Man Made Monster (1941)

Dan the Electrical Man (Lon Chaney Jr.) is the sole survivor of an electrical accident. He is taken in for study by Dr John Lawrence (Samuel S. Hinds), who has some pretty odd views on electricity. His partner, Dr Paul Rigas (Lionel Atwill), has even stranger views, thinking he can turn people into zombies with shock powers. He experiments on Dan, and succeeds. Dr. Lawrence’s daughter, June (Anne Nagel) sympathizes with Dan and is the only one who believes that Rigas is involved with something sinister.

A Universal horror B-movie—and apparently the cheapest film they financed that year—Man Made Monster is a fairly typical mad doctor movie, though better made then most that don’t include the name “Frankenstein” in the title. It is probably best remembered for bringing Lon Chaney Jr. into the Universal monster troop. He’d soon make The Wolf Man with the same director. But Man Made Monster is worth remembering on its own.

Chaney plays a friendly dimwit, and is charismatic in the part. Atwill does the mustache-twirling villain he’d done many times before, but there’s a reason why he’d done it so often: he’s very good at it. Things drag down with a court case, but the beginning is fast moving and the movie has a proper horror climax. At 59 minutes, it doesn’t overstay its slight plot.

The flaw with the picture is that it doesn’t know where to focus. Dan or Dr. Rigas should have been the lead, but June, who has no direct part in the proceedings, becomes the main character. It isn’t a fatal flaw, but I’d have liked to have more time with Dan. Electricity in the film can be seen as a metaphor for drug addiction, and Rigas is a sinister dealer who hooks Dan on the blue demon. His viewpoint is the interesting one. But what’s here is good enough.

Lionel Atwill other horror films are Doctor X (1932), The Vampire Bat (1933), Mystery of the Wax Museum (1933), Murders in the Zoo (1933), Mark of the Vampire (1935), Son of Frankenstein (1939), The Mad Doctor of Market Street (1942), The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), The Strange Case of Doctor Rx (1942), Night Monster (1942), Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943), and House of Frankenstein (1944).

Lon Chaney’s other Universal monster movies are The Wolf Man (1941), The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), The Mummy’s Tomb (1942), Son of Dracula (1943), Frankenstein Meets The Wolf Man (1943), and House of Frankenstein (1944), The Mummy’s Curse (1944), The Mummy’s Ghost (1944), House of Dracula (1945), and Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948).