Dr. Carruthers, a humble but proud chemist working for a cosmetic company in a small town, receives a bonus check for $5 000 from his greedy bosses — a slap in the face considering that his work has helped the company make millions. Returning home from the humiliating ordeal, the bosses’ demeaning words echo in Carruthers’ mind, and he snaps. That very night, he sends out his giant bats to attack his enemies. What’s that? Oh I forgot to mention that he’s also a mad scientist who runs a secret lab in which he breeds giant murder bats who will attack anyone wearing a specific aftershave the doc has concocted.
It’s always fun when the b-movie producers on Poverty Row lands a proper star, and the plain-titled company PCR, Producers Releasing Corporation, bagged a true legend for the lead in this one: Bela Lugosi, not exactly slumming it, but definitely taking whatever jobs he could find at the time. And he found it — in 1940 alone he starred or co-starred in a handful of movies, including one of his most well-known non-Dracula titles, Black Friday, opposite Boris Karloff.
Lugosi is, unsurprisingly, the main reason to watch this. The other is the devil bat itself, a fun little creature so obsessed by the scent of the tonic that it… rips the throat of the people wearing it? The peripheral players are bland and boring. Also, the film features one of my favorite kind of tropes in these 30’s and 40’s horror or science fiction films — the basement lab! Often accessed via some secret entrance, a hidden hideout where a twisted scientist can perform his deranged experiments in peace. I say bring them back. Dr. Runtime approved (68 mins).
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