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Dr. Renault's Secret

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1942 was an interesting year for Hollywood. Horror was once again in it's heyday and almost every studio was on the bandwagon attempting to cash in on Universal's success with THE WOLF MAN. While some studios decided to avoid animal-people movies altogether and stay with other tried and true horror elements, some decided to try their own "weremonster" formulas. 20th Century-Fox decided that besides their own werewolf story (THE UNDYING MONSTER), they would monkey around with the idea. They dusted off an old property that they had made in silent days called THE WIZARD, which was itself a remake of an early silent called BALOO, THE KILLER BABOON. The basic storyline involes a mad scientist who through various medical means (serums, head transplantation (!)) would make a gorilla more like a man-- or part man at least. For the new film, surgery and blood transfusion and body chemical realigning would do to have George Zucco alter his big ape into J. Carrol Naish, thus creating DR. RENAULT'S SECRET! The film is itself a wonderful quickie at 58 minutes with marvelous performances by all performers, especially Zucco and Naish. The film was briskly paced and directed with panache by Harry Lachman, one of the unsung heroes of the B-movies. Makeup was wisely kept to a minimum, as no one was supposed to know that Naish was really some sort of monster. The film was released as the 2nd half of a double bill with THE UNDYING MONSTER and did brisk business. For some reason or another (print trouble, negative difficulties, etc.), this was thought to be an almost lost title. Fox has done a yeoman job on restoring this film to its glory. Thanks, Fox!!Dr. Renault's Secret