Jean Yarbrough

  • Jean Yarbrough – The Devil Bat [+commentaries] (1940)

    1931-1940HorrorJean YarbroughSci-FiUSA

    Synopsis:
    Dr. Carruthers feels bitter at being betrayed by his employers, Heath and Morton, when they became rich as a result of a product he devised. He gains revenge by electrically enlarging bats and sending them out to kill his employers’ family members by instilling in the bats a hatred for a particular perfume he has discovered, which he gets his victims to apply before going outdoors. Johnny Layton, a reporter, finally figures out Carruthers is the killer and, after putting the perfume on himself, douses it on Carruthers in the hopes it will get him to give himself away. One of the two is attacked as the giant bat makes one of its screaming, swooping power dives.Read More »

  • Jean Yarbrough – She-Wolf of London (1946)

    1941-1950HorrorJean YarbroughThrillerUSA

    In the turn of the century in London, the aristocratic lawyer Barry Lanfield proposes to marry the heiress Phyllis Allenby and she accepts. Phyllis lives in the family manor with her “aunt” Martha Winthrop, her pseudo-niece Carol Winthrop and the housemaid Hannah. Out of the blue, dreadful murders happen in a nearby park and Detective Latham believes that they are victims of a werewolf or a she-wolf, but his superior Inspector Pierce says that they are victims of an animal. Meanwhile, Phyllis finds blood on her hands, and her shoes and clothing dirty and she believes that she may be killing people under the influence of a family curse. Who might be the serial-killer?Read More »

  • Jean Yarbrough – Abbott & Costello: The Naughty Nineties (1945)

    1941-1950AdventureComedyJean YarbroughUSA

    Abbott and Costello’s The Naughty Nineties offers a million laughs and a nickel’s worth of plot. Most of the film takes place aboard a 19th century showboat, owned by kindly Captain Sam (Henry Travers). Bud Abbott plays the showboat’s leading man Dexter Broadhurst, while Lou Costello is handyman Sebastian Dinwiddie. A group of slick gamblers (Alan Curtis, Rita Johnson and Joe Sawyer) cheat Captain Sam out of his boat, turning the place into a floating gambling palace, but Dexter and Sebastian foil the villains and save the day. The film is a virtual encyclopedia of wheezy but still hilarious comedy routines, many of them devised by veteran Laurel & Hardy and Three Stooges gagman Felix Adler. The film’s highlight is a full-length performance of Abbott and Costello’s verbal classic “Who’s on First?”-and if one listens very closely, one can hear the cameramen and crew members laughing!
    — Hal Erickson (AllMovie)Read More »

  • Jean Yarbrough – The Devil Bat (1940)

    1931-1940HorrorJean YarbroughSci-FiUSA

    Dr. Carruthers feels bitter at being betrayed by his employers, Heath and Morton, when they became rich as a result of a product he devised. He gains revenge by electrically enlarging bats and sending them out to kill his employers’ family members by instilling in the bats a hatred for a particular perfume he has discovered, which he gets his victims to apply before going outdoors. Johnny Layton, a reporter, finally figures out Carruthers is the killer and, after putting the perfume on himself, douses it on Carruthers in the hopes it will get him to give himself away. One of the two is attacked as the giant bat makes one of its screaming, swooping power dives.Read More »

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