The Raven
Directed by Lou Landers
David Boehm “based on a poem by Edgar Allan Poe”
1935/US
Universal Pictures
IMDb page
First viewing/Criterion Channel
Dr. Richard Vollin: Torture waiting… waiting. It will be sweet, Judge Thatcher!
Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff team up for an enjoyable entry in the Universal horror pictures of this era.
Lugosi plays evil doctor Richard Vollin who is obsessed with Edgar Allan Poe, torture and death. Edmund Bateman (Karloff) who doesn’t appear until midway through, is a murderer who wants Vollin to give him a new face but becomes his unwilling dupe. When Lugosi becomes obsessed with a judge’s young daughter, things get really complicated.
Universal followed its successful pairing of Lugosi and Karloff in The Black Cat (1934) with this film. Karloff is very good as always and Lugosi hams it up until his character is scarier than Dracula’s. Always fun to see these two icons play off each other.
Like in Roger Corman’s The Raven (1963) this film doesn’t have anything to do with Poe’s poem other than that a character recites a stanza or two once in awhile. This version with Vincent Price, Boris Karloff and Peter Lorre is also a lot of fun.
Fan trailer
