Mad doctor uses patients at his isolated psychiatric institute as subjects in his attempts to create longevity by surgically installing an artificial gland in their skulls, with disastrous results.This film has a suspiciously low rating on IMDb, which I suspect can only be caused by one of two things (or both): its being shown on "Mystery Science Theater 3000" or its being associated with Ed Wood. Since the latter is not likely to impact it, I suspect it is the former.And that is just too bad. Despite the lampooning, this is a decent film with good effects (the gland), a better than average plot and decent acting. We have John Carradine, a legendary actor and Carradine family patriarch. And he is surrounded by actresses who had been Miss America, a Playboy Playmate (around the same time the film came out) and more...The script? From a man who went on to write some of the best episodes of "Star Trek". Certainly this cannot be as bad as it is made out to be. Another examination may be in order.

While I am sure my summary is not exactly a glowing endorsement, I do think that this bad movie isn't nearly rotten enough to merit its current listing among the "hallowed 100"--the 100 lowest ranked films listed on IMDb. Instead of being a 100% "stinker", it's actually a low-budget but watchable film....really! When the film begins, you are greeted with a house that is obviously a painting--from which the film's odd title emanates. Odd, because there is nothing "unearthly" about the film--no aliens at all.The first scene you are greeted to is a closeup of Tor Johnson killing someone. Seeing Tor, I knew this film would be low-budget crap--heck, he's the unofficial king of these films with his luminous performances in such dreck classics as BRIDE OF THE MONSTER, PLAN 9 and THE BEAST OF YUCCA FLATS (my vote for the worst of his films). Interestingly, in this film he's named 'Lobo'--the same name he had in NIGHT OF THE GHOULS and BRIDE OF THE MONSTER. He's back again in THE UNEARTHLY as essentially the same guy (though he does talk some in this film, unlike the others). You must assume, then, that he's a freelance henchman--willing to work not for Bela Lugosi, Kenne Duncan and here for John Carradine. I could imagine his classified ad now: "Loyal, brutish henchman looking for a position. Ability to speak limited but hulking appearance more than makes up for shortcomings." It turns out that Tor is working in a weird clinic in the middle of nowhere for the evil doctor (Carradine) and his devoted assistant, Dr. Gilchrist (Marilyn Buferd). Despite Gilchrist being a bit of a 50s horror movie babe, however, Carradine seems rather immune to her advances and focuses his energies on creating and implanting a supposed "new gland" in his patients. Sadly, however, the gland only seems to have the side effect of turning the patients into creepy and disfigured ghouls or werewolf-like creatures. Sadly, the victims have no idea that they'll be subjected to these sick experiments and so they just wait until it's there turn. Of course, considering the clinic is in the middle of no where and the patients are not allowed outside, you'd think they might suspect SOMETHING! Into this lovely menagerie comes a wanted murderer (played by Myron Healey). Healey was a very competent and familiar supporting actor from television and so you wonder why with almost 300 performances to his credit he would have appeared in this film. His character is supposed to be a killer, but it's obvious he's more than meets the eye, as he quickly determines the doctor's true intentions as well as organizes the other patients into an escape team. When this fails, a little surprise takes place and the evil scheme unravels.Okay, so much of the plot sounds a bit familiar. Carradine has played mad scientists in at least 19,390 other cheap movies. Tor has the acting range of a sprig of spinach. Sure, the creatures look amazingly cheesy. Still, despite all this, the film is watchable and campy fun. While far from good, for lovers of bad movies, it's well worth seeing and not nearly as unwatchable as its current rating might imply.

John Carradine is one of those actors from a bygone era that seemed to look at acting as an actual job rather than something to do every now and then while living in multiple homes and living life of luxury. No, he seemed to go from one movie to another taking parts in really good films and really, really bad films. That being said, he has been in more than a couple of films that were featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000 and this was one of them. Not an entirely bad film, Red Zone Cuba was a much worse film that was featured on the show, this film is a bit slow paced even for a film that has a run time of just over an hour. Basically, just your typical mad scientist film that features a mad scientist, strange monsters and Tor Johnson as a sidekick named Lobo! Yes, Tor appeared as a sidekick named Lobo in like two other films other than this one, but while those two Lobo's were the same character, this one is a totally different Lobo...the distinction is apparently this one speaks. So, it has its moments and the film is upgraded a bit by John Carridine's performance, but overall, just seems like it needed a bit more going on.The story has a mansion that seems to be in the middle of nowhere, but near the end of the film seems to be right in the middle of the city housing special patients who seem to think they are there for some sort of mental health treatment. Unfortunately for them, the good doctor who resides in the house plans on using them for his experiments to prolong man's life to an eternity using a special gland that he apparently created or something. A man caught outside the mansion and who the doctor believes is an murder on the run ends up being recruited to be a part of the experiments, but this man seems to know something is not right and tries to uncover the truth.This made for a pretty good episode of MST3K as most films featuring Tor Johnson do. This film had not one, but two shorts which is a bit puzzling seeing as how the film ran 72 minutes which might merit the inclusion of one short, but not really two. Makes me wonder what they edited out of this one. A lot of the riffs in this one were geared to Tor Johnson's Lobo character and John Carridine's mansion that is just about the only place you see during the duration of this film.So, not a horrible film, but just kind of slow. I would not really want to see the film in its entirety as I cannot imagine it really adding anything to this film. What I did see seemed pretty cut and dry as it was a mad scientist using people as guinea pigs for his crazy experiments. You get to see people misshaped by his experiments and I like how they treat the one girl as if she is dead. It's like, "Oh my, she is now unattractive, let's just leave her here to rot because her life is now over." So if you want to see a film featuring strange experiments, a mad doctor and Tor as Lobo this film fits the bill! Along with like at least two other films...

This movie includes a number of distinguished actors playing excellent parts. John Carradine, for instance, plays a gaunt, furrow-faced scientist with a big booming authoritative scientisty voice. Myron Healy plays the mysterious Mark Houston, an average Joe who goes after the ladies with some of the lamest pick-up lines in existence ("Grace? Hmm, pretty name for a pretty girl.") The truly lovely Alison Hayes, she of the sensational chest, plays the aforementioned Grace, a knockout of a girl up to her eyeballs in emotional problems. Sally Todd, a beauty queen in real life, plays Natalie, a relatively well-adjusted knockout blonde who tragically gets turned into a smoked meat sculpture (not on purpose, of course). Marilyn Buferd is the cold, frustrated lady scientist who's carrying a torch for the gaunt furrow-faced scientist guy. Roy Gordon is the scientist-in-cahoots-with-the-other-scientists who looks like the guy on those Monopoly cards. Arthur Batanides is the neurotic palooka who spazzes out at the drop of a hat. Harry Fleer is Jedrow (_not_ Jethro), the hapless victim who looks like Abe Vigoda. And. of course, there's Tor Johnson, who's just his sweet, lovable, playful old self.With a cast like that, how can you go wrong?