THERE IS A SCENE IN THIS MOVIE THAT SHOWS HOW THE LAW USED TO WORK
Published on Mar 22, 2013
Told in flashback by police detective Dick Chasen (Showalter), the movie concerns a 72-hour period of horror for the main characters. Charles “Butcher” Benton (Chaney) is a double-crossed convicted robber and murderer who was executed in the gas chamber. His body is unlawfully sold to a scientist (Robert Shayne of Adventures of Superman fame), who plans to move his testing to human subjects. The corpse is subjected to chemical injection and massive jolts of high-frequency electricity in order to study the effect on human tissues. But Benton’s heart is restimulated and he completely revives (though rendered mute due to electrical damage to his vocal cords), immensely strong and with skin virtually impervious – even to bazooka shells.
After killing the doctor and his assistant (Joe Flynn, pre-McHale’s Navy), Benton sets out to avenge himself on his attorney and the lawyer’s henchmen who, in collusion with the attorney, had betrayed Benton in order to steal his loot. Benton had left the location of his stash to his stripper-girlfriend (Carr), who had since gone straight and begun dating the detective who brought Benton to justice, after she had rejected the lawyer’s own advances.
The story then follows Benton’s revenge on his enemies; the police who first learn of a wave of mysterious killing, then of Benton’s reanimation; and the developing relationship between the detective and the stripper. The lawyer, fearing for his life after the two henchman are murdered, confesses the plot to the police, and reveals that Benton had always used the sewer system to evade detection; and to find a hiding place for the money, as it turns out.
Tracked down by the police, Benton is weakened but not killed when he takes a direct hit in the solar plexus from a bazooka, and is disfigured by a flame thrower. He runs to a power station, where he maneuvers metal equipment and himself into position to trigger a high-voltage jolt of electricity, which kills him. At the fade-out, Chasen proposes to his girlfriend.
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Directed and produced by Jack Pollexfen, written by Vy Russell and Sue Dwiggins, starring Lon Chaney Jr., Max Showalter, Marian Carr, Ross Elliott, Stuart Randall, Ken Terrell, Marjorie Stapp, Robert Shayne, Peggy Maley, Robert Foulk, Reita, Roy Engel and Madge Cleveland.
IN A PARTICULAR SCENE IN THIS MOVE, THE POLICE CHIEF TELLS THE “ATTORNEY”, “WELL, YOU SHOULD KNOW HOW THE LAW WORKS MR., NO COMPLAINT, NO CHARGES…….”
LON CHANEY DOES AN EXCELLENT JOB. ESPECIALLY WITH THE “CHANEY STARE”.