The Self-Destruction Of A Closet Case!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                       Really, darlings, as one of my more learned readers pointed out, the homosexuality in 1958's "How To Make A Monster is far from subtextual, it is clearly overt.

                                         Consider--

                                          Peter Dumond (the great Robert H, Harris), and his assistant, Rivero (Paul Brinegar) have worked together for twenty-five years.  Even before Dumond, goes psycho, it is plain he likes being dominant to Rivero, (who I think is lonely and asexual, rather than gay) and then look out for the tender way he handles the Teenage Frankenstein and Werewolf actors (Gary Clarke and Gary Clarke).  When he invites them to his home--oh, girls, let's face it, is about much more than showing his collection-- though his obsessively calling his make-up creations "his children" clearly is a way to repress his homosexual desires.  Creativity has been a sexual repressor since the beginning of Time.

                                            Drumond is sympathetic when let go, but when termination unleashes psychotic impulses, he loses that, until the end when he is burnt to death, screaming, "I must save my children."  There is seen the lifelong consequence of being a closet case--lovelessness.

                                                AIP was really pushing the envelope with this one, and it is amazing, to me, how much they got away with.  I only wish Rivero had not been killed; he was a true innocent.  Special needs, maybe, but harmless.  I disliked Dumond for this, too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

                                                  It takes several viewings to appreciate this film beyond its campy aspects.  But once the viewer gleans other things at work here, it may not be artistic, but it turns out to be more intelligently written than most film of this type.

                                                     All this, and Cucumbo too, darlings!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!