31 Days of Terror!

Let's All Go to the Lobby!™


For a Lobby Card Treat featuring:
The House of Frankenstein  (Universal, 1944)




This is my favorite of Universal's All-Star Monster Rallys. Crazed Dr. Niemann (Boris Karloff)
escapes prison with his pal Daniel (J. Carrol Naish), and together they take over
Dr. Lampini's travelling horror show (Lampini had no further use for it after his meeting
with Daniel left him all choked up). Now they have an easy way to gallivant around the
country offing their enemies. They also keep running into monsters, as seen above, starting
with Count Dracula (John Carradine).





Dr. Niemann and hunchman (get it?) Daniel on the impressive ice cavern set,
where they find The Wolf Man and The Frankenstein Monster entombed in ice
after their battle in the previous movie - Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man - left
them dam wet and cold.

Yes, I'm totally going for a Famous Monsters vibe here.





Daniel and Dr. Niemann have a conference over Ilonka (Elena Verdugo),
mainly to try and figure out who would name their kid Ilonka.



Well, we're certainly not proceeding in order here... Dr. Niemann chalks up the guard's
indifference to his needs to too much air getting to his brain.



While Daniel shows some guy the stitching in his suit, Inspector Arnz (Lionel Atwill)
shows up looking a lot like Inspector Krogh and Inspector Holtz from two other
Universal monster movies. Did Universal even have time to get Atwill's
inspector costume dry cleaned in between him wearing it in these movies?










Dr. Niemann and Daniel flank Count Dracula, whose South Creature diet has yielded
spectacular results.



The Frankenstein Monster asks Dr. Niemann if he'd care to dance. Niemann seems to
have a crick in his neck. Maybe he slept on it wrong. I mean, look at that bed.



While the Monster tries to nap, Larry Talbot (Chaney) wants to know why he had to
wait until the last lobby card to appear. Niemann, still nursing that sore neck, thinks
about changing his name to Boris Handsoff.


I miss lobby cards. It's funny, the theaters got bigger, but they use fewer promotional items now to sell the upcoming movies. What's up with that?

While we all ponder, you Can Poke Me With A Fork Cause I Am Outta Here!