Roy Del Ruth (1893–1961)

Captain Fred Allison has been in a German Prisoner of War Camp for a long time. It has been two years since he last saw Monica, a girl he met, married and bought a house with in six days before leaving for the front. It has also been a very long time since she had last wrote to him. A month after all the prisoners have been put into lock down after a failed prison break, two things change. One is that the camp gets a new commandant and the other is that Fred’s oldest and dearest friend Digby shows up. While Fred is happy to see Digby, he says little about Monica, whom Fred speaks of constantly. Unable to tell Fred that Monica had fallen in love with him, Digby escapes back to his own lines. But because of a murder that occured during his escape, he may be facing the trial of his life and also the trial by Fred who found a letter that Monica wrote to Digby. (fonte: Imdb)… (mais)

This enjoyable mad scientist / monster flick sees newly-weds Joyce (Beverly Garland) and husband Paul Webster (Richard Crane) heading off on honeymoon. When Paul receives a mysterious telegram he disappears, leaving a distraught Joyce to begin a desperate search. She eventually finds her way to a mansion deep in the Louisiana bayou where Dr Mark Sinclair (George Macready) is conducting experiments into limb restoration by injecting an alligator-derived serum into his patients. These patients include Paul who is gradually mutating into a human / alligator hybrid. "The Alligator People" is a decent little film that is competently directed by Roy Del Ruth and which benefits from excellent widescreen photography by Karl Struss that gives it a cloying, swampy atmosphere. The story is suitably engaging with plenty of enjoyable cod-scientific explanations and nonsense justifications. Beverly Garland is first class in the lead role playing it straight and serious. Lon Chaney Jr. puts in a mad turn as an alligator hating, hooked handed Cajun who rampages about drunkenly for most of the film. The make-up effects range from the excellent to the laughable: the scaly makeup during the first stage of Richard's transformation is effective but when he develops an alligator head it's more than a touch laughable.… (mais)