How sad is this?

Clever, believable, and super fun to watch. It totally has replay value.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

The acting is good, and the firecracker script has some excellent ideas.

Entertaining comedy. While I was watching this, many of the lines were said in a way that reminded me of some other people. Martin and Lewis came to mind. Bing and Bob came to mind. But then it "HIT" me. They are really, Abbott and Costello. 3-4 years early. And the act works. I am thinking that by the time A&C came along, the formula had been perfected, or at least improved on, and that the time for this type of team comedy was ready to take off. Even down to the way lines are said, many that Hugh Herbert makes down in the basement of the lighthouse, when he is alone, is totally Lou Costello. I am wondering if A&C were just mimicking this style of comedy with their own spin. Great as they were. I enjoyed them very much, as well as the others I mentioned.The movie, as a movie, is very enjoyable and moves along at a good pace. I had a good time, and that was the point, then as now.

Saw this movie in 1928 when I was ten years old with my sister 13 and cousin 8. My cousin had nightmares and ever since then has been afraid of an octopus. Why I remember this film I don't know but I do remember it. Had the pleasure of seeing it again on TCM. While it is not a very good movie, in fact probably a very poor one, the memory of having seen it way back when it first was released, was a good one. I do remember that as a kid I liked Hugh Herbert very much and, myself, would often utter his famous sound "woo-woo" much to the consternation of those around me. Hugh Herbert was in many films in his long career, I wonder how many remember him. At the very least, both my cousin and I both do.

Two detectives find themselves on an island looking for a murderer and instead find that they are entangled with a super criminal called the Octopus and a real live giant octopus. Much confusion occurs.Amusing but totally nonsensical "mystery" based upon a stage play of some sort (I would love to read it at some point). Clearly something was lost in translation since the story now transpires in a scant 54 minutes and makes as much sense as a Goon Show episode by Spike Milligan. Twist piles on twist and red herring follows red herring as great deal that is foreshadowed never happens or is changed to become something else.I do like the film I just wish that it didn't have all the ear marks of a comedy mystery since there is plenty of comedy but ultimately no real mystery. There is tension aplenty and there are a few sequences that create a nice sense of suspense and perhaps even terror (the late game revelation of the master criminal creeped me out) but the film falls apart in the end as being much ado about nothing. Its a shame since the cast that includes veteran stalwarts like Allan Jenkins and Hugh Herbert are up to the material or would have been had there been some material.Worth a look so long as you don't expect anything other than the craziness thats happening right in front of you.

How can you make a bad movie with Allan Jenkins and Hugh Herbert? We now know it's possible. The script is hopeless. The acting, aside from the two main characters, is terrible. The sets are cheap and at times seem ready to fall down. I'll bet that the film was made in less than a week.This is the classic two comics in a haunted house. The result makes Monogram's Charlie Chan series look professional and expensive. I rather like "B" films, but this is a "C." I'll wager that the kids in the Saturday matinées laughed when the fake octopus tentacles come reaching out of the wall to grab people. But why go on? This is a stinker, mercifully unavailable in standard VHS or DVD format.