Before I Hang

One of my sci-fi/horror/fantasy reviews written 50 years ago: Directed by Nick Grinde; Produced by Wallace MacDonald for Columbia Pictures release. Screenplay by Robert Andrews from Karl Brown's story; Photography by Benjamin Kline; Edited by Charles Nelson; Music directed by Morris Stoloff. Starring Boris Karloff, Evelyn Keyes, Bruce Bennett, Everett Van Sloan, Pedro De Cordoba and Don Beddoe. Follow-up science fiction to "The Man They Could Not Hang", with a nearly identical plot. Boris again is a scientist tampering with the mysteries of life. It's amazing that the fans could stomach such a reprise within a year of the original film's release. Plot is slightly different from the previous film, since here Boris is tackling the problem of aging and facing a euthanasia rap. Another switch is that instead of coming back from the dead. Boris as Dr. Garth attempts to avoid dying entirely.

Before I Hang (1940) ** 1/2 (out of 4) A kind, elderly scientist (Boris Karloff) is sentenced to hang for a mercy killing but with his last three weeks to live the warden allows him to work with another scientist (Edward Van Sloan) in hopes that he can complete the blood serum he was working on, which could make people younger. Before hanging, Karloff tries it on himself and it works but with deadly side effects. This Columbia cheapie is pretty good during the first half of its 62-minutes but the second half really falls apart as it goes for every cheap cliché in the book. The first half mostly takes place inside the prison and this is where the film is most entertaining. It was great fun seeing Karloff and Van Sloan working together again as they had previous worked together in the classic Universal films of the early 30s. The second half of the film settles into a Jekyll/Hyde type of film and this is where it gets routine and rather boring. The plot itself is rather silly especially how Karloff gets all these privileges inside the prison and is eventually able to get out. Evelyn Keyes and Van Sloan are good in their supporting roles but it's Karloff that steals the film. He turns in another very good performance and especially in the first half when he's playing someone twice his actual age. When it's all said and done there's nothing overly special about this film but it does manage to keep you slightly entertained in its short running time.

Another in the series of mad scientist movies starring Boris Karloff for Columbia, this was directed by Nick Grinde and written by Robert Hardy Andrews. Karloff is Dr. John Garth and he's on trial for mercy killing a friend, predating the right to die controversy by decades. He had been trying to invent a cure for aging but it was too late to give it to the patient. He asks the judge to allow him to live as he's close to this medication, but he is due to be hung in three weeks. Yet with support from the warden (Ben Taggart) and Dr. Ralph Howard (Edward Van Sloan), he is able to take the blood of an executed murderer and turn it into a serum that reverses the effects of aging just in time to be saved from the gallows. If you're wondering, "Will that killer's blood make Dr. Garth a killer?" you don't have to wait all that long to find out. He kills Dr. Howard and a fellow prisoner, which looks like he was the hero, and he's soon released to live with his daughter Martha (Evelyn Keyes). Dr. Garth then tries to convince each of his elderly friends to let him help them escape the ravages of age. When they refuse, his evil blood takes over and he kills them. Convinced that he could even kill Martha, he runs back to the prison and is killed trying to get back inside, in effect killing himself to protect his friends and daughter. There are nearly five similar movies in a year starring Karloff as a scientist driven to murder. I'd watch them all and more.

A routine but well-staged programmer with the inimitable Boris Karloff as an elderly, mild-mannered scientist who unsurprisingly becomes a homicidal maniac when he uses himself as a guinea pig for a new serum he has developed to prolong life - a serum which, surprise, surprise, contains the blood of a hanged murderer. It's not long before Karloff is growing younger before our very eyes, but he also finds himself becoming possessed by a murderous spirit which causes him to strangle all those who are close friends or relatives. What follows is a string of shocking murders, but at a sixty minute running time it's not long before the police are on the case to hunt Karloff down. The same plot - or at least a variation of it - was already a bit clichéd by the time this movie was made, but that doesn't stop it from being entertaining. There's a good pacing, with no scenes dragging as they tend to do from this period, and at least there are plenty of opportunity for chills and scares thanks to Karloff's performance. Here, Karloff is a tragic monster, a kind of Jekyll and Hyde, and Karloff's sympathetic portrayals of screen villains and monsters were always what he did best; you end up caring for his character, and thus become involved in the movie. BEFORE I HANG is no exception, and Karloff's strong acting makes the whole movie worthwhile; furthermore, as a policeman in the film says, Karloff is the only person to send a chill down one's spine whilst being polite - his understated menace is highly effective, and the scenes in which his whole visage grows locked and his eyes madly staring are great stuff. The supporting cast is a strong one, including genre veterans Evelyn Keyes as Karloff's unsuspecting daughter, and Dracula's own Van Helsing, Edward Van Sloan, as a scientist friend of Karloff's. There are some atmospheric moments to enjoy, my favourite coming when Karloff escapes through the fog, his eyes staring almost luminously in the dark with madness. Plenty of macabre touches and Karloff's commanding performance highlight a minor, but efficient, low-budget horror yarn from a forgotten studio.

