Humphrey Bogart Blood Sucker

THE RETURN OF DOCTOR X-1939-Walter Garrett (Wayne Morris), a dumb reporter breaks the news of the death of an actress Angela Merrova (Lya Lys) but her body disappears and when she winds up alive, Garrett's fired. He goes to his friend Dr. Rhodes (Dennis Morgan) for advice. Rhodes does an operation with the brilliant Dr. Flegg (John Litel). When a body is found drained of blood the police think Rhodes is the murderer. Strange bloodstains are found on the scene. Rhodes visits Flegg and meets his weird assistant Quesne (Humphrey Bogart), a soft spoken pale guy with a white streak in his hair. When Merrova suddenly dies (for real), Garrett and Rhodes investigate along with the doc's nurse/girlfriend Joan (Rosemary Lane) in tow. Later Garrett discovers that Quesne is actually Dr. Xavier, a whacko who let a baby die as an experiment and was executed years before. They dig up his coffin and it's empty. Flegg admits that after bringing a rabbit back to life he did the same for X/Quesne and knows Quesne is a murderer and he is to blame. X/Q kills Flegg and kidnaps Joan for her blood (he has a book with the names of all blood donors who have his type). Before he can kill her he's shot and killed in NJ. 

Olin Howland plays an undertaker. Two interns are played by William Hopper and Glen Langan. Huntz Hall is Pinky and Ian Wolfe is a caretaker. 

This is a typical Warner Bros type “stand alone” horror/murder mystery with an untypical horror lead. The casting of Bogart is the only reason it's probably remembered today! It was directed by former actor Vincent Sherman who later worked with Bogart on ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT.

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More Dead

I SELL THE DEAD-2008-In this comedy horror story a grave robber named Arthur (LORD OF THE RINGS's Dominic Managhan) awaiting execution for (of course) grave robbing and murder tells his life story to a priest (Ron Perlman who starred in HELLBOY 2 the same year). He learns his trade from Willie (indie director Larry Fessenden also one of the producers) (who has already been executed). They dig up many corpses mostly for Dr. Quint (PHANTASM's Angus Scrimm) but run into trouble when they unearth a woman who's wearing a garlic necklace. When they remove the garlic she comes to life and tries to kill them. Willie manages to drive a stake through her heart and they deliver the body to Quint who removes the stake and is killed. Later the two have a fight with another guy over the body of an alien. It turns out the guy is from a notorious group of grave robbers known as The House Murphy. Arthur's new girlfriend Brenda Cooney gets them into trouble on an island where some dead come back to life. The body snatching duo then have a falling out.  The ending is fairly ridiculous but before the final credits roll the old Universal Pictures tag line "A fine cast is worth repeating" is used. Directed by Glen McQuaid.

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