The Frog with the Mask, aka Face of the Frog, was based on the Edgar Wallace book Fellowship of the Frog. All things both krimi and giallo flow from Mr. Wallace, so this film is rather essential, as the success of this picture led to Rialto making a series of 32 Wallace films over the next twenty years.
There’s a gang of frog-tattooed nene’er-do-wellsed by a frog-masked madman who ig hopping mad — sorry — in London. They are coming after Ella Bennett, who is protected by not only Scotland Yard, ut by Richard Gordon, a millionaire playboy with a butler named James who is in no way Bruce Wayne in nature.
This story had already been filmed by Archibald B. Heath as the serial The Mark of the Frog in 1928 and Jack Raymond’s The Frog in 1937. Thanks, A Wasted Life!
Man, there’s a lot of plot jammed into the running time here, and not a lot of it is memorable. You know what it is? A frog man who orders the death of people. More of that, please!
