The Devil Bat (1940)

Bela gives bats the great smell of Brut.

Like every other field of science, Mad Doctoring has its areas of specialization—atomic robots, genetically engineered plagues, giant death rays, and advanced henchman-whipping. But year in and year out, one of the most popular courses of post-graduate study for the aspiring movie madman is freestyle Bat Mutation.

Let’s take a squint at one famous example from the Killer Bat canon, and see if we can determine why schemes for enlarging these ecologically helpful mammals to monstrous proportions and imbuing them with a lust for human blood continues to generate so many grant applications each year.

The Devil Bat (1940)
Directed by Jean Yarborough
Screenplay by John Thomas Neville, which seems like a pretty snooty moniker for a guy who’s written something called Devil Bat.

Our story opens in the quiet village of Heathsville—a town apparently founded on the candy bar industry, and controlled by two powerful families, the Heaths and the Zagnuts. A title card appears, saving many minutes of expensive exposition, informing us that kindly village doctor Paul Carruthers (Bela Lugosi) is conducting “weird, terrifying experiments.” Bela is embittered that, despite his obvious mitteleuropean origins, he’s been stuck with a name like Paul Carruthers, and seeks revenge by speaking in an accent so impenetrable that he makes Eva Gabor sound like Alistair Cooke.

Bela walks into an attic full of bats and explains his theory of “glandular stimulation through electrical impulses,” leading the viewer to conclude that Bela has just invented a vibrating novelty item. Instead, the good doctor takes one of the bats—now dangling upside down from a coat hanger—puts him in a closet, and turns on some humming electrical equipment, causing the bat to grow to horrifying proportions. The viewer’s worst fears are confirmed: Bela has learned the secret of creating hideous monsters with One-Hour Martinizing.

Meanwhile, Mr. Zagnut sends his dim-witted son Roy over to Bela’s lab to present him with a $5,000 bonus check on behalf of the firm. Naturally, this makes Bela want to kill everybody, so he asks Roy to try the new shaving lotion he’s just invented. The deeply stupid young man sees nothing sinister in Bela’s request that he “rub some on the tender part of the neck,” and happily complies.

After the reeking Roy departs, Bela takes center stage with a dramatic, Dune-style voice over, telling us that he feels ill-used by his employers and will make them all pay. We also learn that “the worm is the spice! The spice is the worm!”

Bela releases the Devil Bat, which promptly follows the stink of the shaving lotion to Zagnut Manor. It dives out of the night sky and murders Roy, all the while shrieking “Yeeeeee-HAAAAAAA” like Slim Pickens at the end of Dr. Strangelove.

Later, at a big city newspaper, managing editor Perry White gets ace reporter Johnny Layton on the case. Something of a science whiz himself, Johnny has been conducting secret experiments to enlarge the brim of his hat, and makes his first appearance wearing a fedora the size of the Flushing Meadows Unisphere.

Johnny heads for Heathsville in the company of his incredibly abrasive photographer-sidekick “One Shot McGuire.” The less said about this character the better, but if Jimmy Olsen had been half this irritating, Superman would long ago have popped his skull like a zit.

Johnny visits the local Chief of Police, who is impressed by the awning-like brim of Johnny’s hat, and instantly agrees to let this total stranger conduct the homicide investigation himself. He also allows Johnny to carry a gun, declare martial law, and suspend the Constitution at will.

The following night, Roy’s brother Tommy permits Bela to shave his butt and apply the untested shaving lotion. Predictably, the monster drains Tommy’s blood and leaves nothing behind but the great smell of Brut, leading Johnny to believe that the murders and the after-shave lotion are connected. The chief scoffs at Johnny’s theory, even though Bela has just given them each a sample of the lotion in a bottle labeled “Big Bat Bait.”

Johnny, being no smarter than anyone else in this film, slaps on the shaving lotion, causing the Devil Bat to attack Jimmy Olsen. Johnny pulls his gun and fires five times, idiotically missing Jimmy and killing the star.

Undaunted, Bela One-Hour Martinizes up another monster, then goes into the closet and gives the bat a hernia examination (“Turn your head and echo-locate”).

Bela then visits the head of the Heath family, Oh Henry, to dab him with the scented lotion and remind him that “Your brain is too feeble to grasp what I have achieved!” Bela works himself into a Hungarian tizzy, and gloats aloud about killing half the Heath and Zagnut clans with his perfume and bats. The truth dawns on Oh Henry, who finally realizes that between love and madness lies Obsession. He’s on the verge of discovering that nothing comes between Bela and his Calvins when we cut back to Johnny, who is searching the laboratory. He has finally found ironclad evidence that will send Bela to the gallows: Bat guano and dry-cleaning fluid.

Meanwhile, Bela drives off to kill Mr. Zagnut. He has the new bat in his trunk, but he has to release it just outside Zagnut Manor, since it’s a spare bat, and is only good for 25 miles at 50 miles per hour.

Johnny splashes Bela with the lotion, and then, while they wait to see which one of them the bat will kill first, Johnny asks Bela how he managed to develop the monster. Bela gives the old “your brain is too feeble” speech again, then he and the reporter Apache dance until the giant bat arrives to kill Bela with a hearty “Yee-Ha!”

The movie comes to an abrupt end, and we are left not so much with a moral as with a motto. “One-Hour Martinizing: Gets Clothes Clean. Makes Bats Big.”

Poor Dr. Carruthers. Despite his murders and his hammy theatrics, one can almost feel sorry for him. After all, we’ve all been there: not appreciated by the candy bar industry despite our cutting-edge work in the field of rodent-attracting shaving lotion; forced to go by the slave name of “Paul Carruthers”; and hungering to get bat-related revenge on those who gave us bonus checks. And Carruthers would have got away with it too, if it hadn’t been for his big mouth!

The lesson to aspiring mad scientists is obvious: a successful killing spree requires you to refrain from bragging to everyone in town about how you used giant bats to knock off those who wronged you. Hey, you don’t need validation from people whose minds are too feeble to grasp what you have accomplished—their gory death should be its own reward. If you want to explain how you managed to enlarge flying mammals via a secret dry cleaning technique and made them attack the Old Spice man, then do it at Batty Scientists Anonymous meeting, since there at least you’d have a slight expectation of confidentiality.