Absolutely a great horror film. The English countryside setting is perfect and I think the film is enhanced in black and white (somehow black and white produces a scarier effect than color). the cast is very good and they display some fine acting. The plot is sort of easy to guess but the overall atmosphere of the film makes you forget that point. This film should be shown on some TV stations during the Halloween season. Wish they made more of this type today.

Many films thrown together in this era don't do a very good job. This one is quite atmospheric. It involves a family curse where people have died over the years at the hands of a vicious monster. A couple of Thin Man type sleuths are brought in to investigate what is going on and are stopped at every turn by the people most affected. While it has its sappy moments and a whole bunch of characters jumping out of the dark, it keeps our attention pretty well. There is a butler and a house maid who seem to be at the center of things and lots of red herrings, but the production value is decent. Often, in other 1940's offerings, the horror aspect is there to be the distraction from a romantic comedy. In this one, attention is paid to the crime itself. Oh, there is some bad science, but what the heck.

"The Undying Monster" was an attempt by Darryl F. Zanuck to replicate the success that Universal Studios was having with horror movies for his studio 20th Century Fox. What we get here is a sort of horror/mystery mix with a tip of the hat to Sherlock Holmes and "The Hound of the Baskervilles".The story surrounds the Hammond family who have lived in a drafty old house for centuries just outside of London England. The current owners are a brother, Oliver Hammond (John Howard) and his sister Helga (Heather Angel). Also in residence are a creepy old butler Walton (Halliwell Hobbes) and his sinister wife (Elly Malyon). It seems that a family curse has befallen the Hammonds once again.When Oliver and a local girl are found savagely attacked in the foggy old moors, fear spreads throughout the house. When the girl dies a murder investigation is begun by Scotland Yard. Heading up the investigation are the Holmes/Watson like team of Bob Curtis (James Ellison) and his assistant "Christy" (Heather Thatcher). The family doctor, Doctor Jeff Colbert (Bramwell Fletcher) seems to know more than he is telling and the Waltons are lurking about in the shadows.I don't think I'm giving too much away when I say that the culprit turns out to be a werewolf whose identity is not revealed until the end.The film was directed by John Brahm a German who fled his country in the 1930s and had made mostly "B" movies (of which this is one) to date. He injects mystery and horror into his "B" budget in an imaginative way both through his direction and the atmospheric photography of no less than the legendary Lucien Ballard. I was disappointed though at a couple of tacky rear projection shots involving characters riding in a coach.It's odd that everyone in the cast has a British accent except for the "star" James Ellison. Ellison had recently graduated from being second banana to Hopalong Cassidy but never progressed beyond a "B" picture leading man. Heather Angel and John Howard had starred together in the "Bulldog Drummond" series from 1937 to 1939. And yes that was Charles McGraw playing Studwick who battles Curtis in the basement tombs.Brahm would soon be rewarded for his efforts with a pair of "A" budget films with "A" list casts in "The Lodger" (1944) and "Hangover Square" (1945) both starring Laird Cregar.

John Brahm's film is an adaptation of the novel written by Jessie Douglas Kerruish. Following the success for Universal with The Wolf Man a year earlier, 20th Century Fox clearly saw an opportunity to cash in on the renewed interest in Lycanthropic creatures. Brahm's film deals with one such legendary creature that is said to terrorise members of the cursed Hammond family. Roping in master photographer Lucien Ballard, Brahm sets the film up with the creepy ancestral home atop of a cliff, the sea on one side, the foggy moor on the other. Then with minimal budget and a cast of largely minor players-and a short 23 day production schedule, Brahm crafted a tight, eerie mystery that deserves far better appraisal than it's currently getting.Atmosphere is of paramount importance when making a Gothic type picture, The Undying Monster has it by the bucket load. Aided by Ballard's adroit skills, Brahm excellently uses shadows and light to garner unease, be it the interiors that are gorgeously designed, or the foggy exteriors perhaps hiding dark secrets, atmosphere is high quality here. The film has been chided in certain quarters for either being too talky, or for daring to be jovial at times. Yes these charges are fair if one is expecting an outright horror film and not the creepy mystery that it actually is. This is no boo jump bonanza, the creature is purposely kept from us so as to keep us, and the characters wondering when, or if, it will show up. Thus the conversations become crucial and of high interest. Something that hasn't helped the film either is its title, why they didn't go with the first muted {and English title} name, "The Hammond Mystery" is probably due to the afore mentioned attempt to cash in on The Wolf Man. As you can see, one screams out that the film is about a monster who can't be killed, the other sounds like it's an Agatha Christie who done it?. You understand their reasonings, it's just very misleading and hasn't helped the films reputation to flow.It's a cracking mystery film that has horror elements involved in its plot. More like The Hound Of The Baskervilles than The Wolf Man, it none the less is 63 minutes of 1940s Gothic joy. 8/10