Film Year: 1951
Genre: Horror
Director: Curt Siodmak
Starring: Raymond Burr, Lon Cheney Jr., Barbara Peyton, Tom Conway
The Movie
Before fighting crime in Perry Mason and Ironside, murdering his wife in Rear Window, and even being one of the first gawkers at Godzilla, Raymond Burr was were-monkey. In Bride of the Gorilla Burr is having an affair with his boss's wife and murders her husband in order to make her his own bride. Luckily Jimmy Stewart wasn't around to witness this, but a voodoo witch is. She casts a curse on Burr turning him into a gorilla by night (...maybe...?).
Also starring former man-beast Lon Cheney Jr. and the ill-fated Barbara Peyton, Bride of the Gorilla is a lackluster "man turns into monster" flick in a time where they were just getting cheaper and uglier. The movie lacks monster mayhem payoff with only one real gorilla scene in it, which is mostly done in quick shots from a distance. This is probably because the gorilla suit strongly resembles the type of costume the Three Stooges often used for their shorts and hopefully prevents unintentional laughter.
The film ends on the implication that Burr may not have been a gorilla at all, but was hallucinating that he was, but this revelation confounds me a bit. It mildly works for a film like She-Wolf of London (which is a bad movie for other reasons) which never shows you a beast, but we do get shots of a gorilla hauling Barbara Peyton around. We even have a shot of her screaming at something that is slowly coming toward her. If Burr was really her lover, why would she react like this if he wasn't a monster? It's a payoff that doesn't make a lot of sense.
Bride of the Gorilla is a film that fell into public domain. Movies like it fell into public domain because the people who owned them didn't give a rats ass if they owned them or not. It's somewhat easy to see why. It's not a hard movie to watch by any stretch of the imagination, but it feels like it exists because maybe someone could be suckered into paying for a ticket and not because they thought it would be a good movie.
Also starring former man-beast Lon Cheney Jr. and the ill-fated Barbara Peyton, Bride of the Gorilla is a lackluster "man turns into monster" flick in a time where they were just getting cheaper and uglier. The movie lacks monster mayhem payoff with only one real gorilla scene in it, which is mostly done in quick shots from a distance. This is probably because the gorilla suit strongly resembles the type of costume the Three Stooges often used for their shorts and hopefully prevents unintentional laughter.
The film ends on the implication that Burr may not have been a gorilla at all, but was hallucinating that he was, but this revelation confounds me a bit. It mildly works for a film like She-Wolf of London (which is a bad movie for other reasons) which never shows you a beast, but we do get shots of a gorilla hauling Barbara Peyton around. We even have a shot of her screaming at something that is slowly coming toward her. If Burr was really her lover, why would she react like this if he wasn't a monster? It's a payoff that doesn't make a lot of sense.
Bride of the Gorilla is a film that fell into public domain. Movies like it fell into public domain because the people who owned them didn't give a rats ass if they owned them or not. It's somewhat easy to see why. It's not a hard movie to watch by any stretch of the imagination, but it feels like it exists because maybe someone could be suckered into paying for a ticket and not because they thought it would be a good movie.
The Episode
The folks behind the fan riffing project Incognito Cinema Warriors XP have expressed a distaste for their first episode. So much so that they've decided to discontinue production of DVDs of it and not offer it in download. It's not all that dissimilar to how the creators of Mystery Science Theater 3000 dislike their own early season at KTMA and wish it wasn't in circulation. I disagree with this practice. As someone who is pro-preservation, I believe all art, cinema, and yes even puppet shows and fan films demand to be accessible by the public who wish to view it.
That said, I sympathize with them. Bride of the Gorilla is kind of a crash and burn.
But to catch people unfamiliar with Incognito Cinema Warriors up to speed, the zombie apocalypse has happened, and this show is infinitely funnier if you imagine it takes place in the same world as The Walking Dead. Commander Rick Wolf escapes being devoured by the hordes of flesh-eating undead and takes refuge in a movie theater. This theater is ran by a maniacal scientist known as Dr. Blackwood, who agrees to let Rick wait out the apocalypse in the safety of the theater as long as he watches the library of shitty movies at his disposal. Thinking this won't be too hard, Rick agrees and sits down to watch with the two robots who run the theater, Topsy Bot 5000 and Johnny Cylon.
One thing I will note then let it slide, I don't particularly care for the designs of the Bots. I like that the shapes are distinct and don't ring to the look of Crow and Tom Servo, but they are stiff and not very expressive. But I'm going to forgive this since it's an independent production.
