By the Light of the Silvery Moon

BaronBl00d

Universal's first foray into lycanthropy was this version of a man that goes to Tibet in search of a rare flower.  He is bitten by a werewolf.  He then leaves Tibet for his home in London with said plant which flowering buds have the ability to off-set the "disease" at least for that evening against the full moon.  This film is entertaining and has many good points.  It has a great score and lots of wonderful scenes and sets.  Many of the character actors are quite good, in particular Spring Byington and Valerie Hobson. Warner Oland steals the acting honors as an adversary to Dr. Glendon, the titular werewolf.  Oland, the great Charlie Chan himself, hams it up as another werewolf in search of the flowering buds.  The film has a lot of comedy in it, with several scenes between two friendly landladies creating most of the laughs.  I think the picture really suffers from the script, which really does not help create werewolf folklore like The Wolfman did later for Universal.  The make-up by Jack Pierce is pretty good, but actor Henry Hull is very dull in his lead role.  Hull plays the beast with some passion but his role as the doctor is the epitome of boredom.  Nonetheless I found the film very entertaining and recommend it.

score /10

BaronBl00d 13 July 2000

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw0014544/