THE DEVIL BAT (1940) Bela Lugosi, Suzanne Kaaren & Dave O'Brien | Horror, Sci-Fi | B&W

The Devil Bat is a 1940 black-and-white American horror film produced by Producers Releasing Corporation (PRC) and directed by Jean Yarborough. The film stars Bela Lugosi along with Suzanne Kaaren, Guy Usher, Yolande Mallott and the comic team of Dave O'Brien and Donald Kerr as the protagonists. It was the first horror film from PRC.

SYNOPSIS
In the small town of Heathville, Dr. Paul Carruthers, a brilliant yet embittered chemist, harbors a deep grudge against his employers who, in his view, have cheated him out of the fortune they earned from his work. Fueled by his resentment, Carruthers devises a sinister plan for revenge. He creates a special aftershave lotion that, when applied, attracts his latest creation—enormous, bloodthirsty bats he has bred and trained. Disguising the lotion as a "test product," Carruthers distributes it to his unsuspecting enemies, targeting the families of his former employers. One by one, his victims fall prey to the Devil Bats, their lives brutally ended by the creatures Carruthers controls.

As the death toll rises, a sharp-witted reporter, Johnny Layton, and his bumbling photographer, "One-Shot" McGuire, arrive in Heathville to investigate the mysterious killings. As they dig deeper, they begin to unravel the horrifying truth behind the murders. In a final twist, Layton cleverly uses Carruthers' own deadly creation against him, leading the bats to turn on their master. In the end, Carruthers meets a grim fate at the hands of his monstrous bats, and the town of Heathville is finally free from his reign of terror.

CAST & CREW
Bela Lugosi as Dr. Paul Carruthers
Suzanne Kaaren as Mary Heath
Dave O'Brien as Johnny Layton
Guy Usher as Henry Morton
Yolande Mallott as Maxine
Donald Kerr as "One-Shot" McGuire
Edward Mortimer as Martin Heath
Gene O'Donnell as Don Morton
Alan Baldwin as Tommy Heath
John Ellis as Roy Heath
Arthur Q. Bryan as Joe McGinty
Hal Price as Chief Wilkins
John Davidson as Prof. Raines
Billy Griffith as Coroner
Wally Rairdon as Walter King

Directed by: Jean Yarborough
Written by: John Thomas Neville (screenplay), George Bricker (original story)Produced by: Jack Gallagher
Cinematography by: Arthur Martinelli, A.S.C.
Edited by: Holbrook N. Todd
Music by: David Chudnow
Production Company: Producers Releasing Corporation
Distributed by: Producers Releasing Corporation
Release Date: December 13, 1940
Running Time: 68 minutes
Country: United States
Language: English

NOTES
PRC was a young studio when it planned to enter the horror film genre, which had been neglected by the major studios during 1937 and 1938. Lugosi was beginning a comeback when he signed a contract on October 19, 1940, with PRC's Sigmund Neufeld to star in the Poverty Row studio's first horror film.

The shooting of the film began a little more than one week later.[8] PRC was known for shooting its films quickly and cheaply, but for endowing them with a plentiful amount of horror, and The Devil Bat established this modus operandi.

Following its theatrical release, The Devil Bat fell into public domain and since the advent of home video, has been released in countless truncated, poorly edited video and DVD editions.