Hot Picks

- Ready for My Close Up 2019

- Talk of the Dead 2016

- Tower Rats 2020

- Script of the Dead 2024

- The Bell Affair 2023

- Easter Bloody Easter 2024

- Velma 2022

- Everwinter Night 2023

- Main Character Energy 2023

- Stupid Games 2024

- Bittertooth 2023

- 4 Minutes of Terror: Night Slasher 2024

- Apart 2024

- The Abandoned 2006

- Becky 2024

- The Evil Fairy Queen 2024

- The Black Guelph 2022

- Followers 2024

- Silence of the Prey 2024

- Battle for the Western Front 2024

- Beware the Boogeyman 2024

- Subject 101 2022

- Driftwood 2023

- The Legend of Lake Hollow 2024

- Black Mass 2023

- Skinwalkers: American Werewolves 2 2023

- The Manifestation 2024

- Spirit Riser 2024

- Garden of Souls 2019

- It's a Wonderful Slice 2024

- Caleb & Sarah 2024

- The Thousand Steps 2020

- The Desiring 2021

- When a Stranger Knocks 2024

- Quint-essentially Irish 2024

- Son of Gacy 2024

- Saltville 2024

- The True Story of the Christ's Return 2024

- Whenever I'm Alone with You 2023

- Jurassic Triangle 2024

- Midnight Peepshow 2022

- Offworld: Alien Planet 2024

- The Swiss Conspiracy 1976

- Sex-Positive 2024

- Here for Blood 2022

- All Over Again 2024

- The Color Yellow 2023

- Des Töchterleins Leid 2024

- I Am a Channel 2024

- The Hermits 2023

- Murdaritaville 2024

- Inheritance 2024

- The Devil's Partner 1960

- First Impressions Can Kill 2017

- A Killer Conversation 2014

- Star Crash 1979

- Strangler of the Swamp 1946

The Black Widow

USA 1947
produced by
M.J. Frankovich (associate) for Republic
directed by Spencer Gordon Bennet, Fred C. Brannon
starring Bruce Edwards, Virginia Lee, Carol Forman, Anthony Warde, Ramsay Ames, I. Stanford Jolley, Theodore Gottlieb (= Brother Theodore), Virginia Carroll, Gene Roth, Sam Flint, Tom Steele, Dale Van Sickel, LeRoy Mason, Forrest Taylor, Ernie Adams, Keith Richards (II), Robert Barron, George Chesebro, Duke Green, Frank Lackteen, Harold Landon, Carey Loftin, Ted Mapes, Jack O'Shea, Gil Perkins, John Phillips, Stanley Price, Larry Steers, Laura Stevens, Ken Terrell, Frank White, Robert J. Wilke
written by Franklin Adreon, Basil Dickey, Jesse Duffy, Sol Shor, musical director: Mort Glickman, special effects by Howard Lydecker, Theodore Lydecker

serial

review by
Mike Haberfelner

Available on DVD!

To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned)

Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!


Top scientists involved with the atomic rocket program suddenly die like flies, and all of them are killed by the poison of the black widow - thus the murders are soon dubbed "the Black Widow Murders". The police seem to be unable to pick up a single clue though, so newspaper The Daily Clarion hires mystery writer Steve Colt (Bruce Edwards) to investigate as a publicity stunt, and much to the dismay of Joye Winters (Virginia Lee), the girl reporter on the job. It soon becomes evident who's next on the "Black Widow"'s list, professor Weston (Sam Flint), the central figure of the rocket program - and indeed, his formula for rocket fuel is stolen by his own secretary, Ruth Dayton (Ramsay Ames) ... only it wasn't Ruth at all, but Sombra (Carol Forman) aka the Black Widow in perfect disguise including a lifelike facemask. Sombra is the daughter of Hitomu (Brother Theodore as Theodore Gottlieb), ruler of a foreign nation who has implemented her as the head of his spy ring. Hitomu appears to Sombra via a powerful matter transmitter it seems. Sombra in the meantime is a mystic, but that's of course only her legit front.

