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Rating: 
Summary: Dragnet meets Frankenstein.
Review: A brute killer returns from the dead and goes after the crooks that double-crossed him. Robert Shayne is a scientist with good intentions that accidentally creates a monster. Classic TV fans will recall that Shayne played Lt. Henderson opposite George Reeves's Superman. It gets better. Joe Flynn, Captain Binghampton of "McHale's Navy," is Shayne's owlish assistant. Picture Igor in horn-rimmed glasses. They steal the executed Butcher Benton (Lon Chaney), and juice him with 287,000 volts using Frankenstein-type lab equipment. Butcher is resurrected and on the rampage. The massive electric jolt made him indestructible, steel flesh and all. Nothing can stop him. Police Lt. Chasen (Casey Adams), a Joe Friday clone, investigates the robbery that led to Butcher's execution. Chasen does a "just the facts" narration that only Jack Webb could love. Chasen hangs around the burley-Q house, questioning one of the strippers, Eva. He thinks she may have a clue to the still missing money. He wants to pump her, but only for information. Yeah, right. Hot on the tail (oops! trail, I mean) Chasen invites Eva out for dinner. In a Freudian moment, Eva tells Chasen, "I don't even know your first name." Chasen slowly replies, "It's...Dick." Butcher searches the seamy side of town for his victims. The floppy dummies that he throws around are great examples of cheesy special effects. The rest of the cast is as obscure as the dreary B&W photography. Only the names were changed to protect the innocent. Check out the old Rambler police cars. This '50s hybrid of crime thriller and horror flick is entertaining low budget nonsense. Have fun. ;-)
Rating: 
Summary: Another B-Movie
Review: By the time this one was filmed, Lon Chaney Jr. was long past his prime. Aging and beset by a serious problem with alcohol, he was reduced to taking almost any role which became available, which explains his presence here. This one is not as bad as "The Alligator People", but it's not much better. The formula is familiar, with a hokey plot featuring an executed murderer (Chaney) being brought back to life to avenge himself against those responsible for his conviction, all the while being pursued by a not-too-bright detective, as an annoying narrator drones on and on, in pseudo-docudrama style. Chaney is in bad shape, and he looks it; fortunately, his character has very few spoken lines. The supporting cast is none too talented, which is about par for this sort of poverty-row fare. In fact, it's almost bad enough to have been an Ed Wood film. This one is recommended only for those who enjoy "bad" movies. For fans of Chaney in his heyday, it is a sad testimonial to the personal and professional decline of a once-successful actor.
Rating:
Summary: Great double feature theme but where's the trailer?
Review: First of all I love this stuff because I respect it for what it is,
50's Drive-in fodder. I had the pleasure of watching these B-minors
on Creature Feature as I'm sure anyone who grew up in the tri-state
area of New York did. I'll always have a spot in my heart when poor
Lon Chaney Jr comes up out of the sewer flame-broiled and the music
turns somber as you know he's about to meet his end. By the way did
most of you film fanatics know that this was one of the first films
scored by Albert Glasser later known for such cult classics as "The
Amazing Colossal man" & "Beginning of the end? I did not know until
recently that the sewer sequence was stolen from the 1949 film noir
"He walked by night" Roan has a fairly good print department but
they suck on extras. I have both trailers in my collection and I
would have raise my rating up a notch had they been included. At
least Roan did use the original poster artwork on the cover.
Rating:
Summary: One of the most entertaining "bad" horrors ever made!
Review: If you are a fan of low-budget horror and/or film noir, then you must see the struggling Lon Chaney, Jr., as the notorious Charles "Butcher" Benton! By 1956, poor Lon was accepting just about anything he could, being tormented by many demons and having been typecast so severely. (He did, however, also play several good character parts in non-horror Fifties A-films like HIGH NOON, NOT AS A STRANGER, A LION IS IN THE STREETS and THE DEFIANT ONES, something that neither Boris Karloff nor Bela Lugosi did during the 1950s--Karloff being busy with television and the stage, and Lugosi sinking into an endlessly painful morass.) Here, Lon does a fine job with his limited dialogue and then has a heyday as the revived-from-the-dead mute who pummels and THROWS his victims to their deaths (in some of the most humorous killing scenes in horror-film history). The scenes of Lon crawling around in the L.A. storm-drain system and the incredible ending in which the Butcher is cooked alive at a power plant (destroying a multi-million dollar complex while the police recover a fraction of that in gangster's loot) are highlights in this sometimes dreadful yet strangely compelling and nearly always entertaining Jack Pollexfen opus! The DVD version is somewhat superior to most of the cheap VHS copies being peddled everywhere.
