The townsfolk who live near Frankenstein's castle decide to finally finish the job and blow it to the ground. Ygor who lives in the rubbles manages to escape and in doing so discovers the Monster in a sulphur pit. So Ygor and the monster head to the town of Vasaria to see if Ludwig Frankenstein (the son of Henry Frankenstein and brother of Baron Wolf Frankenstein) will help them out and cure the monster. This means finding him a new brain, and Ygor wants the doctor to put his brain into the monster.
Even a weak "Frankenstein" sequel is a diverting, and highly amusing offering. No matter how much they re-use the old-hat formula, the imaginative and crisp look of the film's set designs (not up to par with earlier films though) and effects always seems to win out for me. And how can I forget the iconic monster itself! This time we have Lon Chaney Jr. taking over Boris Karloff's mantle, and there's a splendid cast on hand featuring Ralph Bellamy, Lionel Atwill, Cedric Hardwicke and a scene chewing Bela Lugosi as the enthusiastically sly Igor. Lugosi is the burning flair, and while Lon Chaney does a resourceful job. He's no Karloff. The material is not as deep and thoughtful as it's highly regarded predecessors, but the patchwork script ends up turning into b-grade shenanigans shooting at the straight and narrow. At least the nippy pace makes sure it never truly flags about, and there are some effective set-pieces laid out by Earl C. Kenton's able direction. The music score on the other hand, can fall into the overkill category and tries to hard to leave a mark in every possible sequence. There's no harm to the legacy, but neither is it an impressive addition. But otherwise I've always enjoyed these Universal monster features, no matter what the quality is.
Even a weak "Frankenstein" sequel is a diverting, and highly amusing offering. No matter how much they re-use the old-hat formula, the imaginative and crisp look of the film's set designs (not up to par with earlier films though) and effects always seems to win out for me. And how can I forget the iconic monster itself! This time we have Lon Chaney Jr. taking over Boris Karloff's mantle, and there's a splendid cast on hand featuring Ralph Bellamy, Lionel Atwill, Cedric Hardwicke and a scene chewing Bela Lugosi as the enthusiastically sly Igor. Lugosi is the burning flair, and while Lon Chaney does a resourceful job. He's no Karloff. The material is not as deep and thoughtful as it's highly regarded predecessors, but the patchwork script ends up turning into b-grade shenanigans shooting at the straight and narrow. At least the nippy pace makes sure it never truly flags about, and there are some effective set-pieces laid out by Earl C. Kenton's able direction. The music score on the other hand, can fall into the overkill category and tries to hard to leave a mark in every possible sequence. There's no harm to the legacy, but neither is it an impressive addition. But otherwise I've always enjoyed these Universal monster features, no matter what the quality is.