Bride of the Monster

Figure 1:Poster 

Bride of the Monster (1955) Directed by Ed Wood, is a very strange film. From the beginning as a spectator, it is hard to figure out how the movie will pan out.  We are shown the main antagonist Dr. Eric Vornoff (Bela Lugosi), whose goal it is to create and atomic superhuman, as an effort to create a master race that he can rule. To do this he experiments on all who come close to his home/laboratory. For some reason he has an octopus creature, the creature is seen as the monster, which makes the later acts of the story a bit confusing. It would seem the octopus creature is a plot device only there so the police will investigate all the missing people, and find the doctor.

At some point in the film the main officer's wife Janet (Loretta King), who is a reporter and goes to investigate the monster, tracking it down to the doctor's house. The doctor kidnaps her and hypnotises her, with the goal of turning her into an atomic superhuman. This is fine and makes sense, but at some point he decides that she can become a bride as a super human. So he gives her a wedding dress. It would seem that the monster actually refers to the doctor and she will be his bride, but the film does not really take the time to flesh out this idea. When the doctor summons Janet she is just wearing a wedding dress, it feels almost as if they named the film before actually coming up with the plot, so they had to shoe horn in the bride. The film doesn't really make what it was going for clear, it also leaves questions unanswered, in the form of minor and major plot holes.

A somewhat redeeming factor of this film has to be the camera and editing work, because although the plot starts to lose itself, the film is still shot very well. The monster also wasn't too bad, I could see what they were going for, but i don't really think the octopus was a necessary plot device. Its seems that the octopus creature is just used as exploitation, even though the plot can‘t support it.

Overall the film was enjoyable to watch, I found myself thinking that it is so bad that it is good. But I do feel that it would be a better film without the octopus monster, replacing that with just the metaphorical monster, the doctor. 

Illustration list

Figure1 Poster:Poster(1955)[poster].

at:https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/43/Bride_of_the_Monster_(1956_movie_poster).jpg (accessed on 11/11/2015)