Description

The Corpse Vanishes is a 1942 American mystery film and horror film starring Bela Lugosi, directed by Wallace Fox, and written by Harvey Gates. Lugosi portrays a mad scientist who injects his aging wife (played by Elizabeth Russell (actress)) with fluids from virginal young brides in order to preserve her beauty. Luana Walters as a journalist and Tris Coffin as a small town doctor investigate and solve the disappearances of the brides. The film bears some resemblance to the real world story of Elizabeth Báthory, a 16th-century Hungarian countess and serial killer who was said to preserve her beauty by bathing in the blood of virginal young women.
The film was later the subject of a Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode.

Cast

• Bela Lugosi as Dr. Lorenz, a mad scientist trying to preserve his wife’s youth and beauty by injecting her with fluids removed from the bodies of young virginal brides
• Luana Walters as Patricia Hunter, a newspaper reporter investigating the disappearances of the brides
• Tris Coffin as Dr. Foster, a small town physician who aids Hunter during her investigations and eventually marries her
• Elizabeth Russell (actress) as Dr. Lorenz’s aged wife
• Minerva Urecal as Fagah, a crone and Dr. Lorenz’s servant
• Angelo Rossitto as Toby, Fagah’s son and a dwarf
• Frank Moran as Angel, Fagah’s son and a brutish half-wit
• George Eldredge as Mike, Lorenz’s henchman and the driver of his getaway car
• Joan Barclay as Alice Wentworth, a bride who becomes Lorenz’s victim
• Gwen Kenyon as Peggy, a nightclub cigarette girl who poses as a bride in Hunter’s scheme to trap Lorenz
• Kenneth Harlan as Keenan, a newspaper editor and Hunter’s boss
• Vince Barnett as Sandy, a newspaper photographer and Hunter’s colleague