At a medical institute, a doctor and nurse are killed by what looks like a horribly disfigured man. Two of the man's colleague's come for assistance, but alas too late, but they see the disfigured man escape. The fact that he killed with a scalpel suggests though that the monster might be one of the staffmembers. It's decided to hush up the whole thing for now, even in front of the nurses, to avoid a panic and keep the place running smoothly. In the meantime, nurse Cummings, just desparate to get a glance of the new doctor, Van Cleve (Richard Lyford), sneaks into his office and catches him injecting something into his neck, and when he finally notices her, he at first screams at her, then apologizes so profusely that she suspects something's wrong. So she checks up on the stuff he has been injecting himself with and finds out it's continuous use leads to disfigurement, rage and ultimately death. She tells this to her superior, but when he talks to Van Cleve about it, Van Cleve makes up some story about animal experiments. Soon enough though, another freak accident happens that though can't be directly trailed back to the monster (by anyone but the audience), and nurse Cummings hopes to find some clues in Dr. Van Cleve's office, only to see him enter and transform before her very eyes. Thing is, when he notices her, he's not one to let her give his secret away ...

Now the story of this movie was of course heavily influenced by then contemporary pulp magazines and genre movies, but what sets this one apart from other films of its ilk is its very rich cinematic language, full or carefully composed, moodily lit shots, well-placed pans, a certain directorial playfulness and pretty convincing, at times innovative special effects, something only the biggest studios of the day let slip into their movies some of the time.

... this is all the more remarkable then as The Scalpel is a wholly independently produced film with a director, Richard Lyford) of a mere 19 years of age, and apart from the fact that that the cast (made up mostly of Lyford's friends and family) is a bit uneven and the absence of sound, this film doesn't set a foot wrong and could easily give many studio films a run for their money - and win. In other words, not only historically significant but also pretty cool vintage genre entertainment.

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

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