Harockerce What a beautiful movie!

Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

Lidia Draper Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Sarita Rafferty There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

snicewanger Despite its lurid title, Soul of a Monster is much less of a horror film and much more of a religious allegory. A saintly doctor, George Winston, nationally famous for his humanitarianism is dying and no power on earth is able to save him.Because of this his wife Ann has lost her faith in God. She calls on the dark powers to save him. A rather severe and intimidating women appears out of nowhere to save his life. Her entrance into the story is the eeriest and most mysterious part of the film. She arrives at the doctors deathbed with the claim that she can help him and takes over the situation . The woman calls herself Lilyan Gregg and she does bring about Winston's recovery. The doctor has recovered but he is a changed man. He seems to have lost his humanity. He no longer has any empathy with those whom he formerly cared for.He is now cold, aloft and unsympathetic. He comes to reject his wife and friends for a relationship with Lilyan.His wife Ann regrets her plea to the dark side to save her husbands from death for now she must battle Lilyan for his very soul.Anybody who watches Soul of a Monster to see a horror film is really going to be disappointed. It's a cleverly done fantasy film but hardly horrific.Rose Hobart was a talented actress and here she is quite effective as the Devils messenger. She is someone that seems to invite confrontation and she can intimidate just about anybody.Lilyan is the movies most watchable character.George Macready made a career out of playing egotistical, unscrupulous, slightly feminine men who played at being mentally superior but are actually weak and cowardly. I buy him as the soulless George Winston. It's him as the noble and saintly Dr Winston that I just can't picture.Soul of a Monster has a bit of the Devil and Daniel Webster and Cat People and even a bit of Frankenstein written into it's story.As I said Rose Hobart stands out and its her performance that makes the picture worth viewing. Erik Rolf plays Fred Stevens a family friend who is the conscience of the film. He is the Christian voice in the movie. Rolf always reminded me of Nils Asther. Soul of a Monster is really trying to sermonize about keeping faith in God and not losing morality in times of stress. It's not a terrible film but it ain't great either.

Michael_Elliott Soul of a Monster, The (1944) * (out of 4) Forgotten horror film from Columbia about a doctor on his deathbed whose wife prays, to good or evil, that he lives. He gets better thanks to a mysterious woman but what they don't know is that this woman put the soul of a monster into the doctor's body. There's a very good reason Columbia hasn't released this sucker on any home video format and that's because it's pretty damn bad. I took me three viewings before I could watch the entire film without falling asleep. The film tries very hard to recapture the mood and feel of a Val Lewton film but it fails on all levels.

John Seal Try as it might, this Columbia programmer just can't quite get over the hump. Even with George Macready and Rose Hobart heading the cast, there are too few scares and far, far too much walking. Rose walks (and almost gets hit by a car). George walks with a knife in his hand. Rose walks some more. Bland co-lead Jim Bannon even goes for a stroll. In fact, there's so much shoe leather burned in this film that I humbly offer Sole of a Monster as a more suitable title. It's all shot well by Burnett Guffey, and there IS a modicum of Lewton-style atmosphere, but the stifling straitjacket of Christian spirituality (not to mention the cheat ending) ultimately undoes whatever good work went into this production. An intriguing but ultimately disappointing failure.

MartinHafer I wanted to like this movie, as it is a B-movie monster film--just the sort of entertaining bit of fluff I love to watch!! Unfortunately, despite a great premise and an excellent start, the movie was undone by lousy and very heavy-handed script writing.George Macready played a saintly doctor was on his deathbed. His distraught wife is angry that such a good and selfless man should die so young and she rejects assurances and platitudes from a friend that he's "going on to a better place". And, in a weak moment, she announces that she wants her husband well and could care less who could help--be it Heaven or Hell. Well, not unexpectedly, he DID recover--thanks to a strange woman who appears and magically heals him. Unfortunately, as the film progresses, she turns out to be evil (though exactly WHO she is working for is never revealed) and she is able to control Macready with her evil mind!!! Now all this seemed great except for two problems. Despite her voice appearing in his head with instructions to kill, Macready never really got around to doing that much evil--and he never did icepick victims like the voice commanded. However, much worse was the ultra-heavy-handed moralizing that accompanied this. It seemed like all the fun was missing from the script and it was just a very preachy message about good versus evil--and not in a good way. It was almost like combining "Davey and Goliath" with a 1940s horror film--with much more emphasis on the Davey and Goliath aspects. It was embarrassing bad--so bad I nearly turned off the film. A low budget does NOT mean that a film must be dull or poorly constructed. Don't let this film turn you off the genre!Also, I read through the mostly VERY favorable reviews for this film and this left me baffled. Sure, I could understand a person liking this film (we all have different tastes), but to say this small film deserves a rating of 9 or 10 is madness! Even the truly great films like THE BLACK CAT, THE MUMMY and BRIDE OF FRANKENSTEIN have many reviews that were scored much lower than this!!! The overall IMDb score of 4.9 would NOT indicate that this is a 9 or 10. Such super-high scores should be reserved for only the great films--not run of the mill "cheapie" films like this.