In the theater with Bride of the Gorilla, promise is seen, but delivery is off. There's an over-eagerness to Rick, Topsy, and Cylon that can't be overlooked. They say their riffs REALLY LOUD and reallyfast, like a comedian trying to compensate for the fact that his joke just isn't that funny so he over-emphasizes it in order to underline it. ICWXP is hardly the only riffing project to fall victim to this, as both Rifftrax and the relaunched MST3K have fallen into this pit at times and I'm not fond of it with them either. It's a bit tackier here because the people making this show aren't comedians and they wear their amateur status on their sleeves, which I suppose is part of their charm but doesn't fully win me over.
ICWXP at the very least tries to distance itself from MST by being a bit more "heavy metal" with its approach. I kinda dig it, but there's a certain problem that arises when they wring out a desperate attempt at an "edgy" laugh. At various times they just throw words around like "fart" and "asscheeks" in the middle of lackluster bits in obvious hopes that they might make them funnier. It doesn't work.
But there is a bit of a silver lining. Occasionally they'll put out a really good line or a well timed reference (I laughed pretty hard at the parallel between the witch and the Emperor from Star Wars). Sometimes there's a line I like, but I grit my teeth and think to myself "That might have been just funnier if it was delivered a different way." I had fun with the way they played with the format of the series as well, showing a preview for a movie and a "Let's go to the lobby for popcorn" promo at the beginning of the movie. That's very clever and a lot of fun.
Incidentally, the trailer at the beginning of the episode is for The Hideous Sun Demon, which was riffed by Rifftrax in 2015. Rick and the Bots better wipe the sweat off their brow because that one is torturing someone else!
The host segments are a batch of dogs. The first thing you'll notice is that they're accompanied by a laugh track and for the life of me I can't figure out why anybody on the team thought this was a good idea. If it was meant to distinguish itself from MST all it succeeds in doing is reminding us that MST does it better. If it was meant to make lackluster gags seem funnier, it just makes them look worse.
Other than the laugh track, I can't say I enjoyed these. The way they establish the world in a rush and jump into a theater works pretty well, though I'd hesitate to say any of the jokier segments land. The "plants make a room darker" gag plays off a running gag in the theater that's just not that funny (they over-exaggerate how dark the movie is when honestly it's easy to see what's going on). The segment that fares the worst is a meta sketch about alternate movie taglines that's meant to play like an unfunny Jay Leno bit, but being intentionally unfunny doesn't make your sketch funny. The finale where Topsy tries to put a voodoo curse on Rick has a gag or two that work, but feels endless and ends on a weak point.
Poopie!: In the third host segment, Rick identifies the first movie poster tagline being from Resident Evil: Apocalypse when in fact the poster shown and the film itself he's referencing is Resident Evil: Extinction. In the same segment Cylon misreads the initial tagline to Mr. Woodcock.
I find myself in a mild conundrum in reviewing this release. I'd like to restate that any review I put forth is just meant to be an honest reaction and what constructive criticism I can muster. The people at ICWXP are fans of the professionals I normally review on this blog, and they operate independently and are really just amateurs with a drive as opposed to experienced comedians. I admire their passion and all the hard work they put into this episode and any episode I may watch going forward, because doing what they do isn't easy, and even if I dislike a product I don't want to dismay anybody from doing what they love. That said, Bride of the Gorilla is not very good, and features some mistakes that are pretty damning. But if I were to paint it with some faint praise, if I were to compare this with the weakest episodes of MST and Rifftrax, I'd say Bride of the Gorilla has a better chance of hitting my television again over, oh say, MST's version of Killer Shrews. I'd definitely say that if they edited the laugh track out of this episode I might consider bumping my rating up a notch.
That said, I sympathize with them. Bride of the Gorilla is kind of a crash and burn.
But to catch people unfamiliar with Incognito Cinema Warriors up to speed, the zombie apocalypse has happened, and this show is infinitely funnier if you imagine it takes place in the same world as The Walking Dead. Commander Rick Wolf escapes being devoured by the hordes of flesh-eating undead and takes refuge in a movie theater. This theater is ran by a maniacal scientist known as Dr. Blackwood, who agrees to let Rick wait out the apocalypse in the safety of the theater as long as he watches the library of shitty movies at his disposal. Thinking this won't be too hard, Rick agrees and sits down to watch with the two robots who run the theater, Topsy Bot 5000 and Johnny Cylon.
One thing I will note then let it slide, I don't particularly care for the designs of the Bots. I like that the shapes are distinct and don't ring to the look of Crow and Tom Servo, but they are stiff and not very expressive. But I'm going to forgive this since it's an independent production.