Rating:
Summary: One of the most entertaining "bad" horrors ever made!
Review: If you are a fan of low-budget horror and/or film noir, then you must see the struggling Lon Chaney, Jr., as the notorious Charles "Butcher" Benton! By 1956, poor Lon was accepting just about anything he could, being tormented by many demons and having been typecast so severely. (He did, however, also play several good character parts in non-horror Fifties A-films like HIGH NOON, NOT AS A STRANGER, A LION IS IN THE STREETS and THE DEFIANT ONES, something that neither Boris Karloff nor Bela Lugosi did during the 1950s--Karloff being busy with television and the stage, and Lugosi sinking into an endlessly painful morass.) Here, Lon does a fine job with his limited dialogue and then has a heyday as the revived-from-the-dead mute who pummels and THROWS his victims to their deaths (in some of the most humorous killing scenes in horror-film history). The scenes of Lon crawling around in the L.A. storm-drain system and the incredible ending in which the Butcher is cooked alive at a power plant (destroying a multi-million dollar complex while the police recover a fraction of that in gangster's loot) are highlights in this sometimes dreadful yet strangely compelling and nearly always entertaining Jack Pollexfen opus! The DVD version is somewhat superior to most of the cheap VHS copies being peddled everywhere.
Rating:
Summary: One of the most entertaining "bad" horrors ever made!
Review: If you are a fan of low-budget horror and/or film noir, then you must see the struggling Lon Chaney, Jr., as the notorious Charles "Butcher" Benton! By 1956, poor Lon was accepting just about anything he could, being tormented by many demons and having been typecast so severely. (He did, however, also play several good character parts in non-horror Fifties A-films like HIGH NOON, NOT AS A STRANGER, A LION IS IN THE STREETS and THE DEFIANT ONES, something that neither Boris Karloff nor Bela Lugosi did during the 1950s--Karloff being busy with television and the stage, and Lugosi sinking into an endlessly painful morass.) Here, Lon does a fine job with his limited dialogue and then has a heyday as the revived-from-the-dead mute who pummels and THROWS his victims to their deaths (in some of the most humorous killing scenes in horror-film history). The scenes of Lon crawling around in the L.A. storm-drain system and the incredible ending in which the Butcher is cooked alive at a power plant (destroying a multi-million dollar complex while the police recover a fraction of that in gangster's loot) are highlights in this sometimes dreadful yet strangely compelling and nearly always entertaining Jack Pollexfen opus! The DVD version is somewhat superior to most of the cheap VHS copies being peddled everywhere.
Rating:
Summary: A solid 1950s sci-fi/horror film
Review: In the 1950s, there were tons of sci-fi/horror films. A few of them were outstanding (The Day the Earth Stood Still, Creature From the Black Lagoon), and some stinkers (Plan 9 From Outer Space, Bride of the Monster), but the majority of them were solid, middle-of-the-road flicks. Indestructible Man falls in this category.The film was no challenge for Chaney from an acting standpoint. He only had a few lines at the start of the film before he was rendered mute after being brought back to life in an experiment. However, he did come through by some of his facial expressions that told the viewer what he was thinking. For instance, he arrives at the office of one of his victims to find it empty. He appears frustrated, but then, he hears the elevator coming, and a satisfied smirk comes over his face. The film was definitely low budget, and Chaney was probably doing it for a payday, but it does have some good moments. The scenes in the Los Angeles sewer were suspenseful, and in some of the killings, Chaney's body language and his brutality lived up to his character's nickname of "The Butcher." It is a shame that Chaney enjoyed true stardom for only a few years with Universal in the 1940s as he played nearly every movie monster they had. He was then cast aside in character roles and movies such as this. He was a much better actor, and his talents were wasted. But, like a true professional, he took his medicine and continued to work hard, making several movies throughout his career. Indestructible Man is not for every one, but if you are a Chaney fan and love these types of movies from the 1950s, then it is a worthy addition to your collection.
