The Ape is a 1940 sci-fi horror film about a kindly mad scientist who seeks to cure a young woman’s polio.
Directed by William Nigh (The Ghost and the Guest; The Strange Case of Doctor Rx; Before I Hang) from a screenplay by Curt Siodmak and Richard Carroll.
Plot [contains spoilers]:
Doctor Bernard Adrian is a kindly scientist who was forced to become a small town physician after the medical community rejected his theories. He persists however in pursuing his experiments on nerve regeneration, with the quiet support of his mute elderly housekeeper Jane, and becomes determined to cure local girl Frances Clifford’s polio induced paralysis so she can eventually marry her sweetheart Danny Foster.
After much work the doctor determines that all he needs is spinal fluid from another human to complete the formula for his experimental serum. Meanwhile, a vicious circus ape named Nabu mortally wounds his handler before breaking out of his cage and terrorizing the townspeople. After some time on the lam, the ape eventually breaks into Doctor Adrian’s lab. The doc manages to kill it before any harm can come to himself. However, all the vials of the spinal fluids he requires to perform his experiments are destroyed during the struggle between him and the ape.
Doctor Adrian then concocts an idea after performing an autopsy on the circus handler: he will tear off the ape’s flesh and use its skin to disguise himself as the escaped circus animal before murdering townspeople in order to extract their spinal fluid. Thus the murders will be blamed on the Ape and he, himself, will manage to avoid any suspicion. His conviction to follow through with his plan is further strengthened when he begins to see tangible results from the remnants of his experimental formula after administering it to Frances. During one of his attacks towards the film’s ending though, Adrian is shot and mortally wounded causing him to collapse in front of his own doorstep. The concerned towns-folks believing the ape might have harmed the doctor rush to the scene and there the Ape’s “true identity” is revealed to the town. Just before he passes through the dying doctor sees Frances walk for the first time and so dies with a smile on his face. The movie ends with Danny and a no longer paralyzed Frances enjoying life and happily looking forward to what the future may hold.
Cast and characters:
Boris Karloff … Doctor Bernard Adrian
Maris Wrixon … Miss Frances Clifford
Gene O’Donnell … Danny Foster
Dorothy Vaughan … Mother Clifford
Gertrude Hoffman … Jane – Adrian’s Housekeeper
Henry Hall … Sheriff Jeff Halliday
Selmer Jackson … Doctor McNulty
Jessie Arnold … Mrs Brill
Billy Bletcher … Short Moustached Posse Man
Harry C. Bradley … Quinn
George Cleveland … Mr Howley
Ray Corrigan … Nabu the Gorilla
Pauline Drake … Young Girl
Mary Field … Mrs Mason
Gibson Gowland … Posse Member
Julia Griffith … Townswoman
I. Stanford Jolley … Ape Trainer
Stan Jolley … Boy in Soda Shop
Jack Kennedy … Dep. Archie Tomlin
Donald Kerr … Citizen Carrying Mauled Ape Trainer
Philo McCullough … Henry Mason
Buddy Swan … Willie Brill
Minerva Urecal … Townswoman
Filming locations:
Newhall, Santa Clarita, California
Production company:
Monogram Pictures
Tech specs:
1h 2m (62 min)
Black and white
Aspect ratio: 1.37: 1
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