Walter Stevens (Lionel Atwill) owes a great deal of money in some kind of sketchy deal. He has also been threatened with death by The Gorilla, a maniac killer who’s been getting lots of news coverage. His niece, Norma (Anita Louise), who is the other heir to the family fortune, arrives at his house along with her fiancée Jack (Edward Norris). The other inhabitants are Peters the butler (Bela Lugosi) and Kitty the cook (Patsy Kelly). To protect himself from The Gorilla, Stevens hires three frantic private detectives (The Ritz Brothers), who primarily cause problems. One of them run into a mysterious thief (Joseph Calleia) who is aware of the secret passageways in the house. And there’s the possibility that The Gorilla might be an actual ape.
I’ve heard elsewhere that The Ritz Brothers are an acquired taste. So is turpentine, and I can’t imagine acquiring that one either. They have the wit and class of The Three Stooges without the spark. They don’t even have the excuse that they’re an act for kids. They even lack the fun violent gags, instead just howling a lot, acting frightened, mugging for the camera, and falling down. They’ve been called second-rate Marx Brothers, which is an insult to the Marx Brothers. There’s been worse comedy teams but I can’t think of a more pointless one. If they were offensive or deeply obnoxious, then hating them might be interesting, but they’re only childish and tiresome.
Without them this could have been a decent Old Dark House film. It was based on a stage play and had been made previously as a silent film and a now-lost early talkie, so the source material had enough of a story to fill a movie without the unfunny high jinks. They split the character of the PI into three to make it a vehicle for the Ritz Brothers. Atwill, Calleia, and Lugosi are all favorites of mine and all act as if in another type of movie: a light horror film. Lugosi has some funny moments and never slips into over-the-top silliness. Put in a reasonable detective and we’d have had something.
The house is reasonably nice, and filmed with some wonderful shadows (I always have to comment on the quality of the house in an Old Dark House film), but it’s too simple. There ought to be additional rooms upstairs but the filmmakers didn’t built enough sets. This was apparently a troubled production, but that’s no excuse for skimping on their art design.
Big time fans of Lugosi might find enough here to make the brief 66 minutes worthwhile. Anyone else should choose a different Dark House film.
And for those of you keeping track at home, yes, this is another low budget ’30s “horror” film with an ape in it.