TOWER OF LONDON (1939)
Article #559 by Dave Sindelar
Viewing date: 9-25-2002
Posting date: 2-18-2003

The story of Richard, the Duke of Gloucester and his rise to the throne of England via the use of machiavellian machinations and murder.

This historical drama covers the same ground as Shakespeare’s RICHARD III (“A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse”); it’s fairly entertaining and well-acted throughout. I think it falls just short of greatness because it isn’t really very memorable, and the final battle scene is a bit of a disappointment, though it does feature a good death scene for Karloff. It’s not a horror film despite the presence of Karloff and Vincent Price, though it does contain certain slight horror elements (Karloff is a torturer and executioner, and both him and Basil Rathbone’s Richard have physical deformities), but the presence of the three aformentioned actors does give it enough interest to horror fans to sneak the movie in through the back door, so to speak.