Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man (1943) - Universal's first monster bash is low on frights but entertains

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This exciting poster in splashy colors for Roy William Neill's Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man promises monstrous action and a scantily clad blond

The Wolf Man is awoken to life by graverobbers and flees from England to the village of Vasaria, where Dr. Frankenstein's notes are supposed to help him finally die. - But instead Frankenstein's horrific monster is also reawoken! 

Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man is written by Curt Siodmak (Riders to the Stars (1954)) and directed by Roy William Neill (Hoots Mon (1940)). It is the 5th film in the Frankenstein franchise and the first sequel to George Waggner's great The Wolf Man (1941). It is the first of Universal's 'monster mash' horrors in which established characters meet each other.
The film isn't scary to me: The bizarro monsters were eerie on their own, but when their universes are welded together, the result is almost comical.
Siodmak's script saves the film, along with Lon Chaney Jr.'s (Dracula vs. Frankenstein (1971)) portrayal of the Wolf Man, Lawrence Talbot. Siodmak establishes an adventure-like pace in the rather short feature and works in themes of anxiety of insanity and village lynch mob mentality. SPOILER An exploded dam ends up washing the monsters away in a tidal wave of Biblical proportions.

Listen to 13 minutes of Hans J. Salter's score for the film here

Cost: Unknown
Box office: Unknown
= Uncertain - but likely a box office success
[Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man was released 5 March (USA) and runs 74 minutes. Siodmak came up with the concept, because he needed a new car. Bela Lugosi had turned down playing the monster in the original Frankenstein (1931), thinking it unfit for his sudden stardom after Dracula (1931). He took the job to portray the monster 12 years later here after having played the monster's twisted companion Ygor in Son of Frankenstein (1939) and The Ghost of Frankenstein (1942), in which Ygor's brain is implanted into the monster. Shooting took place at Universal in Los Angeles. Siodmak's script had the monster talking, but test audiences reacted poorly to Lugosi's talking Frankenstein, and so this element was cut. Details on the cost and box office performance of the film are not available online, - but based on the continued stream of similar titles from Universal and the general drought of horror titles in period, the film was likely theatrically successful. Both the Frankenstein monster and the Wolf Man returned in House of Frankenstein (1944). Neill returned with Sherlock Holmes in Washington (1943). Ilona Massey returned in Holiday in Mexico (1946), Patrick Knowles in Hit the Ice (1943) and Lon Chaney Jr. in What We Are Fighting For (1943, short) and Frontier Badmen (1943). Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man is rotten at 25 % with a 5/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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