Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein/Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man VHS

I have been a fan of Abbott and Costello for the longest time. I just received my Blu-ray in the mail today. The movie looks like it was made yesterday. It is so clear, the video is incredible and the audio is great. Great extras on the Blu-ray. Unbelievable performances by Bela Lugosi at age 65 is a definite highlight! Lon Chaney Jr. as the Wolfman and Glenn Strange playing the monster for the third time. Abbott and Costello are so hilarious and definitely are on top of their game. The best part is they do not make fun of the monsters. Interesting they did not want to make it and neither did Universal. But it turned out to be the second highest grossing film of the year at 3.2 million. I believe they made a lot of money doing this movie with an upfront fee and a percentage on the backend. Has to be one of my top five favorite films of all time.

Still reeling with relish over my purchase of the Classic Universal Monsters Blu-ray Collection, I decided it was high time to upgrade my DVD of ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN to Blu. I've always rated this 1948 horror/comedy fest right up there with the best of Universal's monsters; better than their other "all in one" offerings, HOUSE OF FRANKENSTEIN (1944) and HOUSE OF DRACULA (1945).What's great about it is that Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Jr. and Glenn Strange play their respective roles as Dracula, Wolfman and Frankenstein's Monster totally straight, which makes Bud Abbott's and Lou Costello's reactions to all the monstrous mayhem doubly hilarious. This is Lugosi's only other screen appearance as Dracula, and this time he's assisted in his bat transformations by the use of some effective animation. Chaney is lots of fun as the tormented Larry Talbot, who desperately tries to persuade Bud and Lou to help him thwart Dracula's plan of reviving the Frankenstein Monster. Of his three outings as the monster, this is certainly Strange's best, allowing him more screen time and interaction than in the previous films. An added attraction is Lenore Aubert as Lugosi's beautiful assistant, who's after Lou's brain which is supposed to find a new home in the head of "Frankie".Included on this pristine looking/sounding Blu-ray release is a DVD version, along with extras "Abbott and Costello Meet the Monsters", "100 Years of Universal: The Lot", "100 Years of Universal: Unforgettable Characters", a commentary by historian Greg Mank and the theatrical trailer.ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN was my very first encounter with Universal's iconic monster movies via a Castle Films super 8 short. I must've been around 7 or 8 years old, and I remember I didn't consider it a comedy because the seriousness of the monsters stood out so vividly in my impressionable young mind. Because of that memorable introduction, ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN will always be special to me. Aside from that, it's a reverential and very entertaining send-up of those classics equalled only by Mel Brooks' YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN (1974).Highly recommended.

Simply put, this is an amazing film. I doubt the cast & crew realized at the time they were making a classic but that's what "A&C Meet Frankenstein" has become. In fact, it was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the National Film Registry in 2001. I think the key element in this film that makes it so funny and SO ahead of it's time is the fact that all of the monsters/villains are playing it straight. Playing deadpan like that became very popular some 35 / 40 years later in the AIRPLANE and NAKED GUN films. This adds a wonderful level of authenticity and actual suspense to the scenes when the boys are running around trying to avoid being strangled, bitten or crushed.Another wonderful element was the casting of Bela Lugosi as Dracula and Lon Chaney Jr. as the Wolfman. If you were / are a fan of the classic Universal monster films of the 30's and 40's, watching those two playing those roles again made this film feel like the real thing. Unfortunately Boris Karloff did not play Frankenstein's monster as he had hung up his bolts for good by 1948. Glenn Strange, who was a character actor in many westerns played the monster here as he had previously in "House of Dracula" & "House of Frankenstein". He's no Karloff but he gets the job done.Watching this as a kid you were laughing one moment and actually creeped out the next. There is also an amazing moment (though too short) where Dracula and the Wolfman are actually fighting each other. A jaw dropping moment for an 8 year old.The blu ray was released in 2012 and looks fine for a 67 year old film. We're lucky this was released in this format by Universal.

Fans of the movie Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein already know how incredibly fun it is to watch so I won't review the movie here. However if you already own a copy of the movie in standard-def you might be wondering if this Blu-ray transfer is a must buy. Without making this review overly complicated I will simply say that the Blu-ray transfer looks and sounds monsterously great. Do keep in mind though that for an old movie the previously available standard-def transfer of the film already looked darn good. The blacks and whites of the Blu-ray transfer are nicely balanced and the picture has been sharped to the point that you now see a certain amount of grain in the film that you probably didn't notice before. A plus for this transfer is that it appears many of the obvious small scratches seen in other releases have been cleaned up. The bottom line is if you don't own a copy of the movie or just want a Blu-ray copy for your Blu collection I'd say get it but don't expect the eyepopping "WOW" factor you've seen with some old-time movie transfers to Blu-ray. .