ksf-2 Big bucket of hollywood stars in this one! Fay Wray, from King Kong! Glenda Farrell, Frank McHugh. Strange coloring in this one... the backgrounds are blue, due to the color process, but there are mostly pinks where the other colors ought to be. Shenanigans at the wax museum owned by Igor and Worth ( Atwill and Ed Maxwell). Worth wants to collect the insurance money by burning up the museum, but Atwill is much more attached to the shop, and doesn't like that idea. This was before Frank McHugh had really gone off on his own style of comedy... he's a little more serious here, as the big shot at the newspaper. Glenda Farrell comes on really strong here, always on the go, trying to get the big scoop. It's pretty good. they keep remaking this film, so the story must be pretty solid. Directed by Michael Curtiz... this was about halfway through his career. had started in the silents, and made many a talkie. Curtiz had won best director for Casablanca (and rightfully so !). Wax Museum shows on Turner Classic now and then.

arfdawg-1 The Plot. In London, sculptor Ivan Igor struggles in vain to prevent his partner Worth from burning his wax museum...and his 'children.' Years later, Igor starts a new museum in New York, but his maimed hands confine him to directing lesser artists. People begin disappearing (including a corpse from the morgue); Igor takes a sinister interest in Charlotte Duncan, fiancée of his assistant Ralph, but arouses the suspicions of Charlotte's roommate, wisecracking reporter Florence.By any estimate, this is not a good film. I'm convinced the good reviews have everything to do with this film being a curio in two strip technicolor.To be honest, this genre would fare far better in black and white.

jarrodmcdonald-1 Lionel Atwill, Fay Wray and Glenda Farrell encounter strange goings-on in two-strip Technicolor. Due to the technology, the blending of green and blue actually gives the story a more appropriately sinister look. But it is all very anachronistic. In several scenes, we are met with Miss Farrell acting more like a depression-era news hound than a reporter from an earlier era. Miss Wray also seems to act and look a little too contemporary. But she is very good, though given less screen time than her female costar (despite Wray having higher billing). Director Michael Curtiz often cuts to medium shots of the characters. He seems to realize that the true ambiance of this story does not depend on dramatic close-ups, but rather emanates from the characters and their space filled with bizarre energy. This does not necessarily involve an overdressed set, which is something that does bog down the remake.

bkoganbing One of the early two strip color features was this horror classic Mystery Of The Wax Museum. This film starts with a prologue where Lionel Atwill gets into a fight with his partner in Paris and the Wax Museum they own there burns down with both sustaining injuries. Like the Phantom Of The Opera Atwill like Lon Chaney and later Claude Rains and Herbert Lom regards his wax statues as a father does a child.Fast forward to twelve years later where after instructing people to work as he did, he's ready to open shop again in New York. But something about Atwill's operation attracts reporter Glenda Farrell who apparently was doing a dress rehearsal for her later Torchy Blane series. Let's say his figures are way too realistic.Fay Wray who is Farrell's friend is put in as much in harm's way as she was with that giant ape on top of the Empire State Building that same year. And speaking of the Phantom Of The Opera the ending of this film was taken right from said source.Atwill like Claude Rains gives a marvelous performance of a man demented by tragedy. He really dominates the scenes he's in. Farrell and Joan Blondell in their time at Warner Brothers played a lot of the same roles. You could have cast Blondell here and it wouldn't be noticed. Fay Wray did well by her part.But despite all in watching Mystery Of The Wax Museum I saw something I never thought I would see in a film. Frank McHugh who plays Farrell's editor actually gets the girl in a film. Now that alone is worth seeing Mystery Of The Wax Museum.