Of course Steve and Joyce don't know any of this at first, and while they are investigating - bickering all the time at the side but growing more and more fond of one another - they only slowly find clue after clue leading to her, and after many fights by gun and fist, chases by foot, car and airplane, and more "Black Widow"-crimes (some successful, others foiled), do they finally get hold of her and throw her in the slammer - which is when Sombra fakes her own death, and in no time at all have her associates Ward (Anthony Warde) and Dr Jaffa (I. Stanford Jolley) stolen her "dead body". But how she faked her death is the final piece in our heroes' puzzle to find a definite lead to her hideout - or so Steve thinks, as while he's trying to take down the gang, Ward kidnaps Joyce, and wearing a face mask, she manages to get her hands on the atomic rocket, and she and her father and gang almost manage to leave the country ... but via Sombra's radio, Steve manages to track her down and finally take out the whole gang on his own, with Sombra actually dying from her own device, a chair with a retractable spider-sting.

 

As serials from the latter part of the 1940s go, this one's pretty good actually, featuring quite a number of colourful ideas, many a pulp mainstay, characters who have at least a bit of a spark to them, and Republic has not yet started to recycle action scenes from earlier movies on a big scale. That said, The Black Widow is definitely a step down from what the studio had put out in the serial genre's heyday in the 1930s, and was probably budgeted much tighter than cliffhangers from ten years ago, but this is still a likeable and entertaining yarn that does a bit more than just follow the same formula to the t.

 

Quick Links

Abbott & Costello

The Addams Family

Alice in Wonderland

Arsène Lupin

Batman

Bigfoot

Black Emanuelle

Bomba the Jungle Boy

Bowery Boys

Bulldog Drummond

Captain America

Charlie Chan

Cinderella

Deerslayer

Dick Tracy

Dr. Mabuse

Dr. Orloff

Doctor Who

Dracula

Edgar Wallace made in Germany

Elizabeth Bathory

Emmanuelle

Fantomas

Flash Gordon

Frankenstein

Frankie & Annette Beach Party movies

Freddy Krueger

Fu Manchu

Fuzzy

Gamera

Godzilla

Hercules

El Hombre Lobo

Incredible Hulk

Jack the Ripper

James Bond

Jekyll and Hyde

Jerry Cotton

Jungle Jim

Justine

Kekko Kamen

King Kong

Laurel and Hardy

Lemmy Caution

Lobo

Lone Wolf and Cub

Lupin III

Maciste

Marx Brothers

Miss Marple

Mr. Moto

Mister Wong

Mothra

The Munsters

Nick Carter

OSS 117

Phantom of the Opera

Philip Marlowe

Philo Vance

Quatermass

Robin Hood

The Saint

Santa Claus

El Santo

Schoolgirl Report

The Shadow

Sherlock Holmes

Spider-Man

Star Trek

Sukeban Deka

Superman

Tarzan

Three Mesquiteers

Three Musketeers

Three Stooges

Three Supermen

Winnetou

Wizard of Oz

Wolf Man

Wonder Woman

Yojimbo

Zatoichi

Zorro

review © by Mike Haberfelner

 

Feeling lucky?
Want to
search
any of my partnershops yourself
for more, better results?
(commissions earned)

The links below
will take you
just there!!!

Find The Black Widow
at the amazons ...

USA  amazon.com

Great Britain (a.k.a. the United Kingdom)  amazon.co.uk

Germany (East AND West)  amazon.de

Looking for imports?
Find The Black Widow here ...

Thailand  eThaiCD.com
Your shop for all things Thai

Something naughty?
(Must be over 18 to go there!)

x-rated  find The Black Widow at adultvideouniverse.com


Thanks for watching !!!

 

 

In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

 

There's No Such Thing as Zombies
starring
Luana Ribeira, Rudy Barrow and Rami Hilmi
special appearances by
Debra Lamb and Lynn Lowry

 

directed by
Eddie Bammeke

written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

 

now streaming at

Amazon

Amazon UK

Vimeo

 

 

 

Robots and rats,
demons and potholes,
cuddly toys and
shopping mall Santas,
love and death and everything in between,
Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

is all of that.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to
-
a collection of short stories and mini-plays
ranging from the horrific to the darkly humourous,
from the post-apocalyptic
to the weirdly romantic,
tales that will give you a chill and maybe a chuckle, all thought up by
the twisted mind of
screenwriter and film reviewer
Michael Haberfelner.

 

Tales to Chill
Your Bones to

the new anthology by
Michael Haberfelner

 

Out now from
Amazon!!!