13 Nights of Shocktober: Mad Love (1935)

by A.J.

This is my favorite time of year, second only to Christmas. Autumn has arrived, the weather is cooling down, and October becomes the month-long celebration of scary movies called Shocktober. So, in the days leading up Halloween I’ll be posting some horror movie recommendations to help you celebrate Shocktober.

Night 1: Classic Horror Night
“That Dr. Gogol is 100% crazy!”
Mad Love

The classic 1935 horror film Mad Love (not to be confused with the gen-x romantic drama starring Drew Barrymore and Chris O’Donnell) is a weird, wild film and a very creepy one too. Watching it today, you wonder how a film like this made it past the strict and puritanical Production Code, which policed the subject matter and content of films during the classic era.

This 68-minute movie has two horror premises playing out simultaneously. 1) Yvonne, an actress in a Grand Guignol type theater, retires to marry Orlac, a promising pianist and composer, much to the dismay of her obsessive fan, the brilliant surgeon, Dr. Gogol. Dr. Gogol’s obsession with Yvonne goes from unhealthy to creepy to dangerous. 2) After Orlac’s hands are badly damaged in a train accident, Dr. Gogol performs a hand transplant, giving him the hands of a recently dead murderer. Orlac, unaware of the transplant begins to think he is going mad when his hands seem to act on their own and throw knives with great precision. Instead of telling Orlac the truth, Dr. Gogol decides to feed Orlac’s paranoia. Once Orlac is arrested or committed, then Dr. Gogol believes he will be able to have Yvonne.

Peter Lorre, in his American movie debut, gives a great performance as the fiendish Dr. Gogol. Though Yvonne and Orlac are the protagonists, Lorre is the clear star and dominant screen presence. He is plenty creepy and menacing, but his performance even elicits some sympathy too. We see Dr. Gogol’s sympathetic and malicious sides at the same time in an especially creepy and well-staged scene where he talks to his evil side in a mirror. Lorrie is also completely bald as Dr. Gogol; it is a small touch, but it makes him seem extra creepy. Though Yvonne gives up her career to be married and becomes a damsel in distress, she is not a passive character and Frances Drake’s performance gives her some depth. Colin Clive, famous for playing the frantic Dr. Frankenstein in James Whale’s 1931 Universal monster classic, plays Orlac. He brings some of that same frantic energy to the scenes of Orlac troubled and panicked by his sudden violent impulses.

Mad Love’s director, Karl Freund, was a notable cinematographer that worked on films such as All Quiet on the Western Front, Metropolis, and Sunrise, a film whose cinematography is visual poetry. Mad Love would be his final film as a director, but he would continue to work as a cinematographer and win an Oscar for his work on The Good Earth (1937). With his background as a cinematographer, Freund has a keen eye for powerful, effective visuals. This isn’t limited to effects shots or horror imagery: a close up of Lorre looking at Yvonne is as creepy and sinister as any horror image. The Grand Guignol theater is a treasure trove of macabre sights. Scenes of Dr. Gogol talking to the wax statue of Yvonne and playing music to it are unsettling, not just because of the content but also the way they are staged. The most powerful and shocking image in Mad Love, perhaps in any horror movie of the 1930’s, is of Dr. Gogol appearing to Orlac disguised as the beheaded killer whose hands Orlac now has. He is draped in black with a toothy, sinister smile and wears a neck brace where his head has been “reattached.” He shows Orlac his metallic hands as proof. It is a frightening and disturbing scene. 

There are also some great moments of levity that do not clash with the horror plot. Dr. Gogol’s housekeeper/landlady is a daffy old woman with a parrot on her shoulder. Keeping a wax statue of an actress is just one of Dr. Gogol’s eccentricities that she gossips about. When she is drunk and sees the real Yvonne she says, “What are you doing out?” and drags her to Dr. Gogol’s apartment. There is also a persistent reporter wanting to profile Dr. Gogol. He actually helps the police instead of blocking them. When he hears Dr. Gogol’s scheme he says, nonchalantly, that it’s an old trick. It’s worth noting that Yvonne also figures out Gogol’s plan very quickly.

Like all films of the classic era, Mad Love has no closing credits making the ending feel abrupt and adding to the movie's odd tone. This a bizarre and surprising movie that has not lost its shock value over the decades. There is no gore or blood, so someone squeamish could watch this, or even a hardened horror fan, and still be shocked, frightened, and thoroughly entertained on any Shocktober Night. 

Mad Love airs on TCM on Friday, October 30th at 4:15PM CT.