The Body Snatcher 03/23/19

Scream Factory
Blu-ray

This bona fide classic may be, as Greg Mank says, the best American horror picture of the 1940s. The teaming of Boris Karloff and Henry Daniell is sensational, as a grave-robbing cabman and a brilliant but unscrupulous surgeon in need of cadavers to teach anatomy. Producer Val Lewton gives the players career-best characterizations and dialogue, and director Robert Wise adds tension and chills. Bela Lugosi is in for a memorable supporting part. Icing on the chiller cake is a new 4K scan from the original negative — we can forget the dull and dark prints seen in the past. They showed this in high school as an educational film — we learned not to strangle people, but to ‘Burke’ them!  With Russell Wade and Edith Atwater. On Blu-ray from Scream Factory.
03/23/19