Not your typical Jekyll and Hyde

MAD, MAD, MONSTERS was a 1972 episode of ABC’s cartoon anthology show Saturday Superstar Movie. Produced by Rankin/Bass in the style of their Mad Monster Party, it has Baron Frankenstein inviting the great monsters to attend the wedding between his Creature and the Bride; terrified by the people’s he’s delivering to, a jittery mailman decides to quit and work for his brother’s hotel — oh, guess where they’re going to hold the wedding! This qualifies for the appendix by having the mailman pour out his terror to his shrink, Dr. Jekyll. Otherwise unmemorable. “The Creature’s Bride was run over by a lawn mower?”

KARUTHRA RATHRIGAL (1967) was the first film made in India’s Malayalam language; as I don’t speak Malayalam and the versions I found streaming didn’t have subtitles, I’m guessing about a lot of what’s going on. It’s clear the online sources are right about it being a Jekyll and Hyde version as I recognize lots of elements — worried servants, a pleading fiancee, Hyde sheltering behind Jekyll’s respectable face — but there’s a lot I don’t know such as why the doctor Santhan came up with the formula in the first place. I’m also puzzled why the Hyde makeup looks almost like blackface — I’m guessing it’s some aspect of Indian culture I’m not familiar with.

Rewatching HORROR HIGH (1973) I’m inclined to see it as kin to Willard in its story of an awkward young loser getting revenge on his tormenters (mean janitor, cruel teacher, bullying jock). That wouldn’t qualify it for my book except that we open with the high school English class studying Jekyll and Hyde and later the protagonist, Vernon (Pat Cardi), describes Hyde as an atavistic ape man lurking inside all of us. Which is apparently what he turns into, so they know what they’re adapting.

Vernon starts off as a tragic figure: the janitor bullies him, then forces Vernon to drink the formula he’s been experimenting with. We don’t get a good look at the Hyde version of Vernon — I doubt the movie could have pulled off a good one — but his face appears bigger and heavier and his shambling movements suggest an ape moving awkwardly along the ground. Unfortunately after that first accident Vernon begins using the chemicals to transform and avenge himself on his tormentors, which doesn’t end well for anyone. Mediocre acting but not uninteresting (though I might be uninterested if I wasn’t working on this book). “I’ve been working on an experiment — it seems to have gotten away from me, I think.”

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