DAUGHTER OF DR. JEKYLL (1957)
In a pulpy prologue, a snaggletooth fiend (pictured above) regales us with the story of Robert Louis Stevenson's Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. It's a bizarre meta-moment, as we are told that it was a work of fiction. Stranger still, the heinous Hyde is referred to as a "human werewolf." Daughter of Dr. Jekyll works as a Universal horror greatest hits compilation, and I'm chalking it up as a pleasant surprise. Here, the monster can only be killed with a stake to the heart. Yeah, wires are crossed, but that's okay. I'm in love with all of the barmy tropes that get tossed around. The actual storyline is fairly straightforward. A woman inherits a Gothic estate and discovers that her father was Count Chocula.
This flick has the fearful villagers of Frankenstein, the omnipresent full moon of The Wolf Man, and the penetrating social commentary of Bordello of Blood. That was a joke. Director Edgar G. Ulmer has fun playing with shadows. I had fun watching John Agar do his thing. For your information, "his thing" involved sleepwalking as the straight man in dozens of kaleidoscopic b-pictures. You may recognize him from Invisible Invaders, Attack of the Puppet People, Revenge of the Creature, and/or Bordello of Blood. That was a joke. On the whole, Daughter of Dr. Jekyll is all kinds of awesome. I can't believe that I've never heard anyone mention it, but then again, I don't hang with the cool kids.
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