Saturday, November 5, 2011

Doctor X

What a lovely piece of Pulp made into a movie.  The camera work and the sets are astounding.  Worth watching for that alone.  Neat old lab equipment.  And in color!  1932 color.  Doctor X.

It's about a group of PhD types that are implicated in a series of murder/mutilations that occurred on the full moon.  The head of the institution convinces the police to allow him 48 hours to do the investigation to find which of his colleagues may be the dastardly villain.  The repair to his estate at an isolated mansion on the shore and use SCIENCE! to try to puzzle it out.  Suspense!  A bumbling reporter gets in on the act.

Very little gun content, but Fay Wray had a pistol to confront the snoopy reporter with.  He even asked if she had a permit for that thing.  She said yes.  The movie isn't even in the Internet Movie Gun Database, so I'm having a hard time placing it.  A little pocket auto.  If I had to guess, it was a chrome 1908 Colt Vest Pocket.  Or Colt Pocket Hammerless.  Except I don't think it had that little dimple under the barrel where a guide rod would be.  I only caught a glimpse, but I want to say it was smooth there.  I may have to buy the movie now just to see.  I like the styling of a typical Browning pistol.  The dustcover under the barrel.  The aesthetics of a Browning.

I wonder if that Fay Wray person did any acting after 1932...

2 comments:

Miguel said...

I did find it in IMDB.
Doctor X
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0022827/

Bubblehead Les. said...

So, in the last Depression, we get Art Deco, and cool cars, clothes, guns, buildings,etc. Today, we get Art Wrecko, and smashed windows, empty buildings, clothes that looked like Great-Grandpa threw them away in 1932, ugly Guns...