Horror Fest Day One: Alligator People

"NERVE SHATTERING TERROR!"

Filmed in glorious Cinemascope, and black and white.

The Alligator People is more of a mystery than a horror movie, and structured accordingly. We start out with a patient under hypnosis at a psychiatric facility, who weaves a strange and terrifying tale:

Paul and Joyce Webster are newlyweds, taking a train to their honeymoon. Paul was a military pilot who was almost killed in a plane crash, but miraculously survived. Paul receives a telegram, and abruptly gets of the train at a quick stopover. Joyce has no idea why her new husband left, but follows a trail of clues to the Bayou Country, where she finds snakes, radioactive crates, and a drunken Lon Chaney Jr. (with hook, no less)

Chaney hates alligators (this is important) but agrees to take her to the Cypress Plantation, where old Widow Hawthorne locks her in a guest room and then goes to scheme with the mysterious Dr. Sinclair.

Somehow, Joyce gets out, and snoops downstairs, only to find a mystery man playing the piano! Who could it be???

The next morning, Joyce demands answers, and Old Widow Hawthorne and Dr. Sinclair cave; it's Paul. Or, more correctly, Half Paul / Half Alligator (or, as I like to call him, Paulligator). That night, Paulligator sneaks back into the house, only to spy Joyce and run off into the swamp.

Joyce pursues, but is nearly eaten by normal alligators, and then almost ravaged by a Drunken Lon Chaney Jr, until Paulligator comes to the rescue. Then it's time to come totally clean, so Dr. Sinclair explains that he used Alligator glands to heal critically wounded patients, only to discover they became half human / half alligators (I have no good one for this), but he thinks by exposing Paulligator to direct Cobalt Radiation that he can heal him, so they all agree to try it.

Of course, Chaney shows up and screws things up, and in the process gets that hook of his stuck to a live wire, but not before turning Paulligator from half and half to mostly alligator, including a rubber alligator head. The lab explodes, killing everyone but Joyce and Paulligator, who run into the swamp.

Paulligator, unable to cope with this existensial crisis, wrestles some alligators and then drowns in quicksand. The end.

The Alligator People tries very hard to be a serious film about science gone amuck, but when you have Lon Chaney Jr in the twilight of his career (and literally drunk) and a lead character that sounds like Karl from Sling Blade, you can only get so serious.

That being said, it's only 77 minutes long.

Gotta go, I hear Treehouse of Horror Episodes in the background...