Director William Beaudine reunited with Bela Lugosi for BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA in 1952. Beaudine and Lugosi worked together previously on VOODOO MAN (1944), GHOST ON THE LOOSE (1943), and THE APE MAN (1943). Beaudine was the Roger Corman of his time, and earned the nickname ‘One-Shot’ Beaudine because of his refusal to employ multiple retakes (since it would cost additional money). Still, Beaudine had a hell of a career, spanning 50 years and over 200 motion picture and television direction credits! BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA was co-produced by schlockmeister Herman Cohen who apparently had a fetish for primates as he also was responsible for BRIDE OF THE GORILLA, KONGA, and TROG. When this movie was released, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis were atop the Hollywood box-office, so Beaudine and Cohen exploited this with their own lounge act consisting of crooner Duke Mitchell and comedian Sammy Petrillo (who were no Martin & Lewis). Image Entertainment presents this old rarity on DVD, through their distribution deal with Wade Williams.

The story opens on remote Pacific island called Kola-Kola. Entertainers Sammy Petrillo and Duke Mitchell (playing themselves) get stranded on the island, en route to a U.S.O. gig. They are befriended by the beautiful and intelligent Nona (Charlita), daughter of the island chief. Nona and Duke immediately hit it off, while Sammy avoids Nona’s gargantuan lovesick sister, Saloma (Muriel Landers). Nona also works as a lab assistant for the island’s only civilized resident, Dr. Zabor (Lugosi), who also has a crush on her. When Dr. Zabor sees Duke romancing Nona, he becomes jealous and hatches a plan to get rid of him. Dr. Zabor uses his secret formula on Duke which reverses the aging process, causing him to de-evolve into a gorilla. Duke, now a resembling a large gorilla, tries to establish contact with his pal Sammy who of course is scared stiff. Duke finally gets through to Sammy by singing him a song! Sammy teams up with his gorilla-fied buddy to get to the bottom of the situation, and hopefully return Duke to his natural state. Much jungle hijinx ensues. Things get worse when a real gorilla shows up to makes things difficult for everyone.

Bela Lugosi was in the final phase of his career, hence the reason he appeared in such low-brow fare as this and Ed Wood’s films. Yet even in his final roles, he still never failed to be a true professional and was often the saving grace of these films. Make no mistake about it, BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA is a horrid film, sure to entertain those who enjoy camp. The movie is technically awkward and clumsily directed. Especially ridiculous is that all the tribesmen of Kola Kola are obviously played by Caucasian extras dressed in animal skins with bad African accents. The plot is paint-by-numbers, but BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA generates a few legitimate laughs as it pokes fun of the genre and itself. The duo of Mitchell (he can’t sing) and Petrillo (he isn’t funny) act as a double-prong attack to annoy your central nervous system. Petrillo was actually sued by Jerry Lewis for swiping his shtick. They are so bad, that they often get upstaged by the actual jungle animals and guys in gorilla suits. That leaves Lugosi and Western starlet Charlita so put the pieces together. Even though Lugosi’s character is old enough to be her grandfather, he pines for his costar providing much of the conflict in the film. Interestingly, the ragged gorilla suits are not authentic but they are entertaining nonetheless. These look to be the same suits used for BRIDE OF THE GORILLA and GORILLA AT LARGE.

BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA is presented full frame (1.33.1), as this is how it was originally projected at theaters. Wade Williams provides a completely remastered 32mm print for this disc that is a joy to behold. Even though William Beaudine is king of the cheap, the transfer looks like a million dollars. Why can’t all movies from the 1950’s look as good as this DVD? The detail level is immaculate, grain is minimal, and the black & whites hues are perfectly balanced. The special effects for BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA are non-existent; you could say that Charlita is the visual highlight of the movie. The audio is Dolby Digital Mono 1.0 and does not fair as well the video. There are a few crackles and pops and the sound effects and dialog are weak, but you’ll probably be thankful for that when you hear the bad lounge music sung by Duke Mitchell. Besides the blurry theatrical trailer (full frame, DD 1.0, 2:11) the disc contains a recent interview with the elder Sammy Petrillo, who reminisces about working with Lugosi. Petrillo also reveals that the chimpanzee in the movie was Cheetah from the TARZAN show.

BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA is neither scary nor funny, yet it has a few madcap moments (what do you expect from a title like that?) and a solid performance by Bela Lugosi. Bela turns in a great physical performance considering his age when this was filmed---he does pratfalls and gets thrown around by an ape. I actually prefer this movie to that other skid row horror/comedy, THE EAST SIDE KIDS MEET BELA LUGOSI. Image’s DVD transfer for this not-very-good movie is outstanding; far better than the picture deserves. I’d like to see Image change to Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono sound, or at the very least a PCM track for better quality.

BELA LUGOSI MEETS A BROOKLYN GORILLA is available from DVDEmpire.com

                                                 Rating (out of 5):

Movie:	2.5
Video:	3.5
Audio:	2.5
Extras:	1.5
Overall:	3.0

-  Phil Chandler

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                                                 Rating (out of 5):

Movie:	3.0
Video:	3.5
Audio:	2.5
Extras:	2.5
Overall:	3.5

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BACK TO REVIEW INDEX