1958's "The Bride and the Beast" was a three-time loser on Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater, long before the cult of Edward D. Wood Jr. took shape following his death in 1978. You can tell it's a Wood script, with its angora sweaters and bestiality theme, but any camp value is totally drained off by the interminable stock footage once the picture shifts to Africa 34 minutes in. Before that it's a riot, with a captive gorilla making advances toward Charlotte Austin's newlywed bride, passively taking it regardless of the 'stares' that other commentators have deemed sexy (more indicative of a bored actress given nothing to work with). The stakes get raised when a psychiatrist taps into her inner 'Bridey Murphy,' and deduces by regression that the girl was a hairy gorilla in a past life! Once the action enters safari country, we get endless big game hunting, none of which feature animals in scenes shot with the actual performers, nothing but stock footage of a leopard (referred to as a 'cheetah'), a black leopard, and at least TWO tigers (who find themselves on the wrong continent!) all getting dropped abruptly after 35 minutes for the dreaded climax, when the 'gorilla her dreams' pops up out of the blue to kidnap Miss Austin and take her back to his place for a rendezvous with three of his pals (I kid you not). Admittedly, Lance Fuller (previously victimized by another Bridey Murphy ripoff, "The She-Creature") was never the sturdiest of actors, but knowing how difficult it would be to keep a straight face while walking through a studio jungle, his bemused performance seems understandable (his character certainly did nothing to deserve his fate, even stripping off his shirt at one point). The worst thing an Ed Wood movie can be is boring, and this one pays the price for 78 minutes (even "Orgy of the Dead" is more exciting). Charlotte Austin looked like a decent actress in "Frankenstein-1970," but since that was her final film, she probably picked a good time to throw in the towel (think Virginia Leith in "The Brain That Wouldn't Die"). The three films that were paired with "The Bride and the Beast" on Chiller Theater were "Caltiki the Immortal Monster," "Phantom from Space," and "Doctor of Doom."

Laura Carson (Charlotte Austin) has just married big game hunter Dan Fuller (Lance Fuller.) On her wedding night she finds herself strangely attracted to Spanky, a gorilla gone bad that Dan keeps locked up in a basement cage. Before you can say "Ed Wood wrote this," there are gun shots, nightmares, hypnotism, and Dan's unhappy discover that bride Laura may be the reincarnation of a gorilla queen! Can you dig it? Now and then a bad movie becomes unintentionally hilarious, but most of the time bad movies are simply bad. BRIDE AND THE BEAST actually teeters between the two, and this is largely due to the two leads: even in the face of producer-director Adrian Weiss' obvious lack of talent, Austin and Fuller prove unexpectedly competent, and they actually manage to hold the worst of the dialogue at bay. What this means, however, is that BRIDE never self-destructs in the ludicrous way of such films as PLAN 9 FROM OUTER SPACE--and in consequence it isn't so much unintentionally hilarious as it is unintentionally amusing in a mild sort of way.The film is full of absurdities. Dan Fuller's basement, where the ill-fated gorilla Spanky is caged, has a refrigerator, but illumination is provided by torch. Servant Taro (Johnny Roth, in what seems to be his only film role) is very obviously a white man in bad "native" make-up; he runs around saying "Bwana" a lot. There is a lot of canned wild animal footage, shots of Africa that look suspiciously like shots of South America, and men in bad gorilla costumes. And Ed Wood being Ed Wood, he just can't resist writing references to angora sweaters into the script.The print is mediocre, but it is worth pointing out that it was probably never very good to begin with, and the DVD release comes with several bonuses of no interest. Fans of cult films, and especially die hard fans of Ed Wood, will enjoy it--and for their sake I give it three stars. But just about every one else should give it a miss.GFT, Amazon Reviewer

"The Bride and the Beast" starts off well with lots of potential that this could be a pretty good movie. The plot revolves around a man, his newlywed wife, and her strange connection with gorillas. Then the couple goes to Africa and the movie unravels. Forget all about the first part of the movie. Put it on the shelf for a while because you won't need to remember it again until you get to the end. You next get lots of terrible stock footage of African animals and the plot takes a side road as the husband hunts down two tigers. It's almost as though it turned into a Safari movie and a boring one at that. As you watch the different animals, the background scenery changes dramatically from shot to shot. The scenes, especially of the animals are shot in all different kinds of terrain. Very poorly done. At this point there is barely a string connecting the beginning of the movie to the middle. This goes on for quite a while. Nearing the end of the movie, they drop the safari and hunting and go back to the man, woman, gorilla plot to end the movie. It's too bad because this one had a chance if they just stuck with the original plot throughout the film. The Bride and the Beast" is disjointed and boring, not recommended.

Let me see if I have this straight; Adrian Weiss produced it, Adrian Weiss directed it, and Adrian Weiss wrote (relative term) it, but this is an "Ed Wood film.?" Heck, he probably improved it. And it was most likely his imput that had Charlotte Austin staying with the gorillas over Lance Fuller. After all, in the dark, gorilla fur/hair could possibly pass for cashmier.