Scared to Death
Scared to Death
| 01 February 1947 (USA)
Scared to Death Trailers

A woman is married to the son of a doctor, the proprietor of a private sanatorium, where she is under unwilling treatment. Both the son and the doctor indicate they want the marriage dissolved. Arriving at the scene is a mysterious personage identified as the doctor's brother who formerly was a stage magician in Europe. He is accompanied by a threatening dwarf...

Reviews
CheerupSilver Very Cool!!!
Softwing Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??
FuzzyTagz If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.
Kamila Bell This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.
Cristi_Ciopron Lugosi is accompanied by his assistant from 'Spooks …', for doing a similar role, that of a magician, though, here, also a crook; his part is essentially a cameo. An out-fashioned comedy from '47, with amusing roles from Pendleton as the private cop and bodyguard, and Gladys Blake as the piquant _soubrette; Fowley plays a reporter. The lowbrow comedy may be goofy, but the directing is dismaying, absurdly clumsy and inefficient. The coarse style subverts what should of been a bourgeois drama; 'The Bat' has been filmed in an insouciant style, yet, despite the play's mediocrity and the director's lack of feel, there was a basic craft, which lacks here. The topic (the menace, the threat, the attempt to push someone into insanity, to make someone to loose his mind) had already been well used in bourgeois dramas like 'Gaslight'; here, it becomes the pretext for a goofy farce, in which a bodyguard and a _soubrette offer lowbrow comedy.A physician receives a lady who threatens him, then arrives his cousin, who also alludes to compromising facts. Earlier, the physician had examined his daughter in law, with a weird exchange about his feelings for her, suggesting a sulfurous, unholy passion.All is filmed as a farce. There are secret passages in the house (which has been once an asylum), the topography is explained a bit in a dialogue between the guest and his host.The plot is more serious than its perhaps unwillingly, but resignedly absurd treatment, which spoofs the play it has been based on.The movie keeps the structure of a stage-play, but turns the plot into a farce.
Rainey Dawn This is not Bela Lugosi's and George Zucco's best film but it does have some entertainment value there for the fans of Lugosi and/or Zucco - in fact, it may only be Lugosi and Zucco fans that may find some entertainment value in this "so bad it's good fun" flick.What's notable about the film is the fact it is Bela Lugosi's only movie in color. In the film we can clearly see his beautiful blue eyes - the same eyes that hypnotized audiences in "Dracula" and "White Zombie"."Scared to Death" is not a great film but I love the campiness. Lugosi looked as if he was having a good time filming this one - which adds to the pleasure of watching this bad film.The movie is not a complete drama. It's a dramedy (comedy-drama). The cop is there as a comic relief. You will hear the "cutesy" music in the comical parts of the film.The movie is really worth maybe 2 or 3 stars but I'm giving it a 6 out of 10 for the fact we can see Lugosi in color and the campy fun! 6/10
zardoz-13 If Bela Lugosi weren't in "Scared to Death," I would probably have skipped it. As it is, the producers used the "Dracula" star simply as a red herring. He shows up at a doctor's office with a dwarf and lurks mysteriously in the shadows and shrubs. The action focuses on a girl named Laura who is married to the son of the doctor (George Zucco), but she acts like she is a hostage in the house. Most of everything that we learn about Laura occurs as a result of her memories of the past. What makes "Scared to Death" such an oddball opus is that Laura narrates the film from the slab of an autopsy room. Exactly why she undertakes this task is anybody's guess. Not surprisingly, she died--as we discover in the final quarter of the film because she saw a man who she believed was dead, shot by the Nazis. The final five minutes unloads a treasure trove of exposition and revelations that you are not prepared for during the previous 50 minutes. The story unfolds at the doctor's office as Professor Leonide shows up with his dwarf Indigo. Pay close attention to the first few minutes after the autopsy room. Lugosi is appropriately flamboyant while Zucco is all business. About half-way through the story, a wisecracking reporter, Terry, shows up with his future wife. Nat Pendleton is amusing as a cop who is no longer on the force. "Scared to Death" is a low-budget epic shot in color.
Flixer1957 Here's a weird one for you: a terror tale told in flashback by the voice of a dead woman. Heroine Joyce Compton is terrorized by an eerie figure in a green mask until her ticker can't take it any more. Shots of her corpse are separated from flashbacks by loud noise on the soundtrack. Perennial mad doctor George Zucco stars, along with Bela Lugosi as a hypnotist, Angelo Rossitto as his assistant and Molly Lamont as a stereotype Irish maid. Big Nat Pendleton, so good at playing goof-balls, is a dopey detective so inept he couldn't catch a virus during a flu epidemic. They all play their parts as if completely unrehearsed, which at least gives the picture its only continuity. Cabanne blended horror and comedy relief very well in THE MUMMY'S HAND; this outing is a farce with horror trappings and nothing more. Allegedly Lugosi's only film in color.