Body Part Problems (Part 1)

...well, "soon" is a relative term.  But eventually, soon turns into now!

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The Monster Maker (1944)

Grade: C-

Mr. Anthony Lawrence (Ralph Morgan) is an acclaimed concert pianist. Like most pianists (except those noble souls who specialize in rolling oranges across the black keys), he depends on his hands for his livelihood.


(Oh, don't look quite so smug, Mister.)

Naturally, he has a nubile, beautiful (or "beautiful") young daughter, Patricia.  And naturally, she has a high-powered fiancé, who's also Mr. Lawrence's manager.

("Well, I think I've earned the right to wear a robe in mixed company.")

Enter Dr. Igor Markoff (J. Carrol Naish), the inevitably evil Slav, who becomes infatuated with young Miss Pat.  Naturally.  (This is a very natural movie, you understand.)


(Clearly up to no good. You can see it in the eyes.)

This despite the fact that he already has a female assistant, Maxine (Tala Birell), who's completely in love with him -- and who, at least to P.'s way of thinking, is actually more fetching than the nubile young inamorata.  But -- naturally! -- Pat's a dead ringer for Markoff's late wife, so Igor comes a-courtin'.


(A Poe attempt at winning the young lady's heart.)

Meeting with nothing but refusal, he implements a sneaky plan.  You see, Dr. Markoff is the world's leading specialist in acromegaly, AKA the thing that turned André Roussimoff into "the Giant", and is the only man alive who knows how to treat it...or inflict it.


(It was the Vitameatavegamin of its day, really.)

With the aid of a quick injection, and the (all-natural!) power of pituitary dysfunction, Markoff turns Mr. Lawrence's hands into gnarled, useless appendages...and before long, most of the rest of him becomes equally disfigured.  This, of course, throws the domestic life of the Lawrence family into chaos.


(Annoying print defect, or caption contest opportunity? You decide!)

Will Dr. Markoff get what he wants by blackmailing the pianist, and sundering the young couple apart?


"You will be mine, you will be mine, all mine."

Will Mr. Lawrence, desperate for relief from the torture of acromegaly, give in to temptation and sacrifice his daughter's happiness for his career?


(...John Hurt he ain't.)

Will Glenn Strange be used as anything more than vaguely menacing window dressing?


"You rang?"

Well, you'll have to watch The Monster Maker to find out.  But we were pleasantly surprised by Maxine's character arc...


(That difficult moment when you realize your boss is evil. We've all been there.)

...despite her penchant for suicidal "I'm going to tell everyone what you did!" rants -- never a good idea in this kind of movie -- and her adversarial relationship with the gorilla that conveniently resides in Dr. Markoff's lab.


(One could write a master's thesis on the symbolic freight of this image alone.)

It's little more than a potboiler, but believe me, we've seen worse!