While the 1939 Nick Grinde film "The Man They Could Not Hang" dealt with the story of a kindly scientist who vows revenge after his experiment with a mechanical heart is interrupted, this one takes a similar theme to new twists and turns out to be much better. The story opens with Karloff being sentenced to death for aiding an elderly man in "assisted suicide" which is labeled here as mercy killing. Karloff goes to prison and goes to work for the prison's doctor, keeping his experiment going as he prepares to die. On the day of his execution, he is sentenced to life in prison instead, and gladly continues his experimentation of aiding the elderly, unaware that the serum of a dead killer he had implanted in himself has poisoned his mind, making him do quite the opposite than what he originally intended. There's a sad look in the eye of the classic pianist Karloff visits to implant the serum in to test him and improve the quality of his life. The vulnerability and trust in this man is a quiet visual that will remain in my mind's eye when I think of this film. There are some touching realizations of how pathetic we become as our bodies age and mind fights to remain strong in spite of physical pain. Karloff literally becomes "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" as he struggles between the good doctor and the maniacal killer in doing what he wants to do for society and doing what the killer's poisoned blood did to make the dead prisoner kill in the first place. As fast moving as the predecessor, this isn't based upon the revenge plot which dominated and weakened the first film, but more on how good intentions are sometimes the pathway to hell when the rules of the universe aren't followed. Karloff goes between good and evil with ease, and his performance is one of his best. The doctor may not be mad, but his experiments will certainly drive him that way.

source: Before I Hang

Nick Grinde directs Boris Karloff for the third time in a familiar-sounding tale of Dr. John Garth, who was sentenced to death for a mercy killing, who nonetheless is allowed by the prison warden to experiment with his serum using the blood of an executed murderer. Garth uses it on himself however, and it proves a success, but has the unfortunate side-effect of periodically turning him into a killer. After one such murder(which is blamed on an escaped inmate) he is pardoned, but that doesn't stop his lapses into murder, as he decides to help some doctors with his serum, but that plan backfires. Standard thriller has a good performance from Boris, but that's all. Seen this done before, and better.

Karloff often portrayed characters who were torn between good and evil - memorably in THE BLACK ROOM where he played twins, but I have never seen him do such a great job of acting as he does in this film. It opens with him portraying an old, weak, good intentioned doctor - a sympathetic and at times pathetic character. But once he injects himself with a serum that was made from tainted blood, that of a serial murder, he changes. He is younger in appearance and action, and he is a killer, a tortured one, but a chilling one as well. It's great to watch. While the movie has the weakness of being a cheaper B-film, there is still a lot of good work in it. The camera work with the use of light and shadow is exceptional, the music is better than in some other Karloff films I've watched, and the scenes involving blood are almost too strong to watch. Often in these films there are times when you think they could have been much better with a bigger budget, but they still accomplish so much. The scene where the doctor's daughter goes into his lab and the door closes behind her, shutting us out for just a moment, gave me a chill as good as something from Alfred Hitchcock's FRENZY. So catch this little known gem and enjoy it.

Mad scientist Boris Karloff (as Dr. John Garth) is sentenced to hang, as an admitted "mercy killer". But, since his research in medicine is so important, Mr. Karloff is permitted to continue experimenting, in a laboratory behind bars. Karloff thinks human cells could be prompted to reproduce forever, curing both disease and old age. Believing he is going to be executed, Karloff uses his experimental serum on himself, and is transfused with the blood of a convicted murderer. Then, suddenly, Karloff is paroled. He becomes twenty years younger, but must fight the urge to kill, Kill, KILL! A cheap, ludicrous, but bearable star vehicle. **** Before I Hang (1940) Nick Grinde ~ Boris Karloff, Evelyn Keyes, Pedro de Cordoba

Boris Karloff would begin to repeat what might be considered the same part again and again in a series of "Mad Doctor" films he made for Columbia Pictures in the early '40s. As the elderly Dr. Garth, Boris is developing a serum which he hopes may preserve life. He's been convicted of the mercy killing of a terminally sick friend (would that make Karloff the first Dr. Jack Kevorkian?) but yet is allowed to continue his experiments while on death row with the aid of prison physician Dr. Miller (DRACULA's Edward Van Sloan). Garth decides to use himself as a guinea pig and injects himself with a serum made with the blood of a known murderer. The kindly doctor is subsequently pardoned from his crime, and the end result of his experiment produces the amazing effect of turning him into a much younger man. He has now inadvertently reversed the aging process, but the tainted formula has one slight side effect: it periodically turns him into a homicidal killer who is seized with the urge to strangle his victims. BEFORE I HANG is a decent offering in this series, though is not to be confused with the similarly-titled and superior THE MAN THEY COULD NOT HANG from 1939. **1/2 out of ****