One of my all time favorites.

Absolutely Fantastic

Pretty good movie overall. First half was nothing special but it got better as it went along.

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

During the brief 1937-1938 lull in horror film product, Boris Karloff worked for the cheap Monogram Studios, making a series of rather lackluster Mr. Wong detective pictures. When scary movies became in vogue again after the smash hit of SON OF FRANKENSTEIN in 1939, Monogram decided to make Karloff's last contracted movie a horror one.In THE APE, Boris falls into his comfortable niche of portraying a well-meaning and kindly old doctor. As Dr. Adrian, he is devoting all his time and effort into curing a beautiful wheelchair bound girl of her inability to walk. He has had some success with spinal fluid injections taken from recently deceased people, but finds he requires more and more of the serum to perfect a more permanent cure to end the girl's paralysis. At the same time, a savage gorilla has escaped from a local circus and is wreaking havoc right near the dedicated scientist's laboratory.Without revealing more details, the plot that is hatched from here on is potentially absurd and unbelievable. Yet, owing largely to Karloff's professional attitude and straight-forward performance, he helps the story rise above its silly premise. Boris is just perfect in his part, neither overacting nor just phoning it in. And this is what makes all the difference.**1/2 out of ****

This short feature is probably best known as Boris Karloff's only foray into the realm of chap Monogram horror films so often inhabited by Bela Lugosi and George Zucco. That may be technically correct, but it was filmed after he had made a series of Mr Wong films for the same studio, which technically fell into the category of mystery.Here, disguised by round eyeglasses and a large mustache rather than yellow-face, he gives a very different performance. And though the film was made quickly (I read that it was shot in a week) and cheaply, he puts a lot into the performance. He's a murder who is nonetheless quite a sympathetic figure, trying to film a cure that will allow his handicapped daughter-figure to walk.The short running time doesn't help in that I wish there had been more time to build character. What exactly is that nature of Dr Adrian's relationship with Frances that he is so dedicated to her case? The film makes the point quite strongly that the townspeople hate him, but doesn't really explain why.The central premise of extracting (possibly an ape's) spinal fluid to cure human paralysis is delightfully daft. Though I suspect it would have seemed less so in 1940, only fifteen or twenty years after the fad of men using "monkey glands" to cure a loss of virility.The dialogue is actually quite good at some points, and the writing has a good pedigree. It's an adapted version of a successful play (which I can't evaluate, having never seen a copy) by Kurt Siodmak, a respectable novelist. The end may seem hackneyed to some, but I actually didn't quite guess that it was Adrian in a monkey suit. To me it was just the right level of telegraphed that I felt as though I should have guessed it even though I didn't. And it made much more forgivable the fact that the ape looked like a person in an ape costume.I like that Frances was finally able to walk and give Adrian a happy death despite the murderous means he used to find the cure. Melodramatic but fitting. The theme overall touches on the fear of science (in the "some things man was not meant to know" vein) that many of these films had, but repudiates by curing polio despite the murders of the scientist.All in all, a nice little science fiction mystery of the era that manages to be a entertaining and even a bit thoughtful despite its flaws, low budget, and rushed, brief nature.

This dull time-waster is a delirious drag from start to finish. The twisted plot involves Dr. Bernard Adrian (Boris Karloff), who is conducting crazy experiments involving spinal fluid. Meanwhile, a vicious circus ape breaks free and starts murdering townsfolk. The animal soon enters Adrian's lab, but the elderly scientist kills the monkey and then comes up with the devilish plan of wearing it's skin and killing more people so that he can get the desired amount of spinal fluid for his experiments. While the cheesy ape effects have some cheap charm, this typical example of forties B-grade horror is nothing but a badly-constructed bore and should therefore only be viewed by the most die-hard Karloff fans.

In between episodes of the Mr. Wong detective series, Monogram Pictures found some time to cast Boris Karloff in his traditional role as a scientist experimenting in things unknown. The Ape has him in a more traditional Karloff type role.Boris is a doctor who has settled in a small community and is not well liked by the inhabitants of this place. Rumors abound of his experiments on animals. What he's doing in fact is exploring a cure for infantile paralysis.It's hard to understand these days, but that was a dreaded thing back in the day, the President of the United States had that disease, but Karloff isn't worried about curing FDR, it's pretty Maris Wrixon, that's got his attention who's confined to a wheelchair like the president.At the same time a circus ape that's been abused by his trainer gets loose and sets fire to the big top. What The Ape getting loose has to do with Karloff and his experiments is for you to see.Let's just say that Jonas Salk was not pursuing the same line of research as Boris Karloff was.