The Mad Monster
The Mad Monster
NR | 15 May 1942 (USA)
The Mad Monster Trailers

A mad scientist changes his simple-minded handyman into a werewolf in order to prove his supposedly crazy scientific theories - and exact revenge.

Reviews
Hellen I like the storyline of this show,it attract me so much
Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.
Ketrivie It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.
AshUnow This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.
tavm In writing reviews of werewolf movies I found on YouTube for the next several days, here is one on a production made by the lowest of the Poverty Row studios-PRC. George Zucco is the Mad Scientist wanting to create wolfmen so they can aid in the fight during World War II! But he also wants revenge against his former fellow colleagues at his previous institution. His patient is a mentally challenged farm hand played by Glenn Strange who would later take over the Frankenstein monster role at Universal after Boris Karloff didn't want to do it any longer. Also in tow is Zucco's daughter Anne Nagel who I just reviewed in Man Made Monster. Like in that one, she also falls for a reporter here played by a former Our Ganger from the silent era, Johnny Downs. One notable appearance is that of Mae Busch-formerly a usual Laurel & Hardy antagonist-as Susan who I think was the mother of that little girl who's fate was not good...My verdict: this movie seems to lumber it's way through 77 minutes with not much of a music score, too many repetitious lines, and not much action till the end. In fact, part of me felt like sleeping while watching. So on that note, The Mad Monster is worth a look but no more than that.
kai ringler I really enjoyed this movie,, not quite sure why but I just did. A scientist is badly disgraced by his employers because his theories and experiments are not conventional, so abruptly he is dismissed from the company,, he decides to carry on his work in a dilapidated mansion that is out of sight, he uses his gardener as a guinea pig for all of his experiments, the experiment sort of a blood transfusion, to turn the gardener into a werewolf.. the scientist's daughter becomes suspicious of her father,, and her boyfriend happens to be a reporter, so she tells him what she thinks her father is up to ,, and the reporter starts to snoop around and gather up some information,, meanwhile our mad scientist is making plans for a serum to use against his former employers to get revenge on them for dismissing him from the company,, very decent "b" movie.
fwdixon For an obscure werewolf "B" movie, it's hard to beat PRC's 1942 epic, "The Mad Monster". George Zucco is a mad scientist extracting wolf DNA and injecting it into half-wit yokel Glenn Strange, thereby turning him into a werewolf. Strange makes a pretty good werewolf but when not in the throes of lycanthropy, he seems to think he's Lenny from "Of Mice and Men". Anyhow, Zucco uses Strange to bump off several scientists who had ridiculed him in the past and caused him to resign his position in disgrace. The movie moves along at a pretty brisk pace up to the end when Zucco gets strangled by Strange and Strange perishes in a conflagration cause by lightning. Typical PRC production standards except for the werewolf transition scene, which, while not up to Universal standards, ain't bad.
csteidler Spurned mad scientist George Zucco stands at the head of a long table lined with empty chairs. What do his enemies think of him now? His experiment is a success! He gloats over the empty seats—his imagination filling them with former colleagues cringing before his eloquent, triumphant and vengeful lecture.Yes, Zucco is not only a mad scientist, but an angry one, too. The frightening product of his unconventional research will soon be his means of wreaking his revenge on the former colleagues who disgraced him and his "crazy" ideas.Hired hand Glenn Strange is the unfortunate focus of Zucco's research and experiments. A mysterious transfusion involving a captive wolf transforms Strange from a large but weak-minded handyman into a—well, a wolfman.Also part of the plot is Zucco's daughter (Anne Nagel), who doesn't like this spooky house and wants to go back to the city so she can see her boyfriend (Johnny Downs), a newspaper writer who takes a professional interest in the strange goings on down in the swamp country where Zucco has set up shop.Zucco is happily ruthless as the revenge-driven genius; he lets loose one of the all-time great mad scientist laughs around the one hour mark. Strange has a somewhat unique role: as the big dumb handyman who doesn't understand the strange "dreams" he is having, he's part Lenny Small from Of Mice and Men, part Lawrence Talbot from The Wolf Man.The story and script are never especially surprising, but the cast give it their best shot. At 77 minutes, the picture is actually a bit longer and more ambitious than many PRC productions; it does include a fair amount of philosophizing about the true aims and responsibilities of Science (nothing too inspiring, however). A big finish is actually pretty exciting…even if any viewer thinking ahead would probably have seen it coming.All in all, it is a pretty standard 1940s B horror movie—and thus good fun for those of us who enjoy such nonsense.