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Rating:  -
The film begins in an urban setting. The East Side Kids are taken in and placed on a bus for a ride into the country for two weeks. They hear a warning about a maniac who has killed three persons and may be in the vicinity. At night the boys hear some howling. A stranger comes to visit the long empty Billings estate. Dr. Van Grosch shows up next and asks the station master to keep his presence secret. The boys go exploring the countryside at night; a shot is fired and the boys seek refuge at a lone house. The owner leads them upstairs to a bedroom so PeeWee can rest well. The others will stay in another room. [There is no electricity in those days.]
PeeWee awakes and walks out of the room. The boys show up and search for him. They wander around the house. Some of the jokes are no longer funny. A stranger offers a ride to the nurse and she accepts. In town the men get their firearms to search for the monster at the Billings estate. The identity of the mysterious stranger is revealed. Linda screams and the men rush to her aid. The monster is caught for a happy ending. [This story will not strain your brain.]
Rating:  -
There isn't much middle ground when if comes to opinions on the east side kids/Bowery Boys. People seem to love them or hate them. I've always been a fan since I was a kid and a local channel used to show one of their movies every Saturday afternoon.
Spooks Run Wild is the first meeting of the Kids and Bela Lugosi. The second being Ghosts on the Loose. In it..the kids are travelling to a camp out in the sticks where the "monster killer" just happens to be on the loose.
The kids sneak out of their cabin in the middle of the night to walk into town. Cutting through a cemetary Pee wee is shot with buckshot by a night watchman. The rest of the boys carry pee wee to a mysterious old mansion on top of a hill.
The mansion just happens to be home of Bela Lugosi (Nardo the Magician)and his midget assistant Luigi (played by Freaks star Angelo Rossitto).
Well as you might expect the kids run wild throughout the mysterious mansion, hiding out from Lugosi who they are convinced is the killer.
Along the way there's the usual slapstick humor that the kids are known for with Muggs (Leo Gorcey) bossing around the rest of the group. Scruno (Sammy Morrison)steals as he does in ghosts on the Loose with his wide-eyed panic routine.
Of course, Lugosi would turn out to be (once again) the red-herring and the real killer is later revealed as the kids save the day and catch the fiend.
Good fun and just over an hour so it's not a great commitment. Lugosi is his usual menacing self who somehow doesn't remember to tell the kids he's a magician just to make it even more menacing.
Rating: -
The Bowery Boys have always struck me as a little creepy. Men in their forties pretending to be pre-teens has struck me as very jarring (sort of like Roberto Benigni in "Pinocchio"). Still, you could find worse comedians, and in this movie, they at least have the benefit of starring with the always wonderful Bela Lugosi. Basically, it's just the Bowery Boy's running around Lugosi's haunted house. It's kind of fun, in an odd way. The only major drawback is the presence of some racist jokes ("Put on some whitewash before you sneek up on me in the dark").
The DVD from Alpha looks good enough. Some shots are scratchy, others are dark, and the blacks aren't as solid as they should be, but it's as clear as you're likely to find "Spooks Run Wild." Unsurprisingly, there are no extras.
Rating:  -
The East Side boys make more trouble again. Usually they are sent back to reform school. But this time they are put in a bus and taken to a small town. At a soda fountain shoppe, they hear on the radio that a "monster" killer is on the loose. The boys have a room to sleep in at the camp. At a gas station, Bela Lugosi as "Nardo" (Dracula [1931]) comes to town with his midget assistant, "Luigi" (Angelo Rossitto). They are looking for the Billings Estate. The gas station attendent says no one has been there since the killings ten years ago. Later, the gas station attendant meets Dr. Von Grosch (Dennis Moore). He tells the doctor he knows who he is and that he is looking for the "monster" killer. The man up ahead is the monster killer. The gas staion attendent keeps the secret of Von Grosch being in town. The boys go roamin' and they come across the graveyard at the Billings Estate. They are taken into the estate and there they meet the killer. They must stay in this spooky manor overnight. They want to get back to the camp, but they can't leave Pee Wee (played by David Gorcey, Leo's brother) who is under a spell. This is one of the more entertaining and popular films of the series.
Next film in the series is: MR. WISE GUY (1943).
In this his last feature film, Donald Haines ("Pee Wee"/ "Skinny") enlisted as an aviation cadet in the U.S. Army Air Corps on December 10, 1941. He was in World War II. They believe he was killed in action on February 20, 1943.
Bela Lugosi returned in GHOSTS ON THE LOOSE (1943).
Bela Lugosi with dwarf Angelo Rossitto later appeared in SCARED TO DEATH (1947).
Rating:  -
i bought this dvd [SPOOKS RUN WILD] and another [KID DYNAMITE] from alpha video and these dvd's would not play at all. i was very disappointed and will not buy any products from ALPHA again.
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