In the theater with Bride of the Gorilla, promise is seen, but delivery is off. There's an over-eagerness to Rick, Topsy, and Cylon that can't be overlooked. They say their riffs REALLY LOUD and reallyfast, like a comedian trying to compensate for the fact that his joke just isn't that funny so he over-emphasizes it in order to underline it. ICWXP is hardly the only riffing project to fall victim to this, as both Rifftrax and the relaunched MST3K have fallen into this pit at times and I'm not fond of it with them either. It's a bit tackier here because the people making this show aren't comedians and they wear their amateur status on their sleeves, which I suppose is part of their charm but doesn't fully win me over.
ICWXP at the very least tries to distance itself from MST by being a bit more "heavy metal" with its approach. I kinda dig it, but there's a certain problem that arises when they wring out a desperate attempt at an "edgy" laugh. At various times they just throw words around like "fart" and "asscheeks" in the middle of lackluster bits in obvious hopes that they might make them funnier. It doesn't work.
But there is a bit of a silver lining. Occasionally they'll put out a really good line or a well timed reference (I laughed pretty hard at the parallel between the witch and the Emperor from Star Wars). Sometimes there's a line I like, but I grit my teeth and think to myself "That might have been just funnier if it was delivered a different way." I had fun with the way they played with the format of the series as well, showing a preview for a movie and a "Let's go to the lobby for popcorn" promo at the beginning of the movie. That's very clever and a lot of fun.
Incidentally, the trailer at the beginning of the episode is for The Hideous Sun Demon, which was riffed by Rifftrax in 2015. Rick and the Bots better wipe the sweat off their brow because that one is torturing someone else!
The host segments are a batch of dogs. The first thing you'll notice is that they're accompanied by a laugh track and for the life of me I can't figure out why anybody on the team thought this was a good idea. If it was meant to distinguish itself from MST all it succeeds in doing is reminding us that MST does it better. If it was meant to make lackluster gags seem funnier, it just makes them look worse.
Other than the laugh track, I can't say I enjoyed these. The way they establish the world in a rush and jump into a theater works pretty well, though I'd hesitate to say any of the jokier segments land. The "plants make a room darker" gag plays off a running gag in the theater that's just not that funny (they over-exaggerate how dark the movie is when honestly it's easy to see what's going on). The segment that fares the worst is a meta sketch about alternate movie taglines that's meant to play like an unfunny Jay Leno bit, but being intentionally unfunny doesn't make your sketch funny. The finale where Topsy tries to put a voodoo curse on Rick has a gag or two that work, but feels endless and ends on a weak point.
Poopie!: In the third host segment, Rick identifies the first movie poster tagline being from Resident Evil: Apocalypse when in fact the poster shown and the film itself he's referencing is Resident Evil: Extinction. In the same segment Cylon misreads the initial tagline to Mr. Woodcock.
I find myself in a mild conundrum in reviewing this release. I'd like to restate that any review I put forth is just meant to be an honest reaction and what constructive criticism I can muster. The people at ICWXP are fans of the professionals I normally review on this blog, and they operate independently and are really just amateurs with a drive as opposed to experienced comedians. I admire their passion and all the hard work they put into this episode and any episode I may watch going forward, because doing what they do isn't easy, and even if I dislike a product I don't want to dismay anybody from doing what they love. That said, Bride of the Gorilla is not very good, and features some mistakes that are pretty damning. But if I were to paint it with some faint praise, if I were to compare this with the weakest episodes of MST and Rifftrax, I'd say Bride of the Gorilla has a better chance of hitting my television again over, oh say, MST's version of Killer Shrews. I'd definitely say that if they edited the laugh track out of this episode I might consider bumping my rating up a notch.
But I emphasize that this is all in good fun, both the episode I just watched and my review of it. I wish ICWXP luck and success on the endeavor they've embarked. And I sincerely hope I enjoy future episodes more than I've enjoyed this one. And regardless of my opinion on it, I hope the guys over at ICWXP find it in their hearts to re-release it to their fans at some point. After all the support they've given this little project it seems a shame to lock the origin away from them.
Not Recommended
The DVD
Rikk Wolf and the creators of ICWXP initially offered this episode on DVD through their website, icwxp.com. Unfortunately it's out of print. I was provided a copy of the disc via an online friend (thanks Skyroniter!) in which the show probably looks about as well as it ever was intended. The host segments are filmed in widescreen, but are non-animorphic and are pretty lackluster looking. The full screen theater segments look better, with a strong presentation of a damaged public domain film. There are no special features on the disc, though the menu is almost a special feature in itself as it's presented like a comic book in which the characters mock that there are no special features on the disc.
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