Product Details

• Format: Black & White, NTSC
• Language: English
• Studio: Genius Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: January 1, 2004
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• ASIN: B0006B2AJW

Customer Reviews

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5.0 out of 5 stars AMC Monsterfest always comes thru for me (details), February 20, 2011

By 

Patrick W. Crabtree "The Old Grottomaster" (Lucasville, OH USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Amc Monsterfest: Bela Lugosi Classics Collection 2 (DVD)

Just to be clear, I'm reviewing the Bela Lugosi Classics Collection 2 (white DVD case, 2 disc set) which contains the following four films:

-- The Corpse Vanishes (1942, 64 minutes)
-- Invisible Ghost (1941, 64 minutes)
-- Phantom Ship (1935, 80 minutes)
-- Scared to Death (1947, 65 minutes)

I've previously reviewed all except *Phantom Ship* in detail at their respective individual product sites if you want all the specifics.

The Corpse Vanishes -- This one runs on a pretty weird premise but it's still quite good, chiefly due to Lugosi. He plays a mad doctor who causes brides (at their weddings) to go into a sort of suspended animation -- evryone thinks they are dead. Then he steals their bodies away to his home where he draws out their spinal fluid (yuk!) and converts it into a potion to keep his decrepit wife looking good. A nosey gal reporter screws up Lugosi's agenda but he knows how to deal with *her*. With a dwarf assisting Lugosi in his mad scheme, this one can't lose.

Invisible Ghost -- Next to The Return of Chandu the Magician, Vol. 1 and The Return of Chandu the Magician, Vol. 2, this is my favorite Lugosi flick. He plays a kindly patriarch whose wife has left him and whom everyone believes was killed in a car crash when she ran away with her lover. But it's not so! She's gone nuts, kept in a nearby edifice, secretly attended to by Lugosi's handyman who found her but she gets out sometimes. When she does and Lugosi catches a glimpse of her wandering around on the estate he goes into a trance and strides off to strangle someone in the household. It sounds pretty goofy but it really is a fine old film.

Phantom Ship -- This is the big bonus film of the package -- I've never seen it elsewhere. Lugosi gets tapped to knock off a guy on a ship. He's a drunken one-armed sailor so he doesn't have much choice. There's a big storm at sea and *someone* is killing people -- is it Lugosi? He does remarkably well in this non-monster role and I much enjoyed the film although it's really old.

Scared to Death -- (The only color film in which Lugosi ever played.) This one is a doozie and it also co-stars the Great George Zucco as the mad doctor. A corpse (the daughter-in-law of Zucco) spins her tale in retrospect from her slab in the morgue. There are curious goings on in the household and Lugosi's sinister appearance on the scene in hat and cape (along with a dwarf sidekick) does not help matters. There's also an indigo-tinted pseudo-zombie who makes gratifying periodic appearances, peeping in windows, and so on. It's a goofy film but I enjoy watching it now and again.

The two DVDs are nicely packaged. I typically buy these releases (also this one: AMC Monsterfest Collection - Cult Classics, Vol. 1 (The Atomic Brain / The Brain That Wouldn't Die / Carnival of Souls / Night Tide)) at Big Lots for a couple of bucks. I think they're a steal.

The quality of the prints are at least as good as what I've encountered elsewhere from various available sources, and better than some. If you can get this package for cheap and you love classic horror as I do, I recommend that you go for it.