The Ghost Breakers

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Classic Horror Special

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If you've been following along with these reviews, you may be wondering what happened to 'The Invisible Man Returns'. Well, funnily enough, I simply couldn't find it - invisible, indeed. It's actually one of the more difficult films to track down, unless you live in America and may be able to rent it through Amazon. But it didn't take me long to find a replacement with an early horror comedy starring Bob Hope called 'The Ghost Breakers'.

As a 'Ghostbusters' fan, I had to jump on it. There's a whole long story behind the film's namesake and some legal rights, but the fact that this film existed sort of helped put 'Ghostbusters' on the map. If nothing else, it helped inspire the film to get made, as Aykroyd's idea was to modernize some of these old horror spoofs. But I digress. We're here to talk about 'The Ghost Breakers', featuring the one and only Bob Hope, and a bunch of old, dated humor that might make one cringe today. It's very much a product of its time when it comes to a few racial jokes, but there's also a balance. It's sort of like going back to some old school Mel Brooks - there's something dated and uncomfortable there, but so much of the rest of the film is worth it anyway.

The film follows Mary Carter (Paulette Goddard) who inherits a mansion on Black Island, somewhere near the Cuban coast. The island may or may not be fictional, as in doing a bit of homework, the closest you get is an island in The Bahamas. Anyway, the mansion is said to be haunted. She is warned with a phone call from a stranger (Anthony Quinn) to keep away from the place, but Mary carries on with her plan to claim the property and sets sail towards the island.

During all of this, a radio announcer named Larry Lawrence (Hope) lets some information slip over the radio about some members of the local underworld, headed by crime boss, Frenchy Duval (Paul Fix). This leads to a shoot-off, and Larry believing he shot one of Duvall's henchmen, which puts Larry on the run for his life. Coincidentally, he finds Mary (who he knows, and is living in the same hotel as Duval) and hides in one of her trunks, ready to head to Black Island with her. On the ship, he refers to himself as a "ghost breaker" - one who looks into, and gets rid of ghosts of the past. Little does he know just how literal he'll have to take his made up job.

Along the way, Larry is aided by his valet, Alex (Willie Best), and this is where some of that dated humor comes into play. You sort of have to take it for what it was in 1940, and it's just funny enough to shake your head at it and question how much of it they'd ever get away with nowadays. Alex is very much the comedy relief in this; while Bob Hope has plenty of humorous lines and moments, Alex is that cowardly Scooby-Doo-like character who is so cartoonish that there's a point in the film he's so scared that he turns from black to white. So it teeters with some of its humor. But again, so much of it comes from Bob Hope, himself, who kinda keeps you on your toes with his delivery.

Perhaps the most fascinating thing about the film, however, is that this is one of the first visual representations of what is called, in the film, a zombie. Zombies became a thing with 'White Zombie' back in '32, but they'd never become what they are today until 'Night of the Living Dead' in 1968. Up until then, there wasn't much more to them than being Mummy of Frankenstein-like, and it was more of a hypnosis thing than anything to do with the walking dead (at least as far as I know). The zombie is also impressively creepy looking for its time, portrayed by Noble Johnson, who often played extra roles as opposed to anything major.

'Ghost Breakers' is an interesting film, to say the least. Despite some of the dated humor, it's overall a pretty cool idea for the time, and one of the earliest examples of horror comedy. The super famous 'Abbot and Costello Meet Frankenstein' wouldn't be for another eight years, and one of the only horror comedies predating it is 'The Cat and the Canary'. It's always a lot of fun for me to go back in time and see what inspired my favorite subgenre of film, and I look forward to first-timing some more of these as I go.

4/5

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