EDITOR’S NOTE: The Bat was on the CBS Late Movie on June 26, 1984.
If you like your horror with a heavy dose of classic Hollywood royalty mixing it up with proto-giallo bloodshed, 1959’s The Bat is here for it. Based on Mary Roberts Rinehart’s legendary 1908 novel The Circular Staircase and its subsequent 1920 Broadway hit, this is actually the fourth screen adaptation of the material (following the 1926 silent classic, the 1930 talkie The Bat Returns and an uncredited thematic precursor). When it hit theaters, it famously played as a killer double feature with Hammer’s The Mummy.
A corrupt bank president and his shady physical therapist—played with peak, smooth-talking menace by Vincent Price—try to embezzle a cool $1 million (that’s roughly $8.9 million today). They hide the loot in a rented country mansion right as a massive forest fire breaks out, threatening to trap everyone inside.
Enter Agnes Moorehead as Cornelia Van Gorder, a sharp-witted mystery novelist who rents the estate. Moorehead brings absolute gravitas to the role, treating the unfolding chaos like one of her own fictional plots come to life.
Agnes Moorehead plays Cornelia Van Gorder, a mystery author who gets involved with a bank president and his physical therapist (Vincent Price), who are trying to scam $1 million dollars ($8.9 million adjusted for inflation) when a forest fire breaks out.
While the greedy men are busy plotting their heist, a masked maniac known only as The Bat crashes the party in proto-giallo style, a few years before Bava made The Girl Who Knew Too Much and Blood and Black Lace. He’s resplendent in a dark cloak, terrifying mask and steel-clawed gloves, brutally tearing out the tender throats of young women. Among the terrified women trapped in the house is Darla Hood—yes, the very same Darla from Our Gang (The Little Rascals) in what would tragically be her final film role before her untimely death in 1979.
Director Crane Wilbur was a true Hollywood renaissance man. He started his career as a silent film actor, transitioned into a prolific screenwriter, and famously penned the script for 1953’s 3-D classic House of Wax (also starring Vincent Price).
You can watch this on Tubi or download it from the Internet Archive.
