Binge Bones

Cry of the Werewolf (1944) RELEASED August 17, 1944 RUNTIME 63 mins  DIRECTOR Henry Levin  WRITERS Charles O'Neal (screenplay), Griffin Jay (screenplay)  STARS Nina Foch, Stephen Crane, Osa Massen COUNTRY United States LANGUAGE English  STUDIO Columbia Pictures GENRES Horror Streaming on: YouTube The plot: A young Romani woman turns into a wolf because that's the coolest fucking way to destroy your enemies. Random observations:  There aren't enough female werewolf movies Come on, Hollywood! (Or Pittsburgh!) The ones that we have are great, but they don't come out often enough. #gimmemoregingersnaps This film marks the first appearance of a female as a werewolf in a talkie! WTG, Nina Foch! (You might remember her from An American in Paris.) The setting is in New Orleans, Louisiana but is very recognizable as a Hollywood backlot.  Twice-married-to Lana Turner leading man Stephen Crane is really the only actual terrible thing about this movie. It often fe...

  The Mad Monster (1942) RELEASED May 15, 1942 RUNTIME 77 mins  DIRECTOR Sam Newfield  WRITER Fred Myton (screenplay)  STARS Johnny Downs, George Zucco, Anne Nagel  COUNTRY United States LANGUAGE English  STUDIO Sigmund Neufeld Productions GENRES Horror Streaming on: Amazon Prime, Epix, FlixFling, TubiTV, Sling TV, DIRECTV The plot: A simple-minded handyman (who can only be described as "the obvious inspiration for Torgo") gets turned into a revenge exacting werewolf by a mad scientist. Random observations: After watching 1921's Destiny directed by Fritz Lang this morning, it's quite noticeable that the film quality of this movie has degraded greatly since the '40s and could do with a facelift. However, part of the charm of the early 40's b-movies of this budget lies in the imperfections themselves.  If you watch this film on Amazon, please note that there are no closed captions available. The soundscape of this film is akin to an arctic wolf sanc...