Captive Wild Woman (1943) dir. Edward Dmytryk, Universal Pictures Company, Inc.
We've seen how the saga of Paul Dupree ends, so why not see how it starts?
Fred Mason (Milburn Stone) is an animal trainer. He's just returned from a long safari with a whole ship full of animals for John Whipple (Lloyd Corrigan) and his circus. The prize catch is an ape dubbed Cheela (Ray Corrigan), who seems to have almost human intelligence.
While Fred is overseeing the animals being taken off the boat, his fiancé Beth (Evelyn Ankers) meets him with open arms and a heavy heart. Her sister Dorthey (Martha MacVicar) is deathly ill and currently being treated by Dr. Sigmund Walters (John Carradine).
When introductions are made, Dr. Walters goes the circus. He doesn't have a hankering for crackerjacks though; no, he needs animal glands. Seems his latest experiment has died on the table, but Walters is convinced if he found a big enough animal with big enough glands and a will to live, then everything will work!
He sees Cheela and convinces a roustabout to sell him the ape. When the worker mouths off too much, Walters pushes him into the cell with the enraged primate. Taking the ape back to his sanitarium, Walters and his assistant Miss Strand (Fay Helm) get down to business. Namely, taking some glands from Dorthey and shoving them into Cheela.
Naturally this turns the ape into a shapely human female (Acquanetta). Strand protests, saying this would be little more than a beast with human form. It needs a mind, a brain! Walters agrees and decides to donate Strand's brain to this noble goal.
Dubbing her Paula Dupree, Walters shows her off at the circus. Fred is attacked by lions, prompting Paula to rush into the cage and order the big cats back. Fred hires her on the spot but when Paula spots Fred being friendly with Beth this causes Paula to rush back to her trailer in a rage. She starts to change back and soon a woman is beaten to death as if done by a wild ape...
Not bad? Better than one would think; granted the Wild Woman is if anything a reverse werewolf which is still original. Acquanetta didn't have the longest career but she did so much work with just her eyes. A crazy idea though and for 1943 still pretty dang good.
No comments:
Post a Comment