Starring: Bela Lugosi, Luana Walters, Tristam Coffin, Elizabeth Russell. Screenplay: Harvey Gates. Producer: Sam Katzman, Jack Dietz. Director: Wallace Fox. Released in 1942.
Commando Cody – Starring: George Wallace, Aline Towne, Roy Barcroft, William Bakewell. Writer: Ronald Davidson. Producer: Franklin Adreon. Director: Fred C. Bannon. Released in 1952.
Original air date: December 19, 1989
Throughout my life, watching the occasional Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode, I have been astounded by certain scenes in these awful films featured. Usually something happens that comes completely out of left field. While to me it might defy logic, I guess it could make sense in the condensed world of a 70-minute film. But still.
There’s one such scene in this first season episode, “The Corpse Vanishes.” Our plucky heroine, the stereotypically beautiful, yet nosy, reporter comments to a “dashing” medical doctor how much she’d like a June wedding. He says that can be arranged. She asks if this is a proposal. He says yes. Keep in mind, these two have only known each other for maybe a day. And half that time, he was asleep in another room. You can understand why I said “huh?” out loud the same time Joel does in the episode. “Did I really just ask her to marry me?” Tom Servo asks pretending to be the good doctor. Seriously.
Anyway, I had to get that out there, because it’s an unintentionally hilarious moment in a dull, boring, unoriginal suspense film. The writers at MST3K didn’t pick the best or brightest films to feature if their first national broadcasts, and “The Corpse Vanishes” is no exception. It’s the oldest film featured on the show, released in 1942 only months before Episode #103 – “The Mad Monster.” But it does have one big thing going for it; it’s the first episode to feature horror movie legend Bela Lugosi.
But first, Joel and the robots must watch yet another installment of “Commando Cody and the Radar Men from the Moon.” When we first left our heroes, they were about to burn to death in a rain of molten rocks on the Moon. As chapter three, “Bridge of Death,” begins, Cody and his friend escape through a tunnel that apparently was located next to them the whole time. Big surprise.
Cody and his crew then flee to Earth to warn people about the impending invasion of the Moon Men. When they land, the Moon Men’s hired henchmen attack, leading to a car chase with Cody in pursuit. The villains plant a bomb on a bridge, which explodes as Cody’s car drives across. His car plummets into the river as the third chapter ends. “Think Cody will survive?” Servo asks uninterested. In fact, Joel, Servo, and Crow seem completely indifferent in this third installment. It’s easy to see why. Once again, nothing of consequence occurs. For the 15 minutes this serial runs, the gang doesn’t say much of anything. The sparse riffs and jokes make these “Cody” shows more than a little dull.
And then there’s “The Corpse Vanishes.” In this film, which looks like it was shot in about three days, brides keep mysteriously dropping dead at the altar. Hard-nose reporter Patricia Hunter investigates and discovers the brides’ corpses keep, well, vanishing. As it turns out, a Dr. Lorenz (Lugosi) is stealing the brides for their youthful genes and implanting those genes into his elderly wife (Elizabeth Russell) to keep her young. Unfortunately, his wife is a real piece of work – she yells and cries constantly, and has a penchant for slapping random people. Why Dr. Lorenz would waste his time with her is beyond me. “He's been injecting her with young and pretty, now he should start injecting her with smart and nice,” Servo comments.
In true mad scientist tradition, Lorenz keeps three helpers in his large mansion – a retarded hunchback, a midget and their drugged-out mom. Hunter’s investigation (because why should the cops investigate vanishing corpses when they can let the local beat reporter do it) brings her to Lorenz’s house, as well as into the company of a friendly Dr. Foster (Tristam Coffin), whose sole purpose in the film is to act woodenly and propose.
The only piece of interest in this film is Lugosi, who was at the crossroads of his career. He’d already hit it big with “Dracula,” but had yet to meet Ed Wood, Jr. and start doing his notoriously terrible movies. Lugosi was earning a reputation as a difficult actor; his addiction to pain killers really started to kick into full swing around this time. He doesn’t have to do too much here, just speak his lines in that trademark Hungarian accent and glower menacingly at the camera. Even doing these simple gestures, he’s really entertaining. I guess the guy had a gift.
Like the previous episodes, the riffs are far and few between. The writers feel the need to over explain their jokes on a number of occasions, as if they don’t trust their audience yet. This will certainly change as they’ll begin throwing the most obscure jokes out there without explanation. Still, the episode has its moment. When the mother of a bride demands protection from the chief of police, Joel quips “You should have discussed that with your daughter earlier.” The dying brides even offer up a few good riffs, as when Servo impersonates the minister by saying “You may now bury the bride” at the end of the ceremony. But the funniest bits come when Joel and the bots impersonate Lugosi’s accent saying ridiculous things. At one point, Dr. Lorenz dismisses what Hunter has seen in his house as her imagination. “Our minds play strange tricks on us sometimes,” he says. Joel responds in the Lugosi voice: “Yeah, like that wiener- between-the-fingers trick.”
The sketches improve a little from previous episodes. Joel develops the “chiro gyro” for neck pain relief, and the Mads create a flaming corsage during the invention exchange. Another good sketch has Servo and Crow reading “Tiger Bot” magazine and discussing the multi-page spread on “Star Trek’s” Data. The sketch where Joel gets a haircut and Crow impersonates the banter that goes on in barber shops goes nowhere and unfortunately goes on forever.
It’ll be a little while before this show kicks into high gear, but I’ll be patient. With these low ratings, you probably think I hate these early episodes. I really don’t. Even though it’s slow going so far, it’s interesting to see how this show developed into the powerhouse it became
Rating: *1/2
Side note: This episode is available on Shout! Factory’s box set Volume XVI.
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