingram and Anthony Warde sharing screen time together, a real treat for fans, after Chapter Three they seperate for the rest of the serial as Ingram has to take care of the gorilla and Warde heads up the rest of the gang. I would have loved to have seen more of them together as they played well off of each other in the first couple of episodes. The stand out henchman is Stanely Price playing a particularly nasty henchman who goes undercover during the excavation phase of the search for metalogen and first tries to blow up the hero and then tries to drown him, no weaselly traitor this time.
A lot of fans rave about Macready’s performance, but I really couldn’t get into it. While he is as suave as all get out, he is also the most even tempered villain I have ever seen. He is extremely calm whether berating his men, threatening his adversaries, or detailing his eventual conquest. Not once does he cut loose with some over acting sinsterness, a little over the top gloating would have been a welcome addition, but we get none of that here. There is even a weird moment in Chapter Five when he berates his men for their failure, and Warde points out it was Macready’s use of the robot that allowed the hero to get away, and Macready not only agrees, but apologizes for it. What?!?! The only time he really gets going is in a couple of early chapters where he is disguised as the inventor of the metalogen detector and comes off arrogant and cranky, once the disguise is dropped he goes back to his extremely reasonable villainy.
Comedy relief is handle by two actors, Willie Best and Ray “Crash ” Corrigan. Best, a talented comedian (especially in The Ghost Breakers), is saddled with an extremely dumb, lazy and unfunny character. Named Flash, he of course moves slow and mumbles many of his lines. Most of the comedy is him complaining about being woken up or being scared by the robot. His constantly popping eyes and high pitched screech are irritating at best and extremely annoying after a while, one bit has him ripping off a Lou costello routine where he mistakes a gangster radio show for a real person behind him and acts out all of the orders barked out (Lou did it better in Who Done It). Not to say he doesn’t get a few choice moments, in Chapter Fourteen he has a humorous bit of trying to make a phone call while tied up, his reaction to dropping the pencil he was using to dial with is perfect. Chapter Fifteen has him doing an under the breath recitation of everything that happened to make sure he didn’t forget to tell Matthews anything, where he acts out half of it and ends with “No, thats everything.” Not great but it’s miles above the antics he was doing in the earlier chapters, like cutting a table in half while trying to cut a board, he is also on top of the table so that he can end with a prat fall.
Corrigan steals the serial as Thor the gorilla. A viscious brute who is barely controlled by the villains (makes you wonder why they were using him), Corrigan plays him as a realistic animal, growling, baring his fangs, fighting against the chain they are using to lead him, Corrigan makes you think the gorilla is real. There are many moments of physical comedy like Chapter Two with Ingram trying to get Thor back to his cage and the gorilla has to play with everything on a table in the lab, pounding each one on the table a few times and then moving to the next one while Ingram pulls on the chain and says, “Now stop that and come on!” Corrigan constantly manhandles Ingram in a friendly, rough manner and you get the feeling that there is a real friendship between the characters, Ingram is visibly upset when he is forced to leave the gorilla behind during a getaway in Chapter Thirteen.
So while there are some good moments of scary suspense, some good actions scenes and some excellent performances, over all The Monster and the Ape is one of the lesser serials to come out of Columbia’s best period.
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