Expected more

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

A Major Disappointment

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

I DVR'd this movie and liked it a great deal. Boris delivers the goods as a doctor who performs surgery in a THEATER. He does not use anesthesia because it had not been invented yet. So he has to cut people while they squirm in pain. Eventually he invents an anesthesia and gets hooked on it. The more he inhales the stranger he becomes. IN once scene he laughs hysterically and cuts his arm. Yes, he FEELS NO PAIN. There is a large BLUTO looking guy who hoodwinks him into coming to his strange house of sin. At this house there are TONS of wounded people who hobble around. There is this one guy who smothers folks with pillows and sells the bodies to the local hospital. Meanwhile the BORIS KARLOFF continues to dwindle into the depths of madness. Great movie!!

This is a deceptive little film. First off, because it was made and sat for four years before release, you might be inclined to think it is a dud--but that's far from true. The film is very good--good enough to almost earn an 8. Second, while the film has some horrific scenes and features Boris Karloff and Christopher Lee, it is not a horror film but more of a drama. So if you see it, don't expect monsters or madness--instead, there are just bad people and good people doing bad things.The film is set in 1840 and Karloff plays an exceptionally skilled surgeon who is dismayed that there are no drugs to alleviate the suffering of patients during surgery. Basically, people were wide awake and felt EVERYTHING during surgery and amputations! This is true, as the first anesthesias didn't come about until around 1850. Despite his concerns, other doctors didn't share his enthusiasm for change, so Karloff foolishly begins experimenting on himself--inhaling a mixture of various chemicals (including opium). Not surprisingly, he becomes addicted and this once sweet man becomes an unwilling pawn in the seedy underworld.The film gets very high marks for construction, writing, direction and the performance of Karloff. There isn't much I'd change about the film, though fans of Christopher Lee might be disappointed that his role isn't that big and his character isn't that interesting (despite the fact he's a cold-blooded murderer). Give this intelligent little film a watch--it's really very good.

A surgeon, working on the very first anesthetic despite groanings from his medical colleagues and peers that the experiments would lead to certain failure, falls into drug addiction when he becomes drawn to the opium used as an ingredient within the formula. Under a drug-induced state, Dr. Bolton(Boris Karloff) is coerced into writing false death certificates signifying the loss of life from natural causes by Black Ben(Francis De Wolff) and his despicable female companion Rachel(Adrienne Corri) who thrive in the underbelly of London centered in a ugly little spot called Seven Dials..he does so, although Ben has his henchman Joe(Christoper Lee)suffocate paupers so that they can take the fresh bodies to anatomy doctors for wages. It's Burke and Haire repeated by this group all over again. When Bolton's first demonstration failed due to a patient rising from his seat and attacking the on-lookers watching the operation, due to not enough anesthesia being applied for complete unconsciousness, his medical faculty wish for his experiments to cease. Bolton's seduction with inhaling too much of the experimental anesthetic causes his surgery work to suffer, not to mention he loses sleep and scurries to the Seven Dials believing it's all an evil dream. Such as when his pocket-book, containing all his experimental notes, is lifted in Ben's grungy pub and the only way he can retrieve it is to sign a false death certificate, or when he goes to Ben in need of narcotics when the medical institution cuts him off..Bolton believes these unfortunate events are nasty members of a nightmare. The film shows Bolton's very life and career in turmoil as he makes a deal with the devil, so to speak, leading to a murder and theft as Ben & Joe plan to do away with the addicted doctor. What Ben and his cronies do not know is that Inspector Donovan(Nigel Green)is preparing to infiltrate his devious operation..but can the Inspector rescue Bolton from certain peril?Maybe the film is a bit dated in how drug addiction is portrayed(certainly one can see that in a more modern based picture, the ante would be raised and we'd see a much uglier side of addiction and grotesque behavior than presented in this film), but I thought Karloff does a fine job of showing a man with conviction, sorrowful and riddled with anguish at the sight of his patients suffering from such agony and pain through the horrors of surgery and amputation. Although his ideals and notions for creating a painless surgical method are challenged as fleeting and unrealistic, Karloff shows the dogged determination. Yet, Karloff also shows the downward spiral of a man swindled by those willing to take advantage of his addiction and one who can not acknowledge the very fact he is an addict. Good support from Betta St. John as Bolton's dedicated servant/friend Susan and Francis Matthews as his son Jonathan(the film has a budding romantic sub-plot between Susan and Jonathan). Christopher Lee, not surprisingly, is a revelation as the creepy, intense murderer Joe and De Wolff as the slimy Seven Dials boss always carrying a devilish grin, is also quite memorable. Pretty good little film, I must say. It seems the filmmakers put a lot of heart and thought into this..although, it doesn't hurt when you have Karloff anchoring your film and Lee stealing every scene he's in with that commanding presence.

