Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) Review

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein (1948) Review

 

It may have seemed that old school horror was over when Universal paired their best monsters with two of the best comedic actors of the era, Bud Abbott and Lou Costello, but this first collaboration between the comedy legends and horror legends proved to be so much fun that they did it four more times, though never again with this same roster of monsters. For the record, they don’t actually meet Dr. Frankenstein in this movie, and it has little continuity with any of the movies preceding it.

The animated intro and credits with spooky music is charming and sets the tone well. We see Larry Talbot, again played by Lon Chaney Jr., in London trying to contact the USA. Abbott plays Chick Young and Costello plays Wilbur Grey, and in case you aren’t familiar, Costello (Wilbur) is the funny one and Abbott (Chick) is the straight man. Both of them work as baggage clerks, and while Wilbur has Larry on the phone, Larry turns into the Wolf Man! Right away this scene establishes that the horror elements are still, in fact, horror. The transformation is serious and scary, and Costello makes jokes because he doesn’t know what's going on at the other end of the line.

Two crates are being shipped to where Chick and Wilbur work, for a man who runs a House of Horrors show. This House of Horrors motif is repeated from House of Frankenstein, but done in a completely different way. One crate contains the body of Frankenstein’s Monster (again played by Glenn Strange) and the other contains the body of Count Dracula (played by Bela Lugosi, who hadn’t put on The Count’s cape since the original Dracula in 1931). Wilbur is funny about it, but also scared, and we know by this point in the series his fear is justified, but Chick is skeptical of all the supernatural stuff.

Abbott and Costello’s dialogue is quick, witty, and clever. Wilbur repeatedly yelling for Chick anytime something spooky happens when Chick is out of the room does get a little annoying after a while, but it’s also just part of the humour and at a certain point you just have to roll with it. Dracula comes out of his coffin and there are too many jokes made to even recall them all. Here’s an example: Chick reads the write-up about Drac describing how he must sleep in his coffin during the day and says “that's bunk!” to which Wilbur says “That's what I'm saying! That's his bunk!” Then when they look inside he isn’t there, because he’s lurking in the background! 

After the fun encounters between Dracula and Wilbur, Chick and Wilbur open up the crate containing Frankenstein’s Monster. Wilbur freaks out when he sees The Monster’s face, then moments later he gets hypnotized by Dracula while Chick is out of the room. Dracula revives The Monster using his magic ring, so now Drac is its master. The Count goes to Dr. Mornay under a pseudonym looking for a new brain for The Monster. She has the perfect candidate: the guy she is courting, Wilbur! According to her, he has such a simple brain he will obey his master no problem. It’s a pretty funny premise.

Larry Talbot comes to Chick and Wilbur to tell them they need to stop Dracula. Lon Chaney Jr. is exactly how you remember him from the other movies, which makes his seriousness even funnier next to Abbott and Costello, but Chaney still sells it. He’s so good he could make me believe he was the Wolf Man even if he was acting next to the flying spaghetti monster. Costello locks Larry in his hotel room that night under his advisement, then goes back in to his room a minute later with his forgotten suitcase. He isn’t even aware the Wolf Man is lurking around the room trying to kill him. It’s a surprisingly effective combo of tension and laughs.

Wilbur and Chick go over to Dr. Mornay’s place. It’s nice to see an evil female scientist for a change, and her assistant is male, without a hunchback. Wilbur has a dilemma: he has two women pining for him, and poor Chick isn’t desired by either. Soon the duo find themselves in a new dilemma: they are in the house of Dracula! They snoop around and get split up because of a secret passage. Wilbur encounters The Monster in one of the silliest and funniest moments of the whole movie, and the secret passage bit is played up multiple times.   

There’s a running gag that Wilbur always sees the monsters but Chick doesn’t see them and so doesn’t believe him. It's a little cliché, but only because it's been so overdone in countless other movies and shows. Here, it’s actually pretty effective, and doesn’t get too annoying. The buildup to Wilbur’s doomed brain operation is quite good, and he’s saved just in the nick of time. There are plenty of antics to be had with all three monsters toward the end of the movie. We get Wilbur spinning around on the operating table, The Monster lumbering after them, and Dracula fighting the Wolf Man. In the end the duo escape all the mayhem, only to end up in a boat with the Invisible Man! It’s the perfect final joke: Chick finally believes Wilbur about the monsters, having seen them with his own eyes, and here they are with the one monster no one can see.

Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein is a classic horror/comedy that revitalized the tired premises for these ageing monsters. I don’t love it as much as the more serious earlier entries—in some moments it feels like Costello is playing directly to the audience, which I find comes off as a little odd. I used to think it didn’t really count as one of the official Universal monster movies, but looking at it now, you can see how it respects the previously established lore of the monsters and their horror roots without making the monsters themselves into jokes or neutering them. Plus, it’s included in the official DVD releases for the Wolf Man, Dracula, and Frankenstein franchises. If you go into this one knowing it’s a horror/comedy that tends more toward comedy, I think you’ll have a good time with it.

That was the last entry in the original Wolf Man franchise. Werewolves are one of my favourite movie monsters, and there are many good ones out there, but few other werewolf movie franchises went on as long as The Wolf Man and stayed as consistently entertaining with the same actor in the role.

Tomorrow we begin with a new series from the 1980’s that might make you work up an appetite!