Rating:
Summary: Adequate if unremarkable DVD two-fer of minor SF cheapies
Review: Indestructible Man is probably the most familiar, and beloved, of producer-director Jack Pollexfen's poverty-row epics (Neanderthal Man, Daughter of Dr. Jekyll, Atomic Brain). Pollexfen's name in the credits always means you're in no-budget-land. Another clue this time out is the preponderance of narration (indicating an absence of synch sound, of course). The movie gets what little rep it has from the casting of Lon Chaney as back-from-the-dead killer 'The Butcher' Benton, although he actually looks rather thin and haggard here (he was no doubt drinking heavily at the time), and not very threatening at all. Or as the narrator says, "like any normal person on his way to work." Robert Shayne (Neanderthal Man, Inspector Henderson on Superman) makes a brief appearance as "mad" Professor Bradshaw (assisted by Joe "Captain Binghamton" Flynn) resuscitating The Butcher; bland Casey Adams/Max Showalter (Monster that Challenged the World, Niagara) is Lt. Dick Chasen the flatfoot hero; and Ross Elliott (Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, Monster on the Campus) plays a sleazy lawyer. The movie tries for trash appeal by making The Butcher's ex-girlfriend Eva (Marion Carr) a burlesque performer, but her sweet-and-innocent manner totally undercuts any bad-girl ambience that might have been generated. Overall the movie is a bit on the dull side, with a few laughs, and a modicum of bad-movie charm. Cinematography is by John L. (Jack) Russell (Hitchcock's Psycho; Thriller TV series), though you're unlikely to be impressed by the source print: it's fairly grainy, with a slightly soft, 'dupey' look, and respectable if unremarkable grayscale, brightness, contrast, and shadow/highlight detail. There is also light-to-moderate speckling, scratching, and blemishing throughout, and the sound is merely OK, a bit on the muddy side at times. Kind of makes you wonder what exactly Roan "restored." (The box claims the movies to be "digitally mastered and restored from original film elements." ?!?). Not nearly as nice as some of their other releases (e.g. Svengali, Horror Hotel), if not disastrous either.
The Amazing Transparent Man was cult director Edgar G. Ulmer's final American film and it pretty much feels like a last gasp (it's not nearly as much fun as Beyond the Time Barrier). The mostly no-name cast ranges from annoying (loud, abrasive Douglas Kennedy as safecracker Joey Faust) to cloying (Dr. Ulof [familiar character actor Ivan Triesault] and his daughter Maria). The script is an odd mix of gangster movie cliches, soap opera melodramatics, late 50s topicality (Cold War/espionage subplotting), and Weighty Issues thematics that never really goes anywhere. The laboratory set is quite poverty-stricken, and the invisibility effects, accomplished with traveling mattes, are only mildly diverting. Other special effects are of the pantomime-and-fishing-line variety; almost cheesy enough to be funny. Almost. Legendary makeup artist Jack P. Pierce's talents are completely wasted (it was one of his last movies), and, let's face it, Ulmer is way past prime here, with precious little onscreen to distinguish this from any contemporary Dick Cunha or Herbert L. Strock picture.
At least the source print is better than that of Indestructible Man. It's actually quite decent, presented in anamorphic widescreen at approximately 1.85:1, with generally very good to excellent grayscale, sharpness, brightness, contrast, and highlight detail. The shadow detail looks a little blocked up at times, and there is some sporadic light speckling, blemishing, and scratching (mostly around reel changes), but overall the print's quite acceptable, especially considering the age and history of the film.
Bottom line: neither movie is really indispensable to a 1950s SF collection, both being of interest mainly to bad movie diehards with fairly strong constitutions. The DVD package rates a solid three. The source prints, while nothing to write home about, are basically average to slightly above (especially The ATM), and far better than the crap you typically find on a Madacy or Brentwood disc. Unfortunately, there are no menus, trailers, or any other extras, though both movies are broken into chapters. Fifties C-movie completists and Ulmer fanatics might as well go for it, mainstream consumers beware.
Rating: 
Summary: Not A Classic
Review: Stepping out of his father's shadow, Lon Chaney Jr. found initial fame and acclaim in 1940's films, 'Of Mice and Men' and 'One Million Years BC'. As a result, he was swiftly catapulted into Universal's top drawer, playing most of their classic monsters of the time. Only as the poor, tortured Larry Talbot (aka The Wolf Man) did Chaney ever find true success, and in the mid-forties, his time as top-billed status was over. Then came many film roles like this. In the thankless and mostly mute part of 'The Butcher', Chaney is brought back from the dead with 'terrifying' power. He then kills those responsible for his demise. And that's the plot. Of course, he is destroyed at the end, after being horribly scarred by an attack by a flame-thrower. But the film is stagey, with no real commitment. The supporting players don't really seem to have their hearts in it, and matters aren't helped by the 'Dragnet'-style narration that explain several less-than-vital-scenes. For Chaney, there was worse to come, but even this film is for completists only.
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