Copyright 1957 by American-International. New York opening at the Paramount (would you believe? How the mighty have tumbled!): 29 January 1958. U.S. release: November 1957. U.K. release through Anglo-Amalgamated: floating from March 1958. Banned in Australia. Censored to 68 minutes in the U.K. Original running time: 74 minutes.
U.K. release title: TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN.
SYNOPSIS: From the spare parts of dead teenagers, Professor Frankenstein assembles a human form, bringing it to life by electricity. But after the monster commits several murders, the good professor decides to kill the creature and start all over.
COMMENT: A box-office follow-up to producer Cohen's 1957 offering, I Was a Teenage Werewolf.
VIEWER'S GUIDE: Despite its "X" certificate, the British version (which deletes all five or six minutes of the horror) is okay for all. Mind you, this is not the version likely to surface.
COMMENT: One or two shocks do not a very entertaining monster movie make — especially when that m. m. has been produced on such a minuscule budget, enacted by such a second-rate cast, and directed in so stiff and stilted, plodding and pedestrian style.
In his only starring role, minor character actor Whit Bissell does tediously little with Dr Frankenstein. That was to be expected. But what we didn't anticipate was that the lovely Phyllis Coates would turn in such a disappointingly indifferent job as the heroine. Still, lumbered with Whit Bissell as her love interest, perhaps we should not judge her lackluster performance too harshly.
Hampered by risibly poor and oh-so-obvious make-up, Gary Conway registers okay as the monster.
Lothrop's photography is occasionally commendably moody, but mostly as barren of interest as Strock's lethargic direction. Langtry's dialogue is not only incessant but so numb and boring, it seems the censor was doing earnest picture-goers a big favor by banning this effort from cinemas — whose proprietors could well have been accused of taking money under false pretenses.
U.K. release title: TEENAGE FRANKENSTEIN.
SYNOPSIS: From the spare parts of dead teenagers, Professor Frankenstein assembles a human form, bringing it to life by electricity. But after the monster commits several murders, the good professor decides to kill the creature and start all over.
COMMENT: A box-office follow-up to producer Cohen's 1957 offering, I Was a Teenage Werewolf.
VIEWER'S GUIDE: Despite its "X" certificate, the British version (which deletes all five or six minutes of the horror) is okay for all. Mind you, this is not the version likely to surface.
COMMENT: One or two shocks do not a very entertaining monster movie make — especially when that m. m. has been produced on such a minuscule budget, enacted by such a second-rate cast, and directed in so stiff and stilted, plodding and pedestrian style.
In his only starring role, minor character actor Whit Bissell does tediously little with Dr Frankenstein. That was to be expected. But what we didn't anticipate was that the lovely Phyllis Coates would turn in such a disappointingly indifferent job as the heroine. Still, lumbered with Whit Bissell as her love interest, perhaps we should not judge her lackluster performance too harshly.
Hampered by risibly poor and oh-so-obvious make-up, Gary Conway registers okay as the monster.
Lothrop's photography is occasionally commendably moody, but mostly as barren of interest as Strock's lethargic direction. Langtry's dialogue is not only incessant but so numb and boring, it seems the censor was doing earnest picture-goers a big favor by banning this effort from cinemas — whose proprietors could well have been accused of taking money under false pretenses.