Well, as it turned out, I needn't have worried that I would eventually regret my purchase of the Criterion set "Monsters And Madmen" - as this film proved superior to THE HAUNTED STRANGLER (1958).Featuring literate dialogue and a more realistic story (incidentally, inspired by the book "Triumph Over Pain" on which Preston Sturges also based his THE GREAT MOMENT [1944]!), the film was made for something like twice the budget of THE HAUNTED STRANGLER and had the advantage of being shot on existing sets at the MGM-British studios. All of this allowed for an evocative and meticulous recreation of mid-19th century London, highlighting Geoffrey Faithful's cinematography and Anthony Masters' production design. The film's opening sequence creates an admirable mood of mystery and dread, which is generally sustained throughout - propelled considerably by Buxton Orr's powerful score. Besides, here we have a truly remarkable cast - in my opinion, one of the best ever assembled for a horror film: Boris Karloff, Betta St. John, Francis Matthews, Christopher Lee (impressive as the quietly-spoken black-clad resurrectionist), Francis de Wolff, Adrienne Corri, Yvonne Romain, Frank Pettingell, Finlay Currie, Basil Dignam and Nigel Green.While the film has some thematic points of reference with the Jekyll & Hyde story (already dealt with in THE HAUNTED STRANGLER!), Karloff's mad doctor cycle over at Columbia during the early 40s (though all of these had contemporary settings), as well as THE BODY SNATCHER (1945), it manages to hold its own perfectly well - and, as such, succeeds in avoiding the pitfalls of cinematic convention into which THE HAUNTED STRANGLER falls (rather than physically turn into a monster, here Karloff becomes addicted to chloroform). The film has been much criticized for its supposed gore, but it's really quite tame (perhaps it's the intensity of the operation scenes that does the trick, suggesting a lot more than it actually shows); I know the present version is slightly incomplete, but even the few seconds of deleted footage found among the supplements isn't all that graphic! Even so, I really liked the way in which slow motion is utilized for the climax when acid is thrown into a character's face.The accompanying Audio Commentary is just as entertaining as all the Tom Weaver/Richard Gordon tracks I've heard: most fascinating here is the discussion centering around the film's chequered history - CORRIDORS OF BLOOD (by the way, though also known as DOCTOR FROM SEVEN DIALS, it was never shown under that title) was released in the U.S. as part of a double-bill with the low-brow Italian horror WEREWOLF IN A GIRLS' DORMITORY (1961), which I watched a few months back (on the other hand, THE HAUNTED STRANGLER was paired with another Gordon production, the maligned but quite effective sci-fi FIEND WITHOUT A FACE [1958], also available as a "Special Edition" from Criterion). Just as informative are the separate interviews featuring director Day and co-star Francis Matthews (he hates his performance and, amusingly, implores the audience not to watch the film merely for his sake!) and the audio-only career overview with starlet Yvonne Romain (I was surprised to learn that she's half-Maltese and, apart from enjoying her recollections of the various distinguished leading men throughout her career, I was especially glad that she mentioned the ironic fact that Oliver Reed - with whom she appeared four times in film and TV - died in Malta).Finally, I didn't generally mind the fact that both this and THE HAUNTED STRANGLER were presented full-frame rather than being slightly matted so as to duplicate their theatrical exhibition - but there was quite a bit of overscan during the credit sequence of CORRIDORS OF BLOOD...