A waste of 90 minutes of my life

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Before cryogenics was a term that lay people even used Boris Karloff was using it to kill and cure cancer. In fact another medical researcher Roger Pryor is using a technique which Karloff published before he mysteriously disappeared up in the northern woods. After having the scientific community rap him on the knuckles Pryor and nurse Jo Ann Sayers are up to the place where Karloff was last heard from. It seems as though Karloff had a place on and island in the middle of a lake where he did his experiments. He and a few others including the sheriff, the coroner, and a young heir went on a boat out to said island and were never heard from again ten years earlier.What was interesting about The Man With Nine Lives is that Karloff's experiment did have some validity which Pryor's work kind of bears his theory out. That's movie science not necessarily the real thing. Still when Pryor and Sayers go out and find Karloff and the others Karloff has really gone haywire on the subject. As for the others their actions really cause what happens in the climax.This one will satisfy Boris Karloff fans and others as well.

A doctor spearheading the development of killing cancerous cells in the human body by freezing them without damaging tissue and vital organs seeks out the radical, hermit-like scientist he originally took his cue from. They eventually find each other...but first the scientist must be thawed out and revitalized after unintentionally locking himself and a group of medical and legal naysayers in his ice chamber for ten years! Rather stiff co-feature from Columbia does pass muster visually despite a low-budget--and it certainly benefits from Boris Karloff's impassioned portrayal of a determined man willing to kill to prove his scientific theories correct. There's a female nurse (and fiancée to the doctor!) on hand to make coffee and soup and scream on cue. Other ideas are bogged down by talk of formulas and equations, though the central concept is a good one. While it fails to translate into the tense thriller it was obviously supposed to be, Karloff's performance rises above the handling and makes the picture worth seeing. ** from ****

From the vantage point of today (6/21/2014) as I write this, it seems incredible that a film made in 1940 treated the subject of cryogenics as if it were as common as, well, the common cold. The opening scroll mentioned that medical science agreed that disease can be arrested and life can be prolonged by freezing human beings. I'm aware that the concept is still being researched with significant results, as in lowering body temperature to treat victims of drowning, but you'd think a whole lot more progress might have been made by now.Well I'm surprised it took me so long to run across this little Karloff gem. It turned up this morning of all places on Antenna TV, generally better known for it's airing of old TV programs from the Sixties. Actually it was in the Sixties when my dad gave me the run down on actors like Karloff, Chaney and Lugosi and I've been a fan ever since. The film includes elements of horror and sci-fi with a little bit of murder mystery to boot, featuring Karloff once again as a mad, but seemingly normal scientist working for the betterment of humanity. It's only when his work is threatened that he resorts to killing an antagonist. Actually, the scene where he shoots Bob Adams (Stanley Brown), in the back no less for destroying his formula, seemed to me to be a bit over the top. Granted, I'd be PO'd too, but gee, I don't think I'd kill anybody over it.Probably the best part of this flick was the set design of Dr. Leon Kravaal's (Karloff) impressive lab, one of the better ones this side of Frankenstein. And not just one, he had multiple labs in different parts of his house. Which made me wonder, how long would it have taken the good doctor to set up his working lab through a secret tunnel and another hundred feet under ground? That's some kind of dedication.There were other things I had to think about as well as the story got under way. Why would Dr. Mason (Roger Pryor) and his nurse/fiancée Judy Blair (Jo Ann Sayers) embark on their mission to find Dr. Kravaal's missing research wearing business suits. That seemed just a little too formal for me, particularly when they started crawling around through Kravaal's tunnels and labs. Not that this was unusual for films of the era, but I don't understand what would motivate anyone to be attired that way.But you know what really blew me away? When the doc and his assistant rented the boat from old Pete Daggett (Ernie Adams), do you know what the fee was - twenty five cents per hour plus a dollar deposit!!! Holy smokes, and I thought the whole concept of freezing human bodies was scary!

A doctor (Roger Pryor) studying cryogenics visits the deserted home of Dr. Leon Kravaal (Boris Karloff), a pioneer in the field who went missing ten years before. Uncovering a secret passage in the basement, he and his nurse girlfriend (Jo Ann Sayers) find Kravaal and four other men frozen in ice. They successfully revive Kravaal, who then revives the others. It turns out Kravaal had frozen himself and the others years before when they tried to arrest him. So now the somewhat mad doctor holds them all hostage while he tries to recover his original formula.Very interesting and entertaining Karloff mad scientist movie. The subject of cryogenics (never called that here, just frozen therapy) is ahead of its time. The rest of the cast is fine but obviously it's Karloff's show the whole way. Intriguing premise with fun execution. A solid "B" movie that's highly enjoyable.