“Sculpted entirely out of cake!” he boasted, the bastard.
The title The Monster (1925) may be the worst part of this silent movie, as it’s not really clear as to who is the metaphorical monster. People are starting to disappear near the little town of Danburg, leaving behind only their shattered vehicles, with little clue as to what’s happening. There are mysterious lights at the nearby sanatorium, but no one answers the door and the chief doctor and owner is out of town on a trip.
But when the kidnappers mess with young Betty and her beau, Amos, they miss the potential that pretty Betty has a second beau, and that would be underconfident general store clerk Johnny Littlegood. Johnny has followed one of the kidnappers to find Betty and Amos in trouble. Stumbling into a hidden tunnel as he runs from the kidnappers, Johnny finds Betty and Amos are now captives, and a clutch of insane minions who are former inhabitants of the sanatorium see them as toys.
And the former second-in-command of the sanatorium, Dr. Kiska, is now in control, and he probably should have been an inmate, not a doctor. Still, medical experiments are medical experiments and all that rot.
Well, everyone underestimates Johnny, and soon enough the police, sent by Betty’s father, arrive to help Johnny save the day.
So long as you don’t mind reading dialog boards, this is a fairly fun movie to watch. The acting works with the story, and Dr. Kiska is suitably evil. It’s not the greatest silent movie ever made – I liked Battleship Potemkin (1925) and The General (1926) more – but it’s certainly a credit to the genre of horror movies.
