Gurlyndrobb While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Billie Morin This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

Kimball Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

mark.waltz The pretty Maris Wrixon has spent the past ten years in a wheelchair because of paralysis and research doctor Boris Karloff, the pariah in his community, is doing his best to cure her. Practically all of the townspeople hate him (although he's the first one they go to in a sudden medical emergency!) and the children all fear him even though they go out of their way to throw rotten tomatoes at his house. A rash of dog disappearances have caused suspicion to be thrown at him, but when a circus fire breaks out and the caged ape escapes, Karloff sees an opportunity to find the serum he so desperately needs in a way that nobody could suspect him.This is a truly horrible movie, fortunately short, but it is almost laughable that somebody could think up such tripe. Karloff gets to try and humanize his character in a scene with one of the doctors (played by Selmer Jackson) who years ago fought his methods, and when they are standing facing each other, actually look almost identical. Jackson looked here exactly like Jack Betts who would play Karloff in the recent James Whale bio "Gods and Monsters", so that aspect absolutely distracts from the scene. Gertrude Hoffman, the old lady playing Karloff's housekeeper, only gets to whisper one line to him. She would go on to be better used as Barbara Stanwyck's murdered aunt in "The File on Thelma Jordan" and most memorably as the "lifer" who stands up to Hope Emerson in the cult classic "Caged".

MARIO GAUCI Very minor and frankly dull Boris Karloff vehicle, one of the "mad scientist" roles he specialized in during this phase of his career. The plot takes pains to render the idea of how despised his character is, presumably because of his unorthodox experiments, but I cannot fathom why – surely what he was engaged in would prove exceedingly beneficial to mankind if successful (as readily acknowledged by an authority brought in from out of town to investigate him)! A measure of the film's ambivalence in this respect is that both views will be accounted for at the very end – as Karloff's miracle cure does work, but he has had to resort to the despicable act of murder in order to procure specimens!; incidentally, this latter business and the fact that one of the protagonists is wheelchair-bound would both resurface – to infinitely infinitely greater effect – in a later Karloff picture, the Val Lewton classic THE BODY SNATCHER (1945). The titular creature, then, is seen prowling about a number of times – even after having watched Karloff stab it: where we supposed to know that he was behind subsequent killings?; my brother actually arrived at this conclusion about three-quarters of the way in…but I just could not believe Karloff would go to such extremes for Science (after all, he failed to save the immediate members of his family and had kept up the fight for a good 10 years afterwards – why should he bother so much with the rest of the world, especially since they hated him for it?!) and, in any case, being a doctor does not automatically give one a propensity for taxidermy, does it?! All things considered, this is watchable but inessential – and not nearly as much fun (in a guilty pleasure kind of way) as when Bela Lugosi did something similar i.e. in THE APE MAN (1943).

leonardfranks Basically, Boris Karloff is the only good thing about this movie, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if the makers of this film were aware of that. He truly does give a good performance, and adds a good amount of depth to an otherwise rather stereotypical character. But imagine if it had been played by anyone else: a doctor is trying to cure polio, when he is attacked by an escaped circus ape. He kills the circus ape, skins it and makes a perfect costume out of it, and then makes a remarkably unsuccessful attempt to go on a killing spree looking for spinal fluid. It's not a great concept, and no one but Karloff could have added any plausibility to it. And even with him, there are still problems. Lines like "Man... the greatest of animals" are pretty hokey and some of the throwaway scenes that don't relate to the plot (like that random guy and woman whom you never see again looking at the circus) are pretty annoying. I will also note that although there is no such thing as a convincing gorilla suit, that one is scraping the bottom of the barrel.

Michael_Elliott The Ape (1940) ** (out of 4)Boris Karloff plays a kind-hearted doctor trying to cure a woman who is paralyzed from her waist down. When a giant ape escapes from a local circus the doctor sees a woman to continue his experiments but this leads to murder. THE APE comes from Monogram and I think it's the perfect example to use if one wanted to compare the "straight" Boris Karloff to the more "over-the-top" Bela Lugosi. Lugosi would appear in Monogram's THE APE MAN, which is a very silly film that has several silly moments but it's actually entertaining thanks to the campy stuff. This film here is just incredibly stiff, lacks any real entertainment and really comes across as boring. The film seems constantly worried that they're going to hurt Karloff's good guy image and no matter what happens through his character, the screenplay is always quick to give some sort of excuse to make him look good. The character is basically a murderer but instead of just being a bad guy, the screenplay is constantly making him look better and all the excuses just leads to a rather boring story. Karloff offers up a good performance but it's certainly not enough to liven up the film or make it more interesting. The supporting cast is mostly forgettable but I'm sure some of this is due to the screenplay simply not giving them much to work with. THE APE has a pretty forgettable story and there's just no life, energy or passion to be seen anywhere. The film is certainly better made than most Monogram movies but that doesn't lead to any sort of entertainment value.