The Man They Could Not Hang (1939)

When Dr. Savaard's experiment in cryonics is interrupted by the short-sighted authorities, his volunteer dies, and he is condemned to death. He vows vengeance if he can survive his own hanging.

Director:

Nick Grinde

Writers:

Karl Brown (screenplay), George Wallace Sayre (story),

Stars:

Boris Karloff, Lorna Gray, Robert Wilcox

Cast

Complete credited cast:
Boris Karloff	...	Dr. Henryk Savaard
Lorna Gray	...	Janet Savaard
Robert Wilcox	...	'Scoop' Foley
Roger Pryor	...	District Attorney Drake
Don Beddoe	...	Police Lt. Shane
Ann Doran	...	Betty Crawford
Joe De Stefani	...	Dr. Stoddard
Charles Trowbridge	...	Judge Bowman
Byron Foulger	...	Lang
Dick Curtis	...	Jury Foreman Clifford Kearney
James Craig	...	Juror Watkins
John Tyrrell	...	Juror Sutton

Storyline

Mad Scientist, Dr. Henryk Savaard, is obsessed with bringing the dead back to life. The police are alerted of Savaard's activities by his assistant's girlfriend. Savaard is arrested, convicted and sentenced to hang. He vows revenge on the judge, jury and district attorney. After the hanging, his assistant claims Savaard's body and uses Savaard's technique on it. Savaard is brought back to life. Now he can seek sweet revenge on his prosecutors.

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Plot Keywords:

revenge | hanging | mad scientist | cryonics | experiment | 

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Taglines:

Weird! Horrifying! Fascinating!

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Genres:

Crime | Horror | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

Unrated

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

17 August 1939 (USA)

Also Known As:

Celui qui a tué la mort

Company Credits

Production Co:

Columbia Pictures Corporation

Technical Specs

Runtime:

64 min

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Mirrophonic Recording)

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Part of the SON OF SHOCK package of 21 titles released to television in 1958, which followed the original SHOCK THEATER release of 52 features one year earlier. This was also one of the 12 Columbia titles, the other 61 all being Universals.

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Quotes

Dr. Henryk Savaard: We've taken a human life! If we can't restore that life, the law will call it murder.

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Connections

Featured in Cinemassacre's Monster Madness: Man They Couldn't Hang (2009)

User Reviews

"hang" it high

Boris Karloff plays a scientist who discovers a way to prolong people's lives. To try it out, he has to kill someone. When his plan is discovered, they arrest him, convict him and execute him. But, as the title identifies, it doesn't end there. To be certain, he invites the jurors to his house and explains how one person will perish every fifteen minutes. Then, it starts happening.

"The Man They Could Not Hang" is outlandish, definitely, but it's kind of a neat movie. The ending was sort of a cop-out, but most of the movie was pretty fun. Karloff's eerie stare is enough to carry a movie all by itself.