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I don’t go out of my way to reference Mystery Science Theater 3000, but there are times when I find it necessary. The Devil Bat is one of those cases. This movie didn’t actually appear on MST3K, but it definitely feels like it could have. Movies very much like it did appear on the show. I am put in mind of a Bela Lugosi clunker called The Corpse Vanishes that has a fairly similar plot in a lot of respects. The Devil Bat is no worse than that one, and certainly not a whole lot better.
This is yet another in a series of films that gives us Bela Lugosi as a respected scientist of some sort who is secretly completely insane. Lugosi in this case is Dr. Paul Carruthers, a chemist who lives in a small town called Heathville and who works for a cosmetics company. What we will learn eventually is that the company has made a fortune off of the formulas of Carruthers for which he took a $10,000 payoff (it’s worth noting that in today’s dollars, that’s close to a quarter million). Anyway, now that the company has made bank from his ideas, Carruthers decides he is being disrespected and wants revenge.
The method of revenge is a bizarre one. Essentially, he grows bats to a massive size, then trains them to attack a particular odor. Then, using his skills as a chemist, he creates a shaving lotion that incorporates that odor and gives it to the members of the family that own the cosmetics company. Once they’ve used the shaving lotion (and he makes sure that they have), he releases his trained bats to attack, and they do, clawing at their victims’ throats and killing them.
So, it’s ridiculous even though it’s pretty fun. Working the case are reporter Johnny Layton (Dave O’Brien) and his photographer “One-Shot” McGuire (Donald Kerr). Because we can’t get from the front of the film to the back without a romance, Johnny is going to end up going after Mary Heath (Suzanne Kaaren), the daughter of the cosmetics mogul. To keep things fair, One-Shot will be romantically attached to Mary’s maid, Maxine (Yolande Donlan).
So, in our short running time, we’re going to get a few members of the family business bumped off thanks to the giant bats. We’re also going to get some wacky shenanigans with our reporter/photographer combo, and most of this is going to come from the obvious comic character of One-Shot. Eventually, when we start running out of victims we don’t care about and instead get to Mary Heath and Johnny Layton, everyone is going to get a little bit smarter and we’re going to get the ending promised by the opening of the film.
So what on Earth does this have to do with The Corpse Vanishes mentioned at the start? That’s a fair question. On the surface, there’s not a lot that is clearly similar between the films aside from Bela Lugosi, but there’s a lot here that can be talked about. Both films feature Lugosi in a scientist/medical doctor role (he’s a physician in both films) who is conducting weird experiments. In this, he’s looking for revenge while in Corpse he’s trying to keep his wife youthful, but in both cases, he’s bringing a lot of misfortune on the people around him. He’s also someone who uses his hobby to do so. In Devil, he clearly works with genetics. In Corpse, he’s an amateur plant hybridizer, so both films involve some genetic manipulation of something, be that a bat or an orchid. There’s also a subplot in both films where one of the characters gets involved with a reporter, and both go to the photographer for their comic relief.
This is a dumb movie, but it’s also exactly what is expected. Weird science, dangerous Bela Lugosi, and murders on the wing. Anyone expecting something life changing needs to really look more carefully for a film that’s going to do that. If the name didn’t tell you this was going to be exactly what it is, phony bat on a wire and all, you’re just not paying attention.
Why to watch The Devil Bat: I mean…genetic bat mutations!
Why not to watch: It’s pretty dumb.