Murders in the Rue Morgue (1932)

90% of critics liked it
(10 reviews)
52% of users liked it
(935 ratings)

Having missed the opportunity to direct Frankenstein for Universal, Robert Florey was offered Murders in the Rue Morgue as a consolation, whereupon he transformed a pedestrian property into a minor classic. Owing more to Cabinet of Dr. Caligari than to Edgar Allen Poe, the film stars Bela Lugosi as… More Having missed the opportunity to direct Frankenstein for Universal, Robert Florey was offered Murders in the Rue Morgue as a consolation, whereupon he transformed a pedestrian property into a minor classic. Owing more to Cabinet of Dr. Caligari than to Edgar Allen Poe, the film stars Bela Lugosi as Doctor Mirakle (accent on the second syllable), a carnival sideshow entertainer who doubles as a mad scientist. Kidnapping prostitutes off the Paris streets, Mirakle endeavors to mix their blood with that of his pet gorilla. His experiments will forever be doomed to failure, however, until he is able to obtain the blood of a virgin -- and that's where Camille L'Espanye (Sidney Fox) comes into the picture. When Mirakle's monkey kidnaps Camille and murders her mother, suspicion immediately falls upon the girl's sweetheart, starving artist Pierre Dupin (Leon Waycoff, later known as Leon Ames). But by using the deductive skills displayed in the original story by Poe's master detective C. Auguste Dupin, our hero not only proves his innocence, but rescues the helpless heroine from Mirakle's clutches. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Play Trailer

Rating, Runtime: Unrated, 1 hr. 1 min.
Directed By: Robert Florey
Written By: Robert Florey, John Huston, Tom Reed, Dale Van Every
Genres: Action & Adventure, Horror, Mystery & Suspense

On DVD: Sep 10, 1992
Studio: Passport

Critic Reviews

Fernando F. Croce, CinePassion
It crams into its first ten minutes as much bestial subtext as King Kong
Ken Hanke, Mountain Xpress (Asheville, NC)
A flawed, but absolutely fascinating film.
Steve Crum, Video-Reviewmaster.com
Robert Florey's atmospheric horror tale, starring Bela Lugosi.
Dennis Schwartz, Ozus' World Movie Reviews
It has style.
James Sanford, Kalamazoo Gazette
hardly in a class with 'Dracula' or 'Frankenstein'

Critic ratings and reviews powered by RottenTomatoes.com

Fresh (60% or more critics rated the movie positively)

Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)

Featured Audience Ratings

AJ V

The title makes this movie sound like something exciting, but it's not. Lugosi plays a mad scientist who has a circus act where he exhibits an ape who can "talk". The ape cannot talk, he just pretends that he knows what it's saying. I'm sure the audience… More
The title makes this movie sound like something exciting, but it's not. Lugosi plays a mad scientist who has a circus act where he exhibits an ape who can "talk". The ape cannot talk, he just pretends that he knows what it's saying. I'm sure the audience was asking for their money back after that. He has some crazy idea about how people are descended from apes and he wants to make people more like apes, so he kidnaps girls and murders them when his experiments don't work out. The story is stupid, the characters are stupid, I didn't care for this movie at all, I don't know why they included it in the universal monsters collection.
Greg S

Bela Lugosi stars as "Dr. Mirakle," a carny scientist with a trained ape and a penchant for conducting medical experiments on prostitutes, in this loose but effective adaptation of Poe's short story. It's fascinating to consider that the villain here is a… More
Bela Lugosi stars as "Dr. Mirakle," a carny scientist with a trained ape and a penchant for conducting medical experiments on prostitutes, in this loose but effective adaptation of Poe's short story. It's fascinating to consider that the villain here is a foreigner with a unibrow who preaches evolution, and the "good people" he terrorizes are closeminded and casually racist. Also interesting for the bestiality subtext, and the fact that this gorilla-abducts-white-woman tale predates KING KONG.
Morgan S

creepy... ick unibrow :P lol bela lagosi is still awsome