"Law of the Underworld" director Lew Landers' World War II homeland comedy "The Boogie Man Will Get You," starring Boris Karloff, Peter Lorre, and Larry Parks, qualifies as an obvious effort to capitalize on playwright Joseph Kesselring's hysterical Broadway farce "Arsenic and Old Lace." Incidentally, director Frank Capra produced a cinematic version of "Arsenic and Old Lace" in 1941, but Warner Brothers delayed its release until the Kesselring play wrapped up its Broadway run in 1944. Karloff couldn't appear in the Capra film because he was acting on Broadway in the play. "Stalag 17" scenarist Edwin Blum penned his screenplay from an adaptation by Paul Gangelin based on a story by Hal Fimberg & Robert B. Hunt. Interestingly, Gangelin wrote dozens of Roy Rogers and Gene Autry oaters as well as the Johnny Weissmuller epic "Tarzan's Secret Treasure." This low-budget, black & white, Columbia Pictures' release chronicles the endeavors of a looney professor struggling to perfect a machine that will convert ordinary American citizens into 'supermen' for the Allied war effort. Biology Professor Nathaniel Billings (Boris Karloff of "Frankenstein") has been experimenting on human subjects to create "the ultimate specimen of human perfection, eternally young, immune from disease, the super superman himself." Unfortunately, every participant in his bogus experiments stumbles from his machine to topple face down on the floor. Furthermore, not only has Billings failed to achieve his laudable but outlandish scheme, but he has also stashed the bodies in a concealed room. Billings preys on traveling salesmen since they are transients that nobody will miss. The action takes place in an authentic colonial tavern era 1754 near the Canadian border that Billings has been trying to sell. Fortunately for Billings, a young woman, Winnie Layden (Miss Jeff Donnell of "The Phantom Thief"), wants to buy the venerable place so she can turn it into a hotel. Billings is willing to sell the place to Winnie on one condition: if she will allow him to remain on the premises to complete his experiments. When she inquires about his experiments, Billings explains in roundabout terms that he is "shaking the unshakable laws of existence."
Billings summons Dr. Arthur Lorencz (Peter Lorre of "The Maltese Falcon") to complete the sale. A man of diverse talents and occupations, Lorencz makes loans, sells insurance, and serves as the town's sheriff, doctor, notary public, mayor, coroner, and justice of the peace. He carries a Siamese kitten around in his frock coat. As the sale is poised to transpire, Winnie's ex-husband Bill (Larry Parks of "The Black Parachute") bursts in and inform his ex-wife that the Army has drafted him. He has ten days to straighten out his affairs. Principally, Bill wants Winnie to remarry him. He objects to the sale just as Winnie's first guest, J. Gilbert Brampton (Don Beddoe of "Pillow Talk"), enters in search of accommodations. Bill doesn't trust Professor Billings, and he calls him "as slippery as an eel dipped in lard." Winnie doesn't share his suspicions. Bill's curiosity prompts him to nose around Billings' basement laboratory, and he discovers a corpse, alerts Winnie, and they contact Lorencz. He pins on his sheriff's badge and brandishes a revolver. Lorencz catches Billings in his laboratory and learns that the professor has sacrificed five souls for the sake of science. When he accuses him of murder, Billings recoils with indignation. "You may not approve of what you choose to call my unorthodox scientific methods, but surely you know I'm no murderer." Indeed, Billings isn't sure either his latest subject or his four predecessors are dead. He argues, "one good thing about my machine it preserves them beautifully." Billings protests when Lorencz labels him a "homicidal maniac." He calls them "heroes, immortal martyrs of my great experiment." Basically, Billings says he wanted to turn his test subjects into the equivalent of Captain America. "But for one minute little error, that man at this very moment, by sheer dynamic force would be flying around this room like an inspired plane under his own power." Lorencz changes his mind about Billings and his hare-brained experiments. He helps him hide the latest test subject in the old wine cellar. Meantime, Bill believes Billings is trying to convince Winnie to sell the house back to him by employing scare tactics. Winnie Boris Karloff has a field day spoofing a mad scientist, and Edwin Blum provides some clever dialogue that makes the antics of everybody